Iraq’s Yazidis take on Daesh in Sinjar
Kurdish Peshmerga forces enter the northern Iraqi town of Sinjar after pushing out Daesh
Iraqi Izadi [Yazidi] Kurds along with tribal fighters have severed a major supply line by liberating a border area with Syria in the northern region of Sinjar.
According to an Iraqi military statement broadcast on Friday, the group of fighters retook the Um al-Diban and Um Jurais districts located close to the Syrian border following clashes with Daesh.
Meanwhile, Major General Ismail Mahalawi, from Anbar Operations Command, announced that three Daesh hideouts had been destroyed close to the central Iraqi city of Ramadi.
“The air force, in coordination with the Tenth Division, managed to destroy three shelters for Daesh east of Albu Obeid area east of Ramadi, killing all the Daesh members who were in them,” he said.
He added that a total of 67 explosive devices were also located by military engineers and destroyed in areas to the east and north of the city.
Earlier, Iraqi government troops liberated the town of Kubaysah in the conflict-ridden western province of Anbar.
The fresh gains follow the commencement of a military operation to recapture the country’s second-largest city of Mosul in the north from Daesh.
Home to around two million people before its capture, Mosul fell to the extremist militants in the earliest days of the assault. The Iraqi army has been fighting to liberate Daesh-held regions with the help of volunteer forces.
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Yazidi UPDATES genocide has occurred and is ongoing
Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Sat Mar 26, 2016 12:40 pm
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Fri Apr 01, 2016 6:46 pm
53 more Êzîdîs freed from ISIS
After the recent liberation from ISIS of 51 Êzidî Kurds in the village of Medban as part of the 'Operation Vengeance for Martyrs of Shilo', 53 more Êzidî people have been rescued from ISIS thugs and reunited with their families.
A group of 12 women and 41 children from 12 Êzidî families were returned to Mount Shengal yesterday evening after being rescued from ISIS thugs.
The freed civilias were welcomed by a long convoy in Shengal and were reunited with their families in the headquarters of the Shengal Resistance Units (YBŞ).
After the recent liberation from ISIS of 51 Êzidî Kurds in the village of Medban as part of the 'Operation Vengeance for Martyrs of Shilo', 53 more Êzidî people have been rescued from ISIS thugs and reunited with their families.
A group of 12 women and 41 children from 12 Êzidî families were returned to Mount Shengal yesterday evening after being rescued from ISIS thugs.
The freed civilias were welcomed by a long convoy in Shengal and were reunited with their families in the headquarters of the Shengal Resistance Units (YBŞ).
My Name Is KURDISTAN And I Will Be FREE
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Anthea - Shaswar
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Sat Apr 02, 2016 9:14 pm
New York Times
To Maintain Supply of Sex Slaves, ISIS Pushes Birth Control
Locked inside a room where the only furniture was a bed, the 16-year-old learned to fear the sunset, because nightfall started the countdown to her next rape.
During the year she was held by the Islamic State, she spent her days dreading the smell of the ISIS fighter’s breath, the disgusting sounds he made and the pain he inflicted on her body. More than anything, she was tormented by the thought she might become pregnant with her rapist’s child.
It was the one thing she needn’t have worried about.
Soon after buying her, the fighter brought the teenage girl a round box containing four strips of pills, one of them colored red.
“Every day, I had to swallow one in front of him. He gave me one box per month. When I ran out, he replaced it. When I was sold from one man to another, the box of pills came with me,” explained the girl, who learned only months later that she was being given birth control.
It is a particularly modern solution to a medieval injunction: According to an obscure ruling in Islamic law cited by the Islamic State, a man must ensure that the woman he enslaves is free of child before having intercourse with her.
Islamic State leaders have made sexual slavery as they believe it was practiced during the Prophet Muhammad’s time integral to the group’s operations, preying on the women and girls the group captured from the Yazidi religious minority almost two years ago. To keep the sex trade running, the fighters have aggressively pushed birth control on their victims so they can continue the abuse unabated while the women are passed among them.
More than three dozen Yazidi women who recently escaped the Islamic State and who agreed to be interviewed for this article described the numerous methods the fighters used to avoid pregnancy, including oral and injectable contraception, and sometimes both. In at least one case, a woman was forced to have an abortion in order to make her available for sex, and others were pressured to do so.
Some described how they knew they were about to be sold when they were driven to a hospital to give a urine sample to be tested for the hCG hormone, whose presence indicates pregnancy. They awaited their results with apprehension: A positive test would mean they were carrying their abuser’s child; a negative result would allow Islamic State fighters to continue raping them.
The rules have not been universally followed, with many women describing being assaulted by men who were either ignorant of the injunction or defiant of it. But over all, the methodical use of birth control during at least some of the women’s captivity explains what doctors caring for recent escapees observed: Of the more than 700 rape victims from the Yazidi ethnic group who have sought treatment so far at a United Nations-backed clinic in northern Iraq, just 5 percent became pregnant during their enslavement, according to Dr. Nagham Nawzat, the gynecologist carrying out the examinations.
It is a stunningly low figure given that the normal fertility rate for a young woman is between 20 percent and 25 percent in any given month, four to five times the rate that has been recorded so far, said Dr. Nezar Ismet Taib, who heads the Ministry of Health Directorate in Dohuk, which oversees the clinic where the victims are being treated.
“We were expecting something much higher,” he said.
The captured teenage girl, who agreed to be identified by her first initial, M., has the demeanor of a child and wears her hair in a bouncy ponytail. She was sold a total of seven times. When prospective buyers came to inquire about her, she overheard them asking for assurances that she was not pregnant, and her owner provided the box of birth control as proof.
That was not enough for the third man who bought her, she said. He quizzed her on the date of her last menstrual cycle and, unnerved by what he perceived as a delay, gave her a version of the so-called morning-after pill, causing her to start bleeding.
Even then, he seemed unsatisfied.
Finally he came into her room, closed the door and ordered her to lower her pants. The teenager feared she was about to be raped. Instead he pulled out a syringe and gave her a shot on her upper thigh. It was a 150-milligram dose of Depo-Provera, an injectable contraceptive, a box of which she showed to a reporter.
“To make sure you don’t get pregnant,” she recalled him saying.
When he had finished, he pushed her back onto the bed and raped her for the first time.
Ensuring Availability
Thousands of women and girls from the Yazidi minority remain captives of the Islamic State, after the jihadists overran their ancestral homeland on Mount Sinjar on Aug. 3, 2014. In the months since then, hundreds have managed to escape, returning to a community now living in tents in the plains of the yellow massif, hours from their former homes.
Many of the women interviewed for this article were initially reached through Yazidi community leaders, and gave their consent. All the underage rape victims who agreed to speak were interviewed alongside members of their family.
In its official publications, the Islamic State has stated that it is legal for a man to rape the women he enslaves under just about any circumstance. Even sex with a child is permissible, according to a pamphlet published by the group. The injunction against raping a pregnant slave is functionally the only protection for the captured women.
The Islamic State cites centuries-old rulings stating that the owner of a female slave can have sex with her only after she has undergone istibra’ — “the process of ensuring that the womb is empty,” according to the Princeton University professor Bernard Haykel, one of several experts on Islamic law consulted on the topic. The purpose of this is to guarantee there is no confusion over a child’s paternity.
Most of the Sunni scholars who ruled on the issue argued that the requirement could be met by respecting a period of sexual abstinence whenever the captive changes hands, proposing a duration of at least one menstrual cycle, according to Brill’s Encyclopedia of Islam.
In its own manual, the Islamic State outlines the abstinence method as one option. But it also quotes the minority opinion of a Tunisian cleric who in the 1100s argued that it was enough to fulfill merely the spirit of the law. That opens the way for other means, including modern medicine, to circumvent the waiting period.
A total of 37 women abducted by the Islamic State who agreed to be interviewed over three trips to northern Iraq described an uneven system: Some fighters insisted on double and even triple forms of contraception, while others violated the guidelines entirely. Although it remains unclear why some hewed closely to the regulations while others flouted them, one emerging pattern was that women held by senior commanders were more likely to be given contraception, in contrast to those held by junior fighters, who perhaps were less versed on the rules.
J., an 18-year-old, said she had been sold to the Islamic State’s governor of Tal Afar, a city in northern Iraq. “Each month, he made me get a shot. It was his assistant who took me to the hospital,” said J., who was interviewed alongside her mother, after escaping this year.
“On top of that he also gave me birth control pills. He told me, ‘We don’t want you to get pregnant,’” she said.
When she was sold to a more junior fighter in the Syrian city of Tal Barak, it was the man’s mother who escorted her to the hospital.
“She told me, ‘If you are pregnant, we are going to send you back,’” J. said. “They took me into the lab. There were machines that looked like centrifuges and other contraptions. They drew three vials of my blood. About 30 or 40 minutes later, they came back to say I wasn’t pregnant.”
The fighter’s mother triumphantly told her son that the 18-year-old was not pregnant, validating his right to rape her, which he did repeatedly.
When that fighter tired of her, he gave her as a gift to his brother. Yet the brother did not take her back to have another blood test, forcing her to have sex without ascertaining whether she was carrying another man’s child. Several other women reported a similar set of circumstances, including being given birth control by some of their owners but not by others.
However, the low pregnancy rate, say medical professionals, is evidence that the rules intended to avoid pregnancy were more likely to have been applied than not.
In his office in Dohuk’s Ministry of Health Directorate, Dr. Taib, the physician tasked with overseeing the treatment of the hundreds of victims, was initially puzzled by the low pregnancy rate.
In other conflicts where rape has been used as a weapon of war, it has led to waves of unwanted pregnancies — either because the attackers did not use birth control or, as was the case in the former Yugoslavia, because they purposefully tried to impregnate their victims. One medical study of 68 Croatian and Bosnian rape victims found that 29 had become pregnant.
With more than 700 cases of rape recorded so far, Dr. Taib’s center has treated only 35 pregnancies. He expected to see at least 140. “Even higher than that, if you consider that these women had multiple partners and were raped every day over many months,” Dr. Taib said.
“I concluded that either they did an abortion before they came back or they used contraception. And if there were abortions, then there would have been physical signs,” which would have been noted by the gynecologist treating the returnees, he said. “There were no signs.”
A Fragile Protection
The prohibition surrounding pregnancy is perhaps the only instance when the codes that the jihadists were applying lined up with the concerns of their victims, who dreaded carrying their rapists’ children.
Ahlam, a middle-aged woman who was kidnapped with her six children, said she had been not raped because she had been deemed unattractive. Because she spoke Arabic, the Islamic State used her as an interpreter.
One day, she was asked to chaperone a group of young Yazidi women to the hospital in Tal Afar, where each woman was given 150 milligrams of Depo-Provera.
Over the months that followed, she said, she escorted in all around 30 victims to get the injection both in Tal Afar and later in the Iraqi city of Mosul. Twice she was asked to escort her own teenage daughter, who was raped by multiple fighters.
She explained the conflicted feelings she had at the time. “ISIS took our girls as slaves, only for sex,” Ahlam said, but the insistence on birth control brought some relief. “No one wants to carry the child of their enemy.”
Others described how the fighters so opposed pregnancy that some tried to force young women to abort.
Abdal Ali said his sister, 20, was in her second trimester at the time of her capture in 2014. Still, one commander so urgently wanted her as his slave that he tried to end the pregnancy by giving her pills that would cause her to miscarry.
“She hid them under her tongue, and then when they weren’t looking, she spit them out,” said Mr. Ali, who related the story on behalf of his sister because she is undergoing medical treatment abroad for the injuries she suffered. “They wanted to get rid of the child so that they could use the woman.”
A 20-year-old who asked to be identified only as H. began to feel nauseated soon after her abduction. “The smell of rice made me gag,” she said.
Already pregnant at the time of her capture, she considered herself one of the fortunate ones. For almost two months, H. was moved from location to location and held in locked rooms, but she was spared the abuse that was by then befalling most of the young women held alongside her.
Despite being repeatedly forced to give a urine sample and always testing positive, she, too, was eventually picked.
Her owner took her to a house, shared by another couple. When the couple was present, he did not approach her, suggesting he knew it was illegal. Only when the couple left did he forcibly have sex with her, and when he did he appeared drugged.
“I was telling him: ‘I’m pregnant. In your book it says that you can’t do this.’ He had bloodshot eyes. He acted like he was high,” she said.
Eventually he drove her to a hospital with the aim of making her have an abortion, and flew into a rage when she refused the surgery, repeatedly punching her in the stomach. Even so, his behavior suggested he was ashamed: He never told the doctors that he wanted H. to abort, instead imploring her to ask for the procedure herself.
When he drove her home, she waited until he left and then threw herself over the property’s wall. “My knees were bleeding. I was dizzy. I almost couldn’t walk,” she said.
Weeks later, with the help of smugglers hired by her family, she was spirited out of Islamic State territory. Her belly was sticking so far out that she could no longer see her toes when she finally crossed to safety.
Her first child, a healthy baby boy, was born two months later.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/13/world ... .html?_r=0
To Maintain Supply of Sex Slaves, ISIS Pushes Birth Control
Locked inside a room where the only furniture was a bed, the 16-year-old learned to fear the sunset, because nightfall started the countdown to her next rape.
During the year she was held by the Islamic State, she spent her days dreading the smell of the ISIS fighter’s breath, the disgusting sounds he made and the pain he inflicted on her body. More than anything, she was tormented by the thought she might become pregnant with her rapist’s child.
It was the one thing she needn’t have worried about.
Soon after buying her, the fighter brought the teenage girl a round box containing four strips of pills, one of them colored red.
“Every day, I had to swallow one in front of him. He gave me one box per month. When I ran out, he replaced it. When I was sold from one man to another, the box of pills came with me,” explained the girl, who learned only months later that she was being given birth control.
It is a particularly modern solution to a medieval injunction: According to an obscure ruling in Islamic law cited by the Islamic State, a man must ensure that the woman he enslaves is free of child before having intercourse with her.
Islamic State leaders have made sexual slavery as they believe it was practiced during the Prophet Muhammad’s time integral to the group’s operations, preying on the women and girls the group captured from the Yazidi religious minority almost two years ago. To keep the sex trade running, the fighters have aggressively pushed birth control on their victims so they can continue the abuse unabated while the women are passed among them.
More than three dozen Yazidi women who recently escaped the Islamic State and who agreed to be interviewed for this article described the numerous methods the fighters used to avoid pregnancy, including oral and injectable contraception, and sometimes both. In at least one case, a woman was forced to have an abortion in order to make her available for sex, and others were pressured to do so.
Some described how they knew they were about to be sold when they were driven to a hospital to give a urine sample to be tested for the hCG hormone, whose presence indicates pregnancy. They awaited their results with apprehension: A positive test would mean they were carrying their abuser’s child; a negative result would allow Islamic State fighters to continue raping them.
The rules have not been universally followed, with many women describing being assaulted by men who were either ignorant of the injunction or defiant of it. But over all, the methodical use of birth control during at least some of the women’s captivity explains what doctors caring for recent escapees observed: Of the more than 700 rape victims from the Yazidi ethnic group who have sought treatment so far at a United Nations-backed clinic in northern Iraq, just 5 percent became pregnant during their enslavement, according to Dr. Nagham Nawzat, the gynecologist carrying out the examinations.
It is a stunningly low figure given that the normal fertility rate for a young woman is between 20 percent and 25 percent in any given month, four to five times the rate that has been recorded so far, said Dr. Nezar Ismet Taib, who heads the Ministry of Health Directorate in Dohuk, which oversees the clinic where the victims are being treated.
“We were expecting something much higher,” he said.
The captured teenage girl, who agreed to be identified by her first initial, M., has the demeanor of a child and wears her hair in a bouncy ponytail. She was sold a total of seven times. When prospective buyers came to inquire about her, she overheard them asking for assurances that she was not pregnant, and her owner provided the box of birth control as proof.
That was not enough for the third man who bought her, she said. He quizzed her on the date of her last menstrual cycle and, unnerved by what he perceived as a delay, gave her a version of the so-called morning-after pill, causing her to start bleeding.
Even then, he seemed unsatisfied.
Finally he came into her room, closed the door and ordered her to lower her pants. The teenager feared she was about to be raped. Instead he pulled out a syringe and gave her a shot on her upper thigh. It was a 150-milligram dose of Depo-Provera, an injectable contraceptive, a box of which she showed to a reporter.
“To make sure you don’t get pregnant,” she recalled him saying.
When he had finished, he pushed her back onto the bed and raped her for the first time.
Ensuring Availability
Thousands of women and girls from the Yazidi minority remain captives of the Islamic State, after the jihadists overran their ancestral homeland on Mount Sinjar on Aug. 3, 2014. In the months since then, hundreds have managed to escape, returning to a community now living in tents in the plains of the yellow massif, hours from their former homes.
Many of the women interviewed for this article were initially reached through Yazidi community leaders, and gave their consent. All the underage rape victims who agreed to speak were interviewed alongside members of their family.
In its official publications, the Islamic State has stated that it is legal for a man to rape the women he enslaves under just about any circumstance. Even sex with a child is permissible, according to a pamphlet published by the group. The injunction against raping a pregnant slave is functionally the only protection for the captured women.
The Islamic State cites centuries-old rulings stating that the owner of a female slave can have sex with her only after she has undergone istibra’ — “the process of ensuring that the womb is empty,” according to the Princeton University professor Bernard Haykel, one of several experts on Islamic law consulted on the topic. The purpose of this is to guarantee there is no confusion over a child’s paternity.
Most of the Sunni scholars who ruled on the issue argued that the requirement could be met by respecting a period of sexual abstinence whenever the captive changes hands, proposing a duration of at least one menstrual cycle, according to Brill’s Encyclopedia of Islam.
In its own manual, the Islamic State outlines the abstinence method as one option. But it also quotes the minority opinion of a Tunisian cleric who in the 1100s argued that it was enough to fulfill merely the spirit of the law. That opens the way for other means, including modern medicine, to circumvent the waiting period.
A total of 37 women abducted by the Islamic State who agreed to be interviewed over three trips to northern Iraq described an uneven system: Some fighters insisted on double and even triple forms of contraception, while others violated the guidelines entirely. Although it remains unclear why some hewed closely to the regulations while others flouted them, one emerging pattern was that women held by senior commanders were more likely to be given contraception, in contrast to those held by junior fighters, who perhaps were less versed on the rules.
J., an 18-year-old, said she had been sold to the Islamic State’s governor of Tal Afar, a city in northern Iraq. “Each month, he made me get a shot. It was his assistant who took me to the hospital,” said J., who was interviewed alongside her mother, after escaping this year.
“On top of that he also gave me birth control pills. He told me, ‘We don’t want you to get pregnant,’” she said.
When she was sold to a more junior fighter in the Syrian city of Tal Barak, it was the man’s mother who escorted her to the hospital.
“She told me, ‘If you are pregnant, we are going to send you back,’” J. said. “They took me into the lab. There were machines that looked like centrifuges and other contraptions. They drew three vials of my blood. About 30 or 40 minutes later, they came back to say I wasn’t pregnant.”
The fighter’s mother triumphantly told her son that the 18-year-old was not pregnant, validating his right to rape her, which he did repeatedly.
When that fighter tired of her, he gave her as a gift to his brother. Yet the brother did not take her back to have another blood test, forcing her to have sex without ascertaining whether she was carrying another man’s child. Several other women reported a similar set of circumstances, including being given birth control by some of their owners but not by others.
However, the low pregnancy rate, say medical professionals, is evidence that the rules intended to avoid pregnancy were more likely to have been applied than not.
In his office in Dohuk’s Ministry of Health Directorate, Dr. Taib, the physician tasked with overseeing the treatment of the hundreds of victims, was initially puzzled by the low pregnancy rate.
In other conflicts where rape has been used as a weapon of war, it has led to waves of unwanted pregnancies — either because the attackers did not use birth control or, as was the case in the former Yugoslavia, because they purposefully tried to impregnate their victims. One medical study of 68 Croatian and Bosnian rape victims found that 29 had become pregnant.
With more than 700 cases of rape recorded so far, Dr. Taib’s center has treated only 35 pregnancies. He expected to see at least 140. “Even higher than that, if you consider that these women had multiple partners and were raped every day over many months,” Dr. Taib said.
“I concluded that either they did an abortion before they came back or they used contraception. And if there were abortions, then there would have been physical signs,” which would have been noted by the gynecologist treating the returnees, he said. “There were no signs.”
A Fragile Protection
The prohibition surrounding pregnancy is perhaps the only instance when the codes that the jihadists were applying lined up with the concerns of their victims, who dreaded carrying their rapists’ children.
Ahlam, a middle-aged woman who was kidnapped with her six children, said she had been not raped because she had been deemed unattractive. Because she spoke Arabic, the Islamic State used her as an interpreter.
One day, she was asked to chaperone a group of young Yazidi women to the hospital in Tal Afar, where each woman was given 150 milligrams of Depo-Provera.
Over the months that followed, she said, she escorted in all around 30 victims to get the injection both in Tal Afar and later in the Iraqi city of Mosul. Twice she was asked to escort her own teenage daughter, who was raped by multiple fighters.
She explained the conflicted feelings she had at the time. “ISIS took our girls as slaves, only for sex,” Ahlam said, but the insistence on birth control brought some relief. “No one wants to carry the child of their enemy.”
Others described how the fighters so opposed pregnancy that some tried to force young women to abort.
Abdal Ali said his sister, 20, was in her second trimester at the time of her capture in 2014. Still, one commander so urgently wanted her as his slave that he tried to end the pregnancy by giving her pills that would cause her to miscarry.
“She hid them under her tongue, and then when they weren’t looking, she spit them out,” said Mr. Ali, who related the story on behalf of his sister because she is undergoing medical treatment abroad for the injuries she suffered. “They wanted to get rid of the child so that they could use the woman.”
A 20-year-old who asked to be identified only as H. began to feel nauseated soon after her abduction. “The smell of rice made me gag,” she said.
Already pregnant at the time of her capture, she considered herself one of the fortunate ones. For almost two months, H. was moved from location to location and held in locked rooms, but she was spared the abuse that was by then befalling most of the young women held alongside her.
Despite being repeatedly forced to give a urine sample and always testing positive, she, too, was eventually picked.
Her owner took her to a house, shared by another couple. When the couple was present, he did not approach her, suggesting he knew it was illegal. Only when the couple left did he forcibly have sex with her, and when he did he appeared drugged.
“I was telling him: ‘I’m pregnant. In your book it says that you can’t do this.’ He had bloodshot eyes. He acted like he was high,” she said.
Eventually he drove her to a hospital with the aim of making her have an abortion, and flew into a rage when she refused the surgery, repeatedly punching her in the stomach. Even so, his behavior suggested he was ashamed: He never told the doctors that he wanted H. to abort, instead imploring her to ask for the procedure herself.
When he drove her home, she waited until he left and then threw herself over the property’s wall. “My knees were bleeding. I was dizzy. I almost couldn’t walk,” she said.
Weeks later, with the help of smugglers hired by her family, she was spirited out of Islamic State territory. Her belly was sticking so far out that she could no longer see her toes when she finally crossed to safety.
Her first child, a healthy baby boy, was born two months later.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/13/world ... .html?_r=0
My Name Is KURDISTAN And I Will Be FREE
-
Anthea - Shaswar
- Donator
- Posts: 31601
- Images: 1151
- Joined: Thu Oct 18, 2012 2:13 pm
- Location: Sitting in front of computer
- Highscores: 3
- Arcade winning challenges: 6
- Has thanked: 6019 times
- Been thanked: 746 times
- Nationality: Kurd by heart
Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Sun Apr 03, 2016 7:45 pm
ARA News
Yezidi fighters of YBŞ repel ISIS attack near Shingal, kill over 30 jihadis
Kurdish Yezidi fighters of the Shingal Resistance Units (YBŞ) repelled an offensive led by militants of the Islamic State (ISIS) in Iraq’s western areas of Sinjar (Shingal) on Saturday, killing scores of ISIS extremists and wounding dozens more, local and official sources reported.
Iraqi official sources confirmed that at least 32 ISIS militants have been killed in clashes with the YBŞ fighters and allied groups in the Yezidi region of Sinjar in northern Iraq.
Also, local sources reported that the YBŞ [local Yezidi fighters], backed by allied fighters from the Nawader al-Shammar, were able to repel an ISIS-led attack and kill dozens of jihadis.
The hardline group launched an offensive on the Yezidi areas in a bid to recapture positions in western Sinjar it lost earlier, according to local sources.
“The YBŞ and allied Arab group of Nawader al-Shammar have pushed ISIS back after clashes in the western suburbs of Nineveh,” Iraqi MP and representative of the Nineveh province, Abdul Rahim al-Shammari, said in an official statement on Saturday.
The MP pointed out the local forces caused the hardline group heavy losses in manpower and equipment.
Speaking to ARA News in Shingal (Sinjar), YBŞ member Saleh Jimmeh said that military confrontations continue between the local forces and ISIS militants, especially in the areas near Baaj and Tal Afar.
Over the past few days, the US-led coalition forces conducted dozens of air raids on ISIS headquarters in the vicinity of Sinjar.
The Nawader al-Shammar group, affiliated with the Arab clan of Shammar, is mainly based in Rabia town and the areas adjacent to the Iraqi-Syrian border. It was formed after ISIS’s control over Mosul city in order to protect their areas from any possible attacks by the radical group.
In August 2014, ISIS extremists had taken control of Shingal, causing a mass displacement of nearly 400,000 Yezidi civilians towards Duhok and Erbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan. Tens of thousands of Yezidis remained trapped in Mount Sinjar, suffering mass killings, kidnappings and rape at the hands of ISIS extremists. Also, more than 3000 Yezidi women have been taken by the radical group as sex slaves.
Backed by the U.S.-led coalition’s air cover, the Yezidi region of Shingal was liberated in November 2015 at the hands of the Kurdish Peshmerga army after more than a year of ISIS occupation.
After ISIS departure, the Kurdish forces have discovered several mass graves in Shingal. Most of the victims were women and children from the Yezidi minority. Specialized teams, that have been inspecting traces of the people disappeared during the group’s rule over the Yezidi-populated region, have so far discovered five mass graves belonging to Yezidi civilians, according to human rights activists and Peshmerga officials who spoke to ARA News.
http://aranews.net/2016/04/yezidi-fight ... 0-jihadis/
Yezidi fighters of YBŞ repel ISIS attack near Shingal, kill over 30 jihadis
Kurdish Yezidi fighters of the Shingal Resistance Units (YBŞ) repelled an offensive led by militants of the Islamic State (ISIS) in Iraq’s western areas of Sinjar (Shingal) on Saturday, killing scores of ISIS extremists and wounding dozens more, local and official sources reported.
Iraqi official sources confirmed that at least 32 ISIS militants have been killed in clashes with the YBŞ fighters and allied groups in the Yezidi region of Sinjar in northern Iraq.
Also, local sources reported that the YBŞ [local Yezidi fighters], backed by allied fighters from the Nawader al-Shammar, were able to repel an ISIS-led attack and kill dozens of jihadis.
The hardline group launched an offensive on the Yezidi areas in a bid to recapture positions in western Sinjar it lost earlier, according to local sources.
“The YBŞ and allied Arab group of Nawader al-Shammar have pushed ISIS back after clashes in the western suburbs of Nineveh,” Iraqi MP and representative of the Nineveh province, Abdul Rahim al-Shammari, said in an official statement on Saturday.
The MP pointed out the local forces caused the hardline group heavy losses in manpower and equipment.
Speaking to ARA News in Shingal (Sinjar), YBŞ member Saleh Jimmeh said that military confrontations continue between the local forces and ISIS militants, especially in the areas near Baaj and Tal Afar.
Over the past few days, the US-led coalition forces conducted dozens of air raids on ISIS headquarters in the vicinity of Sinjar.
The Nawader al-Shammar group, affiliated with the Arab clan of Shammar, is mainly based in Rabia town and the areas adjacent to the Iraqi-Syrian border. It was formed after ISIS’s control over Mosul city in order to protect their areas from any possible attacks by the radical group.
In August 2014, ISIS extremists had taken control of Shingal, causing a mass displacement of nearly 400,000 Yezidi civilians towards Duhok and Erbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan. Tens of thousands of Yezidis remained trapped in Mount Sinjar, suffering mass killings, kidnappings and rape at the hands of ISIS extremists. Also, more than 3000 Yezidi women have been taken by the radical group as sex slaves.
Backed by the U.S.-led coalition’s air cover, the Yezidi region of Shingal was liberated in November 2015 at the hands of the Kurdish Peshmerga army after more than a year of ISIS occupation.
After ISIS departure, the Kurdish forces have discovered several mass graves in Shingal. Most of the victims were women and children from the Yezidi minority. Specialized teams, that have been inspecting traces of the people disappeared during the group’s rule over the Yezidi-populated region, have so far discovered five mass graves belonging to Yezidi civilians, according to human rights activists and Peshmerga officials who spoke to ARA News.
http://aranews.net/2016/04/yezidi-fight ... 0-jihadis/
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Mon Apr 04, 2016 4:20 pm
Arab refugees in Greece are attacking Yazidi refugees screaming (Allah akber) in Greek (Thssaloniki) camp
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Thu Apr 07, 2016 8:07 am
Human Rights Watch calls for release of Yezidi women
The extremist armed group of Islamic State (ISIS) should urgently release Yezidi women and girls abducted since 2014, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday. According to statistics, at least 1,800 Yezidi women and girls are still in ISIS-hands.
“The longer they are held by ISIS, the more horrific life becomes for Yezidi women, bought and sold, brutally raped, their children torn from them,” said Skye Wheeler, women’s rights emergencies researcher at Human Rights Watch.
According to officials of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria continue to hold about 1,800 abducted Yezidi women and girls.
The United Nations has cited allegations, based on Yezidi officials’ estimates, that as many as 3,500 people remained in ISIS captivity as of October 2015.
“Many of the abuses, including torture, sexual slavery, and arbitrary detention, would be war crimes if committed in the context of the armed conflict, or crimes against humanity if they were part of ISIS policy during a systematic or widespread attack on the civilian population,” the HRW said.
The UN Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights said in March 2015 that ISIS may have committed genocide against the Yezidis in August 2014.
“The abuses against Yezidi women and girls documented by Human Rights Watch, including the practice of abducting women and girls and forcibly converting them to Islam and/or forcibly marrying them to ISIS members, may be part of a genocide against Yezidis,” HRW said.
“Women also reported ISIS members taking their children from them, physically abusing their children, and forcing them to pray or take Islamic names.”
“ISIS attacks on women and girls, especially Yezidis, have created a new and terrifying crisis for women and girls in the region,” Wheeler said. “One way Iraq’s government can help these women is to change its laws and policies to better protect all women who have been subjected to rape.”
In August 2014, ISIS extremists had taken control of the Yezidi Shingal district in northern Iraq, causing a mass displacement of nearly 400,000 people. Tens of thousands of Yezidi Kurds remained trapped in Mount Sinjar, suffering mass killings, kidnappings and rape at the hands of ISIS militants. Also, more than 3000 Yezidi girls have been taken by the radical group as sex slaves.
The Kurdish Peshmerga troops regained control of the Yezidi Shingal region in November of 2015, after fierce battles against ISIS. The Kurdish forces have recently discovered more than five mass graves in the Yezidi region, where hundreds of Yezidi civilians have been summarily executed and buried by ISIS jihadis.
http://aranews.net/2016/04/human-rights ... idi-women/
The extremist armed group of Islamic State (ISIS) should urgently release Yezidi women and girls abducted since 2014, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday. According to statistics, at least 1,800 Yezidi women and girls are still in ISIS-hands.
“The longer they are held by ISIS, the more horrific life becomes for Yezidi women, bought and sold, brutally raped, their children torn from them,” said Skye Wheeler, women’s rights emergencies researcher at Human Rights Watch.
According to officials of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria continue to hold about 1,800 abducted Yezidi women and girls.
The United Nations has cited allegations, based on Yezidi officials’ estimates, that as many as 3,500 people remained in ISIS captivity as of October 2015.
“Many of the abuses, including torture, sexual slavery, and arbitrary detention, would be war crimes if committed in the context of the armed conflict, or crimes against humanity if they were part of ISIS policy during a systematic or widespread attack on the civilian population,” the HRW said.
The UN Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights said in March 2015 that ISIS may have committed genocide against the Yezidis in August 2014.
“The abuses against Yezidi women and girls documented by Human Rights Watch, including the practice of abducting women and girls and forcibly converting them to Islam and/or forcibly marrying them to ISIS members, may be part of a genocide against Yezidis,” HRW said.
“Women also reported ISIS members taking their children from them, physically abusing their children, and forcing them to pray or take Islamic names.”
“ISIS attacks on women and girls, especially Yezidis, have created a new and terrifying crisis for women and girls in the region,” Wheeler said. “One way Iraq’s government can help these women is to change its laws and policies to better protect all women who have been subjected to rape.”
In August 2014, ISIS extremists had taken control of the Yezidi Shingal district in northern Iraq, causing a mass displacement of nearly 400,000 people. Tens of thousands of Yezidi Kurds remained trapped in Mount Sinjar, suffering mass killings, kidnappings and rape at the hands of ISIS militants. Also, more than 3000 Yezidi girls have been taken by the radical group as sex slaves.
The Kurdish Peshmerga troops regained control of the Yezidi Shingal region in November of 2015, after fierce battles against ISIS. The Kurdish forces have recently discovered more than five mass graves in the Yezidi region, where hundreds of Yezidi civilians have been summarily executed and buried by ISIS jihadis.
http://aranews.net/2016/04/human-rights ... idi-women/
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Thu Apr 07, 2016 6:35 pm
Al Jazeera
In five years there won't be any Yazidis left here
Deep in the mountains of Iraq's Kurdish region lies a sanctuary for the Yazidis, a religious minority that has been viciously persecuted by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL/ISIS).
Lalish, which means both silence and listen, is the oldest Yazidi temple in the world. Usually quiet and peaceful, the temple has more recently become a refuge for internally displaced Yazidis who fled ISIL's advance on the city of Sinjar in 2014.
Although Kurdish forces have expelled ISIL from Sinjar, many Yazidis displaced from the city have no plans to return.
"In five years there won't be any Yazidis left here," said Najim Aleas Abdi, a Yazidi general fighting with the Peshmerga, a Kurdish armed group battling ISIL
According to the Yazidi Human Rights Organisation, Iraq was originally home to 800,000 Yazidis, but just 450,000 remain today.
Much of this is due to emigration. Abdi's oldest son lives in Germany, and he plans to take the rest of his family there soon. "No family is complete here. Everyone has brothers and sisters in Germany," Abdi told Al Jazeera.
The dream is shared by many Yazidis.
"I will either be eaten by the fish or make it to Germany," said Ziad Shangar, who is originally from Sinjar. Shangar said he planned to cross the Mediterranean Sea next month, and travel onwards to Germany. For the time being, he works as a volunteer at the tomb of Sheikh Adi, a Yazidi saint.
Shangar says he has found a German woman on Facebook who is willing to marry him, and he is confident it will all work out.
It is estimated that 50,000 Yazidis are living in Germany.
"The Yazidis aren't fleeing just Iraq; they are fleeing their homeland, where their holy city, Lalish, is located -which to them is the equivalent of Saudis having to flee Mecca," said Kyle Msall, a University of Chicago PhD candidate with expertise on the crisis facing Yazidis.
Yazidi culture is so intertwined with their religion that it seems "unfathomable" for them to leave this area, where their religion has been for centuries, Msall said.
Over scalding tea in Lalish's mountainside temple, which is used for worshipping the sun, four Yazidi men discussed the possibility of a better life in Germany and their concerns about returning to Sinjar.
Luqman Mahmood, a native of Mosul, now works as a teacher at a high school in Sheikhan, Iraq. He said most of his students refuse to shake his hand because they liken his religion to devil worship.
This misconception stems from the link between the devil and Tausi Melek, the Peacock Angel believed to have been created by God to reign over the universe. The Peacock Angel is identified as a fallen angel, but is not the devil in Yazidism.
Mahmood said that on one occasion, students appreciative of his help pulled him aside after school to offer a sign of their gratitude. They told him that he would go to hell for being Yazidi, but that they would help him convert to save his soul.
"We don't have a problem with people. But people have a problem with us," Mahmood told Al Jazeera.
The persecution of Yazidis predates the rise of ISIL, but has increased in recent years. In 2007, two Yazidi communities were reduced to rubble by bombings that killed 500 people and displaced more than 1,000 families.
"When families feel their children will have no future, that's when they choose to leave. The aggregate situation for all children in Iraq is extremely troubling - including Yazidis," said Karim Elkorany, a spokesperson for UNICEF's Iraq branch.
Qasim Hussein, a local Kurdish translator, has applied to go to Germany legally. Asked whether he would consider himself a refugee, he vehemently shook his head, saying Iraq is still home. "But if you get slaughtered and killed, what's the point? We have to let go," he said.
According to Msall, "Many individual Yazidis believe that everyone wants the Yazidis gone from the Middle East, so the option for Europe seems like best-case scenario in their opinion."
After tea, the Yazidi men walked through Lalish towards a baptismal pool. Only Yazidis may enter the room surrounding the baptismal pool, and an old woman guards the entrance to enforce this rule. She said that 10 families had visited the holy site on a recent day before making the dangerous journey to Europe.
In colder weather, the price charged by smugglers to bring families to Europe drops by thousands of dollars, and families who previously could not afford the risky journey have been jockeying to secure spots.
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/02/y ... 37283.html
In five years there won't be any Yazidis left here
Deep in the mountains of Iraq's Kurdish region lies a sanctuary for the Yazidis, a religious minority that has been viciously persecuted by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL/ISIS).
Lalish, which means both silence and listen, is the oldest Yazidi temple in the world. Usually quiet and peaceful, the temple has more recently become a refuge for internally displaced Yazidis who fled ISIL's advance on the city of Sinjar in 2014.
Although Kurdish forces have expelled ISIL from Sinjar, many Yazidis displaced from the city have no plans to return.
"In five years there won't be any Yazidis left here," said Najim Aleas Abdi, a Yazidi general fighting with the Peshmerga, a Kurdish armed group battling ISIL
According to the Yazidi Human Rights Organisation, Iraq was originally home to 800,000 Yazidis, but just 450,000 remain today.
Much of this is due to emigration. Abdi's oldest son lives in Germany, and he plans to take the rest of his family there soon. "No family is complete here. Everyone has brothers and sisters in Germany," Abdi told Al Jazeera.
The dream is shared by many Yazidis.
"I will either be eaten by the fish or make it to Germany," said Ziad Shangar, who is originally from Sinjar. Shangar said he planned to cross the Mediterranean Sea next month, and travel onwards to Germany. For the time being, he works as a volunteer at the tomb of Sheikh Adi, a Yazidi saint.
Shangar says he has found a German woman on Facebook who is willing to marry him, and he is confident it will all work out.
It is estimated that 50,000 Yazidis are living in Germany.
"The Yazidis aren't fleeing just Iraq; they are fleeing their homeland, where their holy city, Lalish, is located -which to them is the equivalent of Saudis having to flee Mecca," said Kyle Msall, a University of Chicago PhD candidate with expertise on the crisis facing Yazidis.
Yazidi culture is so intertwined with their religion that it seems "unfathomable" for them to leave this area, where their religion has been for centuries, Msall said.
Over scalding tea in Lalish's mountainside temple, which is used for worshipping the sun, four Yazidi men discussed the possibility of a better life in Germany and their concerns about returning to Sinjar.
Luqman Mahmood, a native of Mosul, now works as a teacher at a high school in Sheikhan, Iraq. He said most of his students refuse to shake his hand because they liken his religion to devil worship.
This misconception stems from the link between the devil and Tausi Melek, the Peacock Angel believed to have been created by God to reign over the universe. The Peacock Angel is identified as a fallen angel, but is not the devil in Yazidism.
Mahmood said that on one occasion, students appreciative of his help pulled him aside after school to offer a sign of their gratitude. They told him that he would go to hell for being Yazidi, but that they would help him convert to save his soul.
"We don't have a problem with people. But people have a problem with us," Mahmood told Al Jazeera.
The persecution of Yazidis predates the rise of ISIL, but has increased in recent years. In 2007, two Yazidi communities were reduced to rubble by bombings that killed 500 people and displaced more than 1,000 families.
"When families feel their children will have no future, that's when they choose to leave. The aggregate situation for all children in Iraq is extremely troubling - including Yazidis," said Karim Elkorany, a spokesperson for UNICEF's Iraq branch.
Qasim Hussein, a local Kurdish translator, has applied to go to Germany legally. Asked whether he would consider himself a refugee, he vehemently shook his head, saying Iraq is still home. "But if you get slaughtered and killed, what's the point? We have to let go," he said.
According to Msall, "Many individual Yazidis believe that everyone wants the Yazidis gone from the Middle East, so the option for Europe seems like best-case scenario in their opinion."
After tea, the Yazidi men walked through Lalish towards a baptismal pool. Only Yazidis may enter the room surrounding the baptismal pool, and an old woman guards the entrance to enforce this rule. She said that 10 families had visited the holy site on a recent day before making the dangerous journey to Europe.
In colder weather, the price charged by smugglers to bring families to Europe drops by thousands of dollars, and families who previously could not afford the risky journey have been jockeying to secure spots.
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/02/y ... 37283.html
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Fri Apr 08, 2016 12:27 pm
A Romanian Organisation Providing Treatment to Yazidi Women
SINJAR — A Romanian organisation has provided assistance and medical treatment to the Yazidi women who had been captured by the Islamic State (IS) once Sinjar fell into the hands of the jihadists.
Peace Action, Training and Research Institute of Romania (PATRIR) revealed that 60 Yazidi women have so far received psychological treatment from their organisation, and the program is intended to continue and help more survivors.
The head of the Department of Peace and Operations of PATRIR, Kai Brand-Jacobsen, explained that the Yazidi survivors have been subjected to sexual assault, humiliation and physical punishment; and they need assistance to re-join the society and re-build their lives.
Nearly 5,000 Kurdish women from the Yazidi minority were taken captive by IS in August 2014. They have reportedly been traded in IS sex slavery markets across the territories under the control of the jihadist group.
According to Jacobsen, one of the Yazidi survivors had been greatly affected by the brutality of IS and she was filled with hatred toward Muslims; “and, after receiving medical treatments, she is now working as an activist to maintain coexistence in Iraq.
http://www.basnews.com/index.php/en/new ... tan/269141
SINJAR — A Romanian organisation has provided assistance and medical treatment to the Yazidi women who had been captured by the Islamic State (IS) once Sinjar fell into the hands of the jihadists.
Peace Action, Training and Research Institute of Romania (PATRIR) revealed that 60 Yazidi women have so far received psychological treatment from their organisation, and the program is intended to continue and help more survivors.
The head of the Department of Peace and Operations of PATRIR, Kai Brand-Jacobsen, explained that the Yazidi survivors have been subjected to sexual assault, humiliation and physical punishment; and they need assistance to re-join the society and re-build their lives.
Nearly 5,000 Kurdish women from the Yazidi minority were taken captive by IS in August 2014. They have reportedly been traded in IS sex slavery markets across the territories under the control of the jihadist group.
According to Jacobsen, one of the Yazidi survivors had been greatly affected by the brutality of IS and she was filled with hatred toward Muslims; “and, after receiving medical treatments, she is now working as an activist to maintain coexistence in Iraq.
http://www.basnews.com/index.php/en/new ... tan/269141
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Sat Apr 09, 2016 7:04 pm
1,300 Yezidi men and women receiving military training to defend Shingal
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - More than 1,300 Yezidi women and men are undergoing voluntary military training at a base in Shingal by the Ezidkhan Protection Units, as the community recovers from a devastating attack by the Islamic State (ISIS) in August 2014.
"We have come here to protect this land and our dignity. Now we better defend this land ourselves," said Xeri Saeed, a volunteer.
Since the launch of the training, some 1,300 Yezidi men and women volunteers have joined the force and the number is on the rise, Saeed said.
The Ezidkhan Protection Units were formed shortly after Shingal fell to the Islamic State (ISIS). But organizers said that efforts to seek funding for it from the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) did not succeed, nor did they succeed in getting it recognized as a regular force.
"This base was opened not to oppose any party, but to strengthen Yezidi men and women to defend their land, dignity and reputation in the face of any future threat,” said a military trainer at the base.“We called on the KRG to recognize our force, but they have not answered our request yet,” he said.
According to Article 121 of the Iraqi constitution, no force except the Peshmerga can be formed in the autonomous Kurdistan Region.
Shingal mayor Mahma Khalil has said that the militia has recently received $2.3 million from the Iraqi government for the force. He said Baghdad did not see any difference between the Yezidi force and the Shiite Hashd al-Shaabi militia that it funds and maintains.
Since the attack on Shingal, several forces remain in the area, including the Peshmerga and units of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) as well as the Shingal Protection Units and Shingal Resistance Units.
http://rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/09042016
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - More than 1,300 Yezidi women and men are undergoing voluntary military training at a base in Shingal by the Ezidkhan Protection Units, as the community recovers from a devastating attack by the Islamic State (ISIS) in August 2014.
"We have come here to protect this land and our dignity. Now we better defend this land ourselves," said Xeri Saeed, a volunteer.
Since the launch of the training, some 1,300 Yezidi men and women volunteers have joined the force and the number is on the rise, Saeed said.
The Ezidkhan Protection Units were formed shortly after Shingal fell to the Islamic State (ISIS). But organizers said that efforts to seek funding for it from the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) did not succeed, nor did they succeed in getting it recognized as a regular force.
"This base was opened not to oppose any party, but to strengthen Yezidi men and women to defend their land, dignity and reputation in the face of any future threat,” said a military trainer at the base.“We called on the KRG to recognize our force, but they have not answered our request yet,” he said.
According to Article 121 of the Iraqi constitution, no force except the Peshmerga can be formed in the autonomous Kurdistan Region.
Shingal mayor Mahma Khalil has said that the militia has recently received $2.3 million from the Iraqi government for the force. He said Baghdad did not see any difference between the Yezidi force and the Shiite Hashd al-Shaabi militia that it funds and maintains.
Since the attack on Shingal, several forces remain in the area, including the Peshmerga and units of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) as well as the Shingal Protection Units and Shingal Resistance Units.
http://rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/09042016
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Mon Apr 11, 2016 7:23 am
ISIS in Iraq: The female Kurd and Yazidi fighters that put the fear into jihadis
(because ISIS jihadists killed by them will not go to paradise)
"Raping the Yazidi women was part of [the ISIS] plan. Destroy the women, destroy the culture,” Haveen, a 22-year-old Kurdish fighter says as she scans the road ahead.
Dressed in the green guerilla uniform synonymous with Kurdish armed groups, Haveen and her friend Denis keep watch, as two members of a unit of fighters within the YBS - a Kurdish civil defence militia. The all-women or “jin” unit based in Kananshor village near Sinjar mountain is home to a rotating group of female fighters made up of local Yazidi women and Kurds from nearby Turkey and Syria.
"I have been fighting for a long time now. I was on the frontline but I was injured by an IED [Improvised Explosive Device]," Haveen explains, pointing to a scar near her eye.
Denis, an energetic 30-year-old fighter from Turkey, said the women set up in Sinjar after Isis stormed the region in August 2014. Thousands of women were taken captive as Isis seized control of Sinjar in north-western Iraq, home to hundreds of thousands of members of the minority religion Isis has labelled as infidels. Isis abducted younger women and children and murdered men and older women. Those who could not flee were killed and buried in mass graves.
"After what happened to the Yazidi women it's important to have all women units here,” Denis says.
The YBS is an offshoot of the People's Protection Units (YPG) – the paramilitary wing of Syria's Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD). The YPG, who have been one of the most effective forces fighting Isis, say they are training Yazidi women to fight against any further incursions into Yazidi land.
“We have to support these women and help them to protect themselves. Isis took those women and children because they wanted to destroy their honour. We help train the Yazidi women to defend themselves and then they can control their own future. That’s why we’re here,” Denis says.
The women fighters live in separate quarters from the men, and romantic relationships are strictly forbidden. “We live separately but that’s the only difference,” Haveen says. “On the frontline we are all the same.”
The women’s base is adorned with pictures of female martyrs and brightly coloured carpets. It boasts a strategic vantage point, with a clear view of all cars entering the Yazidi village. Leaning out the window, Denis erupts into laughter when asked how successful the women’s units have been in the battle against Isis.
"They are so scared of us! If we kill them they can't go to heaven. It makes us laugh.... We make loud calls of happiness when we see them to let them know we are coming. That’s when they become cowards,” she says. Under the strict interpretation of Islam by Isis, if a fighter is killed by a women he cannot go to heaven, a fact the women clearly relish
“I like that when we kill them they lose their heaven. I don’t know how many of them I’ve killed,” Haveen says as she takes a drag of her cigarette. “It’s not enough. I won’t be happy until they’re all dead”
Three hours away in a predominantly Arab village close to the Syrian border, Kurdish fighters explain how they retook the village – which had been held by Isis - two weeks ago
“We waited in the mountains for weeks... We lost 15 fighters, 14 men and one woman,” a young guerrilla who gave his name as Dilsan explains.
The YBS has attracted young fighters from neighbouring Syria.
“I came to kick Isis out of these lands,” an 18-year-old fighter named Rozaline explains. “I came for the Yazidi women. I saw them cutting women’s heads off in Rojava [what Kurds call the three Kurdish enclaves just south of the Turkish border in Syria]. I saw so many awful things. I don’t want to see any more cutting and killing”.
The former medical student left her studies to spend three months training with the YPG in the mountains in Syria. A recent recruit to the frontline - she arrived four days ago after Isis launched an attack to retake the village - Rozaline says she is there to avenge the Yazidi women.
“I must protect the Yazid women from those animals…. I hate them so much but I’m not afraid. Kurdish women sing when we go into battle. We know they are cowards,” she says, while the other ‘jin’ fighters let out the shrill celebratory uluation call they use in battle
The women are in high spirits - but Isis fighters are just a few kilometres over the horizon. Two suicide bombers recently drove a car loaded with explosives to within 500 metres of the group’s base. Fragments are scattered all over the village, as our YBS driver weaves his way through carefully through the sandy terrain littered with recently removed IEDs set by Isis.
“They came to destroy our base but one of our fighters shot them,” Amara a Syrian fighter says.
On the road back to Kananshor the car passes a militia base where Kurdish fighters are evaluating their last offensive against Isis. A small woman shouts into a microphone, assessing the group's strengths and weakness. Dozens of young guerrillas sit listening to the speech, a common occurrence after an ISIS offensive.
Passing through areas of Sinjar mountain we see how the exposed bones of Yazidi women in mass graves are slowly being fenced off by members of the US-based Yazda group – an NGO which aims to support the Yazidis. In the nearby city of Duhok the International Commission for Missing People (ICMP) prepare to exhume the remains of those massacred by Isis, in order to build a genocide case - a gruesome task that has enlisted a team of international experts and forensic anthropologists.
Denis, who has already spent a large part of her life as a fighter, says protecting the Yazidi women is just one step in their plan to defend women’s rights globally.
"You and me, we are free, I am a fighter, you are a journalist but our sisters around the world - they suffer under the power of men, In Africa, in Asia, in Europe and American women suffer like the Yazidis. The fight of our women is a fight for all women," she says.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 77761.html
(because ISIS jihadists killed by them will not go to paradise)
"Raping the Yazidi women was part of [the ISIS] plan. Destroy the women, destroy the culture,” Haveen, a 22-year-old Kurdish fighter says as she scans the road ahead.
Dressed in the green guerilla uniform synonymous with Kurdish armed groups, Haveen and her friend Denis keep watch, as two members of a unit of fighters within the YBS - a Kurdish civil defence militia. The all-women or “jin” unit based in Kananshor village near Sinjar mountain is home to a rotating group of female fighters made up of local Yazidi women and Kurds from nearby Turkey and Syria.
"I have been fighting for a long time now. I was on the frontline but I was injured by an IED [Improvised Explosive Device]," Haveen explains, pointing to a scar near her eye.
Denis, an energetic 30-year-old fighter from Turkey, said the women set up in Sinjar after Isis stormed the region in August 2014. Thousands of women were taken captive as Isis seized control of Sinjar in north-western Iraq, home to hundreds of thousands of members of the minority religion Isis has labelled as infidels. Isis abducted younger women and children and murdered men and older women. Those who could not flee were killed and buried in mass graves.
"After what happened to the Yazidi women it's important to have all women units here,” Denis says.
The YBS is an offshoot of the People's Protection Units (YPG) – the paramilitary wing of Syria's Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD). The YPG, who have been one of the most effective forces fighting Isis, say they are training Yazidi women to fight against any further incursions into Yazidi land.
“We have to support these women and help them to protect themselves. Isis took those women and children because they wanted to destroy their honour. We help train the Yazidi women to defend themselves and then they can control their own future. That’s why we’re here,” Denis says.
The women fighters live in separate quarters from the men, and romantic relationships are strictly forbidden. “We live separately but that’s the only difference,” Haveen says. “On the frontline we are all the same.”
The women’s base is adorned with pictures of female martyrs and brightly coloured carpets. It boasts a strategic vantage point, with a clear view of all cars entering the Yazidi village. Leaning out the window, Denis erupts into laughter when asked how successful the women’s units have been in the battle against Isis.
"They are so scared of us! If we kill them they can't go to heaven. It makes us laugh.... We make loud calls of happiness when we see them to let them know we are coming. That’s when they become cowards,” she says. Under the strict interpretation of Islam by Isis, if a fighter is killed by a women he cannot go to heaven, a fact the women clearly relish
“I like that when we kill them they lose their heaven. I don’t know how many of them I’ve killed,” Haveen says as she takes a drag of her cigarette. “It’s not enough. I won’t be happy until they’re all dead”
Three hours away in a predominantly Arab village close to the Syrian border, Kurdish fighters explain how they retook the village – which had been held by Isis - two weeks ago
“We waited in the mountains for weeks... We lost 15 fighters, 14 men and one woman,” a young guerrilla who gave his name as Dilsan explains.
The YBS has attracted young fighters from neighbouring Syria.
“I came to kick Isis out of these lands,” an 18-year-old fighter named Rozaline explains. “I came for the Yazidi women. I saw them cutting women’s heads off in Rojava [what Kurds call the three Kurdish enclaves just south of the Turkish border in Syria]. I saw so many awful things. I don’t want to see any more cutting and killing”.
The former medical student left her studies to spend three months training with the YPG in the mountains in Syria. A recent recruit to the frontline - she arrived four days ago after Isis launched an attack to retake the village - Rozaline says she is there to avenge the Yazidi women.
“I must protect the Yazid women from those animals…. I hate them so much but I’m not afraid. Kurdish women sing when we go into battle. We know they are cowards,” she says, while the other ‘jin’ fighters let out the shrill celebratory uluation call they use in battle
The women are in high spirits - but Isis fighters are just a few kilometres over the horizon. Two suicide bombers recently drove a car loaded with explosives to within 500 metres of the group’s base. Fragments are scattered all over the village, as our YBS driver weaves his way through carefully through the sandy terrain littered with recently removed IEDs set by Isis.
“They came to destroy our base but one of our fighters shot them,” Amara a Syrian fighter says.
On the road back to Kananshor the car passes a militia base where Kurdish fighters are evaluating their last offensive against Isis. A small woman shouts into a microphone, assessing the group's strengths and weakness. Dozens of young guerrillas sit listening to the speech, a common occurrence after an ISIS offensive.
Passing through areas of Sinjar mountain we see how the exposed bones of Yazidi women in mass graves are slowly being fenced off by members of the US-based Yazda group – an NGO which aims to support the Yazidis. In the nearby city of Duhok the International Commission for Missing People (ICMP) prepare to exhume the remains of those massacred by Isis, in order to build a genocide case - a gruesome task that has enlisted a team of international experts and forensic anthropologists.
Denis, who has already spent a large part of her life as a fighter, says protecting the Yazidi women is just one step in their plan to defend women’s rights globally.
"You and me, we are free, I am a fighter, you are a journalist but our sisters around the world - they suffer under the power of men, In Africa, in Asia, in Europe and American women suffer like the Yazidis. The fight of our women is a fight for all women," she says.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 77761.html
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Mon Apr 11, 2016 10:27 pm
Iraqi play highlights Ezidi woman's ordeal
ZAKHO – The brutal treatment of Ezidi women at the hands of Islamic State (IS) militants is hard to portray, but a group of students from northern Iraq wants to show the world how it has suffered.
On Wednesday (April 6), a group at Camp Qadiya for Ezidi refugees in the northern Kurdish city of Zakho staged a play, which told the story of a young Ezidi girl who committed suicide after being kidnapped by IS during the capture of her village of Tel Azeer in August 2014.
The plot focuses on Gilan Burjis, a 17-year-old girl who kills herself after being taken captive by IS militants.
Her father and brothers were killed by the militant group and her eldest sister committed suicide while in captivity.
The play, titled 'Gilan', was performed in front of Gilan's mother and other remaining relatives.
"She went to the bathroom and cut her wrist with a piece of glass and when her sisters started to scream, Daesh members knocked down the door and when they saw her lying dead on the ground, they asked her sisters why she killed herself. Her sisters said that they had heard Gilan saying that she could not live after the killing of her father, brothers and uncles and that she would not let them touch her,” said Gilan's mother, Shemma Hassan.
“They then wrapped her body in a blanket and threw it outside to be eaten by dogs. Daesh killed Gilan's father and her two brothers who were physicians when they entered the village, while her eldest sister Jihan, who was also a physician, killed herself in Syria.”
IS has hounded ethnic and religious minorities in northern Iraq since seizing the city of Mosul in June last year, killing and displacing thousands of Christians, Shia Shabaks and Turkmen who lived for centuries in one of the most diverse parts of the Middle East.
Hundreds of Ezidi women and girls were captured, raped and tortured, and forced to convert to Islam and marry IS followers, according to rights groups.
The play was presented in English by a group of Ezidi secondary school students who said they wanted to send a message to the rest of the world.
"Gilan was my friend. She was from Sinjar and was dear to us and we hope anyone who sees this message will help them (the kidnapped Ezidi women). We performed the play in English because it is addressed to the whole world. I hope that it reaches all the people and pushes them to help them (Ezidi women) in their ordeal," said 17-year-old Marwa Murad, who played Gilan's mother in the play.
The play's director Musadeq Hassan, from Mosul city, which is still under the control of IS, said he wants to shed light on the plight of the Ezidi.
"I am a Muslim, but I wanted to present this work as a message of peace and a show of co-existence," he said.
IS considers the Ezidi to be devil-worshippers and says they must convert to Islam or die.
The Ezidi, thought to number several hundred thousand in Iraq before they came under attack by IS, are mostly Kurdish speakers whose ancient religion has elements of Zoroastrianism, Christianity and Islam.
IS says enslaving Ezidi is the revival of an ancient custom of using women and children as spoils of war.
The radical militant group captured around 5,000 Ezidi men and women in the northern region of Sinjar in summer 2014.
Some 2,000 have managed to escape or have been smuggled out of IS’ self-proclaimed caliphate in Iraq and Syria, activists say. The rest remain in captivity.
http://www.nrttv.com/EN/Details.aspx?Jimare=6284
ZAKHO – The brutal treatment of Ezidi women at the hands of Islamic State (IS) militants is hard to portray, but a group of students from northern Iraq wants to show the world how it has suffered.
On Wednesday (April 6), a group at Camp Qadiya for Ezidi refugees in the northern Kurdish city of Zakho staged a play, which told the story of a young Ezidi girl who committed suicide after being kidnapped by IS during the capture of her village of Tel Azeer in August 2014.
The plot focuses on Gilan Burjis, a 17-year-old girl who kills herself after being taken captive by IS militants.
Her father and brothers were killed by the militant group and her eldest sister committed suicide while in captivity.
The play, titled 'Gilan', was performed in front of Gilan's mother and other remaining relatives.
"She went to the bathroom and cut her wrist with a piece of glass and when her sisters started to scream, Daesh members knocked down the door and when they saw her lying dead on the ground, they asked her sisters why she killed herself. Her sisters said that they had heard Gilan saying that she could not live after the killing of her father, brothers and uncles and that she would not let them touch her,” said Gilan's mother, Shemma Hassan.
“They then wrapped her body in a blanket and threw it outside to be eaten by dogs. Daesh killed Gilan's father and her two brothers who were physicians when they entered the village, while her eldest sister Jihan, who was also a physician, killed herself in Syria.”
IS has hounded ethnic and religious minorities in northern Iraq since seizing the city of Mosul in June last year, killing and displacing thousands of Christians, Shia Shabaks and Turkmen who lived for centuries in one of the most diverse parts of the Middle East.
Hundreds of Ezidi women and girls were captured, raped and tortured, and forced to convert to Islam and marry IS followers, according to rights groups.
The play was presented in English by a group of Ezidi secondary school students who said they wanted to send a message to the rest of the world.
"Gilan was my friend. She was from Sinjar and was dear to us and we hope anyone who sees this message will help them (the kidnapped Ezidi women). We performed the play in English because it is addressed to the whole world. I hope that it reaches all the people and pushes them to help them (Ezidi women) in their ordeal," said 17-year-old Marwa Murad, who played Gilan's mother in the play.
The play's director Musadeq Hassan, from Mosul city, which is still under the control of IS, said he wants to shed light on the plight of the Ezidi.
"I am a Muslim, but I wanted to present this work as a message of peace and a show of co-existence," he said.
IS considers the Ezidi to be devil-worshippers and says they must convert to Islam or die.
The Ezidi, thought to number several hundred thousand in Iraq before they came under attack by IS, are mostly Kurdish speakers whose ancient religion has elements of Zoroastrianism, Christianity and Islam.
IS says enslaving Ezidi is the revival of an ancient custom of using women and children as spoils of war.
The radical militant group captured around 5,000 Ezidi men and women in the northern region of Sinjar in summer 2014.
Some 2,000 have managed to escape or have been smuggled out of IS’ self-proclaimed caliphate in Iraq and Syria, activists say. The rest remain in captivity.
http://www.nrttv.com/EN/Details.aspx?Jimare=6284
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Mon Apr 11, 2016 10:30 pm
Nearly 200 Ezidis, Kurds leave Idomeni camp
IDOMENI, Greece — About 180 Ezidi and Kurdish refugees from Iraq and Syria moved on Monday (April 11) from their migrant camp near the Greek town of Idomeni to new migrant centers set up by Greek authorities near the border with Macedonia.
The refugees, who have fled from Iraq's Sinjar region after Islamic State (IS) attacks, said they decided to move because of what they perceive as insecurity at the camp, where clashes between protesters and Macedonian police on the other side of the border wounded more than 300 on Sunday (April 10).
Others said they were leaving because they had lost hope that the border would open.
''No, it was not because of yesterday's events, but we have been here for 47 days and it is no use. The border will not open. So we decided to go to the new camps," said Aziz Kareem, 41, from Sinjar region in Iraq, who was moving with 11 members of his family.
Greece has been trying for weeks to convince those stuck at the border to move to camps set up by the government across the country.
Most have been reluctant to move, fearing they will forever miss any chance to move on to central and western Europe.
On Monday, migrants from the camp in Idomeni boarded three buses, which for many days have sat empty.
Greece's Citizen Protection Minister Nikos Toskas, a retired major-general who once served at NATO on defense planning, said the government did not intend to let the situation at Idomeni "fester," but would not forcibly remove migrants either.
In Idomeni on Monday, a brief scuffle broke out between the migrants and Greek police after dozens tried to push a train carriage along rail tracks leading to Macedonia.
The minor trouble came a day after dozens of migrants and refugees were injured in clashes with Macedonian police which Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras deplored as "a disgrace for European civilization".
More than 10,000 migrants and refugees have been stranded at the Greek border outpost of Idomeni since February after a cascade of border shutdowns across the Balkans closed off their route to central and western Europe.
During Monday's scuffles, men stood on top of a train carriage shouting and waving Greek and German flags in protest. Others walked up to the border and waved olive branches at Macedonian soldiers who stood guard on the other side of the razor wire fence.
http://www.nrttv.com/EN/Details.aspx?Jimare=6290
IDOMENI, Greece — About 180 Ezidi and Kurdish refugees from Iraq and Syria moved on Monday (April 11) from their migrant camp near the Greek town of Idomeni to new migrant centers set up by Greek authorities near the border with Macedonia.
The refugees, who have fled from Iraq's Sinjar region after Islamic State (IS) attacks, said they decided to move because of what they perceive as insecurity at the camp, where clashes between protesters and Macedonian police on the other side of the border wounded more than 300 on Sunday (April 10).
Others said they were leaving because they had lost hope that the border would open.
''No, it was not because of yesterday's events, but we have been here for 47 days and it is no use. The border will not open. So we decided to go to the new camps," said Aziz Kareem, 41, from Sinjar region in Iraq, who was moving with 11 members of his family.
Greece has been trying for weeks to convince those stuck at the border to move to camps set up by the government across the country.
Most have been reluctant to move, fearing they will forever miss any chance to move on to central and western Europe.
On Monday, migrants from the camp in Idomeni boarded three buses, which for many days have sat empty.
Greece's Citizen Protection Minister Nikos Toskas, a retired major-general who once served at NATO on defense planning, said the government did not intend to let the situation at Idomeni "fester," but would not forcibly remove migrants either.
In Idomeni on Monday, a brief scuffle broke out between the migrants and Greek police after dozens tried to push a train carriage along rail tracks leading to Macedonia.
The minor trouble came a day after dozens of migrants and refugees were injured in clashes with Macedonian police which Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras deplored as "a disgrace for European civilization".
More than 10,000 migrants and refugees have been stranded at the Greek border outpost of Idomeni since February after a cascade of border shutdowns across the Balkans closed off their route to central and western Europe.
During Monday's scuffles, men stood on top of a train carriage shouting and waving Greek and German flags in protest. Others walked up to the border and waved olive branches at Macedonian soldiers who stood guard on the other side of the razor wire fence.
http://www.nrttv.com/EN/Details.aspx?Jimare=6290
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Thu Apr 14, 2016 1:22 am
About 6,000 Ezidis taken prisoner by ISIS, 2,400 free 3,600 still held
The Iraqi Federal Government has done nothing to reconstruct Sinjar (Shingal) since the city was liberated from the Islamic State (IS) five months ago, said a Kurdish Yezidi (Ezidi) MP on Tuesday.
In an exclusive interview with Kurdistan24, Sheikh Shamo, an Ezidi member of the Kurdistan Region Parliament, stated that 5,000 people have returned to their homes in northern Shingal so far. Shamo believes that several others are expected to return in the coming months, but he pointed to the worrying living conditions in the city.
“Sinjar is destroyed for the most part and people need basic services such as electricity and water to be able to live there,” he said.
Regarding the security of the area, he stated that Shingal is safe, especially in northern parts such as Snune town, but people don't have basic amenities.
Citizens remain confident in the security of the area “as Peshmerga have destroyed the myth of Da’esh [ISIS] and are now in charge of the security of the city,” Shamo said.
He noted that unofficial statistics show 6,000 Ezidi prisoners were under the control of IS, 2,400 of whom are now freed, thanks to the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) who rescued the kidnapped Ezidis.
He also added that that almost 3,600 remain in captivity by ISIS.
Regarding the affair of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in the Kurdistan Region, Shamo said that 56 schools have been opened for Ezidi children, and as a result nearly 28,000 Ezidi children receive a proper education.
He reported that some groups are attempting to impose themselves on Shingal with the support of the Iraqi Federal Government and Iran. Shamo claimed that Iran wants to take control of Shingal Mountain, a place the former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein would use to threaten Israel with missiles.
He believes that the above scenario is true because the Iraqi Federal Government has done nothing for Shingal since the city was liberated from ISIS on November 2015.
Moreover, he said that Baghdad recognized the destruction by IS of the city of Ramadi in Anbar Province and spent money on rebuilding it, but has provided nothing for Shingal.
The MP pointed out that Ezidis have lost hope in Baghdad to reconstruct Shingal, but they still hope that the Kurdistan Region will help them since Peshmerga forces liberated the city from IS.
He also mentioned that KRG has opened an international corridor for the humanitarian organizations to help rebuild Shingal, a city 80 percent destroyed.
Shingal was invaded by ISIS on August 2014. On Nov. 13, 2015, the city was liberated by the Peshmerga forces with the aerial support of the international coalition warplanes.
The Iraqi Federal Government has done nothing to reconstruct Sinjar (Shingal) since the city was liberated from the Islamic State (IS) five months ago, said a Kurdish Yezidi (Ezidi) MP on Tuesday.
In an exclusive interview with Kurdistan24, Sheikh Shamo, an Ezidi member of the Kurdistan Region Parliament, stated that 5,000 people have returned to their homes in northern Shingal so far. Shamo believes that several others are expected to return in the coming months, but he pointed to the worrying living conditions in the city.
“Sinjar is destroyed for the most part and people need basic services such as electricity and water to be able to live there,” he said.
Regarding the security of the area, he stated that Shingal is safe, especially in northern parts such as Snune town, but people don't have basic amenities.
Citizens remain confident in the security of the area “as Peshmerga have destroyed the myth of Da’esh [ISIS] and are now in charge of the security of the city,” Shamo said.
He noted that unofficial statistics show 6,000 Ezidi prisoners were under the control of IS, 2,400 of whom are now freed, thanks to the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) who rescued the kidnapped Ezidis.
He also added that that almost 3,600 remain in captivity by ISIS.
Regarding the affair of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in the Kurdistan Region, Shamo said that 56 schools have been opened for Ezidi children, and as a result nearly 28,000 Ezidi children receive a proper education.
He reported that some groups are attempting to impose themselves on Shingal with the support of the Iraqi Federal Government and Iran. Shamo claimed that Iran wants to take control of Shingal Mountain, a place the former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein would use to threaten Israel with missiles.
He believes that the above scenario is true because the Iraqi Federal Government has done nothing for Shingal since the city was liberated from ISIS on November 2015.
Moreover, he said that Baghdad recognized the destruction by IS of the city of Ramadi in Anbar Province and spent money on rebuilding it, but has provided nothing for Shingal.
The MP pointed out that Ezidis have lost hope in Baghdad to reconstruct Shingal, but they still hope that the Kurdistan Region will help them since Peshmerga forces liberated the city from IS.
He also mentioned that KRG has opened an international corridor for the humanitarian organizations to help rebuild Shingal, a city 80 percent destroyed.
Shingal was invaded by ISIS on August 2014. On Nov. 13, 2015, the city was liberated by the Peshmerga forces with the aerial support of the international coalition warplanes.
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Fri Apr 15, 2016 1:38 pm
Threatened Yezidi minority has once again called for
US Special Forces to free their families from ISIS detention
Reporting by: Wladimir van Wilgenburg
Yezidi Peshmerga fighters have called on the US-led coalition against the Islamic State (ISIS) to free their women and children from the ISIS detention in Tal Afar in northwestern Iraq.
The frontlines in Sinjar –known in Kurdish as Shingal– are quiet and restless and are protected by around 5,000 Yezidi Peshmergas and fighters of the Shingal Resistance Units (YBŞ). On Wednesday, ISIS mortars injured several civilians inside the city of Sinjar.
“There are not any more ISIS forces in Tal Afar. My family is all in Tal Afar. There are 700 Yezidi families in the hands of ISIS in Tal Afar. I need my family to be free,” said Hassan, a Peshmerga fighter. “Now people need apaches here, there are no more ISIS forces in Tal Afar, I am sure,” he told ARA News.
“They [Americans] made a special operation in Hawija and freed prisoners, why they don’t do it here too?” he said.
In October, Kurdish and American special forces stormed an ISIS prison in Hawija. Moreover, in May US special forces killed senior ISIS leader Abu Sayyaf and captured his wife and freed a young Yezidi woman.
“Why they couldn’t come to help us to free Yezidis held by ISIS in Shingal. They did a special operation in Syria by special forces in 15 minutes, and why they don’t do the same for Shingal. If you go 15 kilometers further to Tal Afar, there are many Yezidi prisoners held by the ISIS,” said another Yezidi fighter called Azad.
“If ISIS commits one more genocide, we Yezidis are finished, we are surrounded by Arabs in Shingal, and in Tal Afar by Turkmens. My mother, my family is in the hands of ISIS terrorists,” Azad told ARA News.
Many Yezidis are afraid that the captured Yezidis could be lost if they are not freed. There are already rumours in Sinjar, that the Islamic State group is using Yezidi captives as fighters in Libya.
“If the US-led coalition won’t help us free the Yezidis in Iraq and Syria, ISIS could bring them to other countries, and we will never find them again,” he said.
The Peshmerga fighters say they are fighting ISIS jihadis with light weapons. “They [ISIS] are the strongest terrorist organization in the world. We are trying to defend ourselves and our people here [in Shingal] with these simple weapons and supplies,” Hassan said.
“We ask Western countries to send us more weapons and military supplies. The most dangerous thing is that the Islamic State still controls our land. There are still many [Kurdish Yezidi] villages in the hands of the terror group,” he said.
Peshmerga forces say the United States is preventing them from taking the villages south of Shingal which are still under ISIS control, and where Yezidis were massacred in August 2014.
Speaking to ARA News in Shingal, senior Peshmerga commander Qasim Shesho said: “We are ready as Peshmerga forces, but the decision belongs to the United States. If they allow us, we will attack ISIS; it would be easy to regain those areas.”
In August 2014, ISIS extremists had taken control of the Yezidi Shingal district in northern Iraq, causing a mass displacement of nearly 400,000 people. Tens of thousands of Yezidi Kurds remained trapped in Mount Sinjar, suffering mass killings, kidnappings and rape at the hands of ISIS militants. Also, more than 3000 Yezidi girls have been taken by the radical group as sex slaves.
The Kurdish Peshmerga troops regained control of the Yezidi Shingal region in November of 2015, after fierce battles against ISIS. The Kurdish forces have recently discovered more than five mass graves in the Yezidi region, where hundreds of Yezidi civilians have been summarily executed and buried by ISIS jihadis.
Human Rights Watch calls for release of Yezidi women
The extremist armed group of Islamic State (ISIS) should urgently release Yezidi women and girls abducted since 2014, Human Rights Watch said last week. According to statistics, at least 1,800 Yezidi women and girls are still in ISIS-hands.
“The longer they are held by ISIS, the more horrific life becomes for Yezidi women, bought and sold, brutally raped, their children torn from them,” said Skye Wheeler, women’s rights emergencies researcher at Human Rights Watch.
According to officials of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria continue to hold about 1,800 abducted Yezidi women and girls.
The United Nations has cited allegations, based on Yezidi officials’ estimates, that as many as 3,500 people remained in ISIS captivity as of October 2015.
“Many of the abuses, including torture, sexual slavery, and arbitrary detention, would be war crimes if committed in the context of the armed conflict, or crimes against humanity if they were part of ISIS policy during a systematic or widespread attack on the civilian population,” the HRW said.
The UN Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights said in March 2015 that ISIS may have committed genocide against the Yezidis in August 2014.
“The abuses against Yezidi women and girls documented by Human Rights Watch, including the practice of abducting women and girls and forcibly converting them to Islam and/or forcibly marrying them to ISIS members, may be part of a genocide against Yezidis,” HRW said.
“Women also reported ISIS members taking their children from them, physically abusing their children, and forcing them to pray or take Islamic names.”
“ISIS attacks on women and girls, especially Yezidis, have created a new and terrifying crisis for women and girls in the region,” Wheeler said. “One way Iraq’s government can help these women is to change its laws and policies to better protect all women who have been subjected to rape.”
http://aranews.net/2016/04/threatened-y ... -families/
US Special Forces to free their families from ISIS detention
Reporting by: Wladimir van Wilgenburg
Yezidi Peshmerga fighters have called on the US-led coalition against the Islamic State (ISIS) to free their women and children from the ISIS detention in Tal Afar in northwestern Iraq.
The frontlines in Sinjar –known in Kurdish as Shingal– are quiet and restless and are protected by around 5,000 Yezidi Peshmergas and fighters of the Shingal Resistance Units (YBŞ). On Wednesday, ISIS mortars injured several civilians inside the city of Sinjar.
“There are not any more ISIS forces in Tal Afar. My family is all in Tal Afar. There are 700 Yezidi families in the hands of ISIS in Tal Afar. I need my family to be free,” said Hassan, a Peshmerga fighter. “Now people need apaches here, there are no more ISIS forces in Tal Afar, I am sure,” he told ARA News.
“They [Americans] made a special operation in Hawija and freed prisoners, why they don’t do it here too?” he said.
In October, Kurdish and American special forces stormed an ISIS prison in Hawija. Moreover, in May US special forces killed senior ISIS leader Abu Sayyaf and captured his wife and freed a young Yezidi woman.
“Why they couldn’t come to help us to free Yezidis held by ISIS in Shingal. They did a special operation in Syria by special forces in 15 minutes, and why they don’t do the same for Shingal. If you go 15 kilometers further to Tal Afar, there are many Yezidi prisoners held by the ISIS,” said another Yezidi fighter called Azad.
“If ISIS commits one more genocide, we Yezidis are finished, we are surrounded by Arabs in Shingal, and in Tal Afar by Turkmens. My mother, my family is in the hands of ISIS terrorists,” Azad told ARA News.
Many Yezidis are afraid that the captured Yezidis could be lost if they are not freed. There are already rumours in Sinjar, that the Islamic State group is using Yezidi captives as fighters in Libya.
“If the US-led coalition won’t help us free the Yezidis in Iraq and Syria, ISIS could bring them to other countries, and we will never find them again,” he said.
The Peshmerga fighters say they are fighting ISIS jihadis with light weapons. “They [ISIS] are the strongest terrorist organization in the world. We are trying to defend ourselves and our people here [in Shingal] with these simple weapons and supplies,” Hassan said.
“We ask Western countries to send us more weapons and military supplies. The most dangerous thing is that the Islamic State still controls our land. There are still many [Kurdish Yezidi] villages in the hands of the terror group,” he said.
Peshmerga forces say the United States is preventing them from taking the villages south of Shingal which are still under ISIS control, and where Yezidis were massacred in August 2014.
Speaking to ARA News in Shingal, senior Peshmerga commander Qasim Shesho said: “We are ready as Peshmerga forces, but the decision belongs to the United States. If they allow us, we will attack ISIS; it would be easy to regain those areas.”
In August 2014, ISIS extremists had taken control of the Yezidi Shingal district in northern Iraq, causing a mass displacement of nearly 400,000 people. Tens of thousands of Yezidi Kurds remained trapped in Mount Sinjar, suffering mass killings, kidnappings and rape at the hands of ISIS militants. Also, more than 3000 Yezidi girls have been taken by the radical group as sex slaves.
The Kurdish Peshmerga troops regained control of the Yezidi Shingal region in November of 2015, after fierce battles against ISIS. The Kurdish forces have recently discovered more than five mass graves in the Yezidi region, where hundreds of Yezidi civilians have been summarily executed and buried by ISIS jihadis.
Human Rights Watch calls for release of Yezidi women
The extremist armed group of Islamic State (ISIS) should urgently release Yezidi women and girls abducted since 2014, Human Rights Watch said last week. According to statistics, at least 1,800 Yezidi women and girls are still in ISIS-hands.
“The longer they are held by ISIS, the more horrific life becomes for Yezidi women, bought and sold, brutally raped, their children torn from them,” said Skye Wheeler, women’s rights emergencies researcher at Human Rights Watch.
According to officials of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria continue to hold about 1,800 abducted Yezidi women and girls.
The United Nations has cited allegations, based on Yezidi officials’ estimates, that as many as 3,500 people remained in ISIS captivity as of October 2015.
“Many of the abuses, including torture, sexual slavery, and arbitrary detention, would be war crimes if committed in the context of the armed conflict, or crimes against humanity if they were part of ISIS policy during a systematic or widespread attack on the civilian population,” the HRW said.
The UN Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights said in March 2015 that ISIS may have committed genocide against the Yezidis in August 2014.
“The abuses against Yezidi women and girls documented by Human Rights Watch, including the practice of abducting women and girls and forcibly converting them to Islam and/or forcibly marrying them to ISIS members, may be part of a genocide against Yezidis,” HRW said.
“Women also reported ISIS members taking their children from them, physically abusing their children, and forcing them to pray or take Islamic names.”
“ISIS attacks on women and girls, especially Yezidis, have created a new and terrifying crisis for women and girls in the region,” Wheeler said. “One way Iraq’s government can help these women is to change its laws and policies to better protect all women who have been subjected to rape.”
http://aranews.net/2016/04/threatened-y ... -families/
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Re: Yazidi UPDATES and How to Donate to Yazidis by TEXT
Author: Anthea » Fri Apr 15, 2016 1:48 pm
Sadly, I think that we all realise by now that
WORLD MEDIA DOES NOT CARE
Apart from ARA News and the reporting done by Wladimir van Wilgenburg
Every other media outlet has long since forgotten or stopped caring what happens to the Yazidis
I can assure that we at Roj Bash Kurdistan have not and will not ever forget the plight of these gentle innocent people
If there is ever anything my colleagues or I can do to support the Yazidis be assured we will do our best
WORLD MEDIA DOES NOT CARE
Apart from ARA News and the reporting done by Wladimir van Wilgenburg
Every other media outlet has long since forgotten or stopped caring what happens to the Yazidis
I can assure that we at Roj Bash Kurdistan have not and will not ever forget the plight of these gentle innocent people
If there is ever anything my colleagues or I can do to support the Yazidis be assured we will do our best
My Name Is KURDISTAN And I Will Be FREE
-
Anthea - Shaswar
- Donator
- Posts: 31601
- Images: 1151
- Joined: Thu Oct 18, 2012 2:13 pm
- Location: Sitting in front of computer
- Highscores: 3
- Arcade winning challenges: 6
- Has thanked: 6019 times
- Been thanked: 746 times
- Nationality: Kurd by heart
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