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Years after Genocide, Yazidis Urgently Need Help

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Yazidis Urgently Need Help

Yazidis Urgently Need Help

by Uzay Bulut,

  • There are two types of aid urgently needed by Yazidis at Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps in northern Iraq, according to Saad Babir, media director of Yazda: psychological support for the victims of genocide, and basic services such as healthcare, food, water, electricity, heat, new tents — and even firetrucks and ambulances. Many Yazidis have died in IDP camps due to a lack of the latter two.
  • “When I was in the camps, I noticed that when UN officials came in to do an assessment, the Yazidi people were not able to tell them the truth about what was happening for fear of retaliation from the country’s leaders.” — Dawood Saleh, Yazidi author and activist.
  • “We wrote many reports to the UN, for it to consider Yazidis in the camps refugees, due to their dangerous situation, but our pleas were rejected. The UN has not reported on the situation accurately and sufficiently to enable Western countries to help Yazidis more.” — Dawood Saleh.

On June 13, Mark Green, administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), finally offered some good news for the persecuted Christians and Yazidis in Iraq. In an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal entitled: “Help Is on the Way for Middle Eastern Christians,” he wrote:

“Every day of delay brings persecuted communities that much closer to extinction. In Iraq alone, nearly 90% of Christians have fled in the past 15 years, emptying entire villages that had stood for more than a thousand years. The Yazidi population has been similarly decimated. Without immediate additional support, these groups may be forced to continue their unprecedented exodus, perhaps never to return to their ancient homes.

“The time to act is now. Christians, Yazidis and other persecuted religious communities in the Middle East have suffered unspeakable harm for too long. Their plight has touched the hearts of the American people and stirred this nation to step up with compassion and conviction. President Trump promised to provide them with the help they need to rebuild their communities and restore their hope, and we will work tirelessly to break down any barrier that stands in the way.”

The 2014 invasion of the region of Sinjar (or Shingal) in Iraq by the Islamic State (ISIS) brought a mostly forgotten community to the attention of the world: the Yazidis, one of the world’s most persecuted ethno-religious groups. A peaceful, non-Muslim people who oppose bloodshed, Yazidis have for centuries been targeted for their faith. Their native lands contain parts of Iraq, Turkey and Syria. Yazidis say that they have been subjected to 74 genocidal campaigns and severe oppression throughout their history at the hands of Islamists.

When ISIS invaded Sinjar in August 2014, hundreds of defenseless Yazidi men and elderly women were murdered. Yazidi girls and women became the victims of widespread abduction and slavery. ISIS “deliberately tormented the relatives of Yazidis who were forced to witness or listen over the phone as their daughters and sisters were abused,” according to a 2017 report by Yazda, a Yazidi advocacy organization. The report also reveals that Yazidi boys were kidnapped and recruited to undergo forced conversion and military training:

“In these camps, young Yazidi children are taught IS’s extremist ideology and Quranic interpretations, and brainwashed to hate Yazidism, their own families and their community. They are trained to use weapons, including firearms and knives, and made to watch videos depicting decapitations of hostages and to practice this over dummies, or even human beings.”

Since the genocide, according to the Yazda report,

“Women and girls have suffered ongoing sexual violence and trafficking. They have been dehumanized and sold in slave markers (souk sabaya) organized by IS’s Committee for the Buying and Selling of Slaves or traded among militants through online auctions. In addition to sex trafficking, some Yazidi women and girls have been forcibly married to ISIS fighters, and subjected to forced pregnancy in some cases, and forced contraception or abortion in other cases. All of these tactics were accompanied by forced conversion, the forced abandonment of Yazidi customs, and name changes. Yazidi women and girls in captivity are subjected to constant verbal and psychological abuse, with severe punishments for speaking their own language or practicing Yazidi traditions. Insults are particularly directed at their faith – captives are accused of being ‘devil worshippers’ and referred to derogatorily as ‘kuffar’ [infidels] and told to forget their families and their God.”

Speaking with Gatestone about the situation of Yazidis, Saad Babir, Yazda’s media director, said that there are two types of aid urgently needed by Yazidis at Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps in northern Iraq: psychological support for the victims of genocide, and basic services such as healthcare, food, water, electricity, heat, new tents — and even firetrucks and ambulances. Babir explained that many Yazidis have died in IDP camps due to a lack of the latter two. On May 25, for example, a 17-year-old Yazidi girl burned to death, while three of her siblings were severely injured, when the family’s tent caught fire in one of the camps.

Dawood Saleh, a Yazidi author and activist who fled, was in Sinjar when ISIS launched the genocide there in 2014. “Yazidis have lived in the camps in Iraq for four years now,” he told Gatestone. “Most of the tents they live in are temporary and could not last for more than one or two seasons. These tents could be fully burned in 30 seconds,” he said.

He prioritized the need for psychological support and post-trauma care:

“War and genocide, which Yazidis have recently experienced once again, cause the destruction of the human soul. Yazidis in general suffer from an unprecedented psychological crisis. They have lost hope of living a decent life. I call for providing healthcare and psychological treatment facilities to help all Yazidis, especially women and children survivors, who have managed to escape from the ISIS slavery.”

A Yazda report states:

“Survivors of the genocide, including those who were able to flee before being captured, yearn to return to their homeland with assurances of security, peace and stability… However, there are still serious obstacles to return, including the lack of inhabitable homes and suitable infrastructure, with entire villages and towns having been flattened… According to the Mayor of Sinjar, Mahama Khalil, about 80-85% of Sinjar District has been destroyed by ISIS and rebuilding the district will require significant investment… a dedicated fund, which would be administered and supervised efficiently and transparently.”

Ibrahim told Gatestone:

“It is not clear that the US will be capable of ensuring that Shingal will be a safe and secure place for Yazidis to live. If not, the US should not pressure Yazidis to return there, but rather it should support the Yazidi community through providing skills, training, and opportunities for them to improve their lives.”

As for the Iraqi parliamentary elections that were held on May 12, Saleh said to Gatestone that Yazidis’ “votes were burned or stolen. None of the Yazidi parties were able to enter the Iraqi parliament, although the Yazidi votes amounted to more than 100,000. The Yazidis in the camps are still being marginalized, even after the genocide.”

Saleh’s comments are supported by the Yazda report, which says:

“The discrimination against Yazidis in every aspect of life is exacerbated by the fact that Yazidis are underrepresented in all key institutions in both Iraq and the KRI [Kurdistan Region of Iraq], as they have little opportunity to make changes to government policy or programs.”

For a long-term solution, Yazda’s Babir proposes a protected enclave for Yazidis in Sinjar and the recognition of the Yazidi right to self-rule. “We suggest international protection for the Yazidi and other vulnerable minorities in Iraq, because both the Iraqi and Kurdish governments have failed to protect us,” he concluded. “Also, Yazidis need self-administration in our territories and security to be provided by our own armed forces. To be able to survive and live in safety as honorable people, we need to have the right to self-rule.”

PKK accuses Barzani’s KDP of preventing Yazidis from returning to Sinjar

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Erbil, Iraq’s Kurdistan region,— The political wing of Kurdistan Workers’ Party PKK, the Group of Communities in Kurdistan KCK, accused the Massoud Barzani-led Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) of preventing Yazidis from returning to their homes in Sinjar (Shingal) in northwest Iraq.

The KCK Foreign Relations Committee in a statement on Tuesday responded to Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani, who earlier said the PKK was preventing Yazidis from returning to Sinjar.

The committee denied Sinjar Resistance Units (YBS) had prevented aid from coming into Sinjar and denied the statements made by the KRG premier.

“YBS fighters have never prevented aid into Sinjar. It is the KDP which prevented aid into Sinjar by the closure of the Semalka border gate where assistance was transferred to Sinjar,” the statement said.

“The duty of both the KDP and the PKK and of all other Kurdish political forces is to achieve Yazidis self-government and self-defense there,” the statement added.

During the Conference of the Future Independence of Kurdistan, Challenges and Opportunities, held at the American University of Kurdistan in Duhok, KRG premier Nechirvan Barzani said the PKK has complicated the situation in Sinjar by settling in.

“A reason that displaced people won’t return to Sinjar, and that the town remains un-constructed, is the PKK. These people are not certain of their lives, the PKK must understand that,” he said.

Islamic State group has captured most parts of the Yazidi Sinjar district in northwest Iraq on August 3, 2014 which led thousands of Kurdish families to flee to Mount Sinjar, where they were trapped in it and suffered from significant lack of water and food, killing and abduction of thousands of Yazidis as well as rape and captivity of thousands of women.

Those who stay behind are subjected to brutal, genocidal acts: thousands killed, hundreds buried alive, and countless acts of rape, kidnapping and enslavement are perpetuated against Yazidi women. To add insult to injury, IS fighters ransack and destroy ancient Yazidi holy sites.

According to Human Rights organizations, thousands of Yazidi Kurdish women and girls have been forced to marry or been sold into sexual slavery by the IS jihadists.

A Yazidi member of Iraqi parliament Vian Dakhil, said in August that 3,770 Kurdish Yazidi women and children still in Islamic State captivity.

Kurdish forces including PKK, backed by Coalition warplanes, declared victory over Islamic State (IS) in Sinjar on Nov. 13, 2015 after more than a year of fighting over the mainly-Yazidi district.

Source: Ekurd.net

Germany’s Yazidis call on Turkey to combat ‘Islamic State’

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0,,17854482_303,00One year ago, terror group “Islamic State” began a brutal campaign of violence against Iraq’s Yazidi minority. Germany’s Yazidi community has used the anniversary to demand Turkey do more to stop the militants.

The chairman of Germany’s Central Council of Yazidis, Telim Tolan, on Monday accused Turkey of doing little to stop “Islamic State” (IS) militants from recruiting fighters and smuggling weapons from within its borders.

“Turkey knew about that and should have put a stop to it,” Tolan told German broadcaster SWR. “(IS) is a scourge, and these barbarians only know one language, and that’s the language of violence,” he said.

On August 3, 2014, IS made an unexpected advance into areas of northern Iraq that had been under Kurdish control. Of all the minorities living there, the Yazidi Christians were worst hit. Hundreds of people in the Sinjar area were massacred or abducted, while tens of thousands were forced to flee their homes for the mountains. Many remained stranded there for days without food and water, and several thousand remain there still.

The United Nations has described the violence as “an attempt to commit genocide.” The onslaught received international media attention and was one of the main justifications for the US-led airstrikes against IS that began days later.

At a ceremony in Dohuk marking one year since the IS attacks, the president of Iraq’s Kurdish region, Massoud Barzani, vowed to “hunt down those who committed this crime until the last one.”

Call for more support

Tolan told SWR it was vital the international community counter IS with airstrikes and provide the Kurds fighting against them with more weapons.

“With this military force that the Kurds have, that the Iraqis have, and that America and the international community have, we could have stopped this terrible campaign by IS a long time ago,” he said.

Tolan also called on the German government to provide more humanitarian aid to Yazidi refugees who’ve been living in camps for the past year, and to open a program for receiving persecuted Yazidis.

According to figures from the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), Yazidis account for 400,000 of the more than three million people who have been displaced in Iraq since the beginning of 2014.

An estimated 60,000 Yazidis live in Germany, mainly in the western states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Lower Saxony. A number of local associations planned to mark the August 3 anniversary with rallies in Berlin and Bremen later on Monday.

nm/jil (AFP, AP, KNA, epd, dpa)

Source: dw.com

Karabakh willing to accept on its territory Yezidis refugees

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Davit Babayan, spokesman of President Bako Sahakian Karabakh, yesterday expressed its willingness to grant asylum to Yezidis who were forced to flee their homes in parts of arton102548-268x151northern Iraq controlled by the Islamic state.

Davit Babayan mentioned the Yezidis as “brothers” faced genocide at the hands of Sunni insurgent groups.

“The Armenian people can not be indifferent to what is currently done for Yazidis,” said Babayan. “The Yezidis are the only people who have become an integral part of the Armenian people.”

Nagorno-Karabakh is ready for Yazidi refugees. “Artsakh has many socio-economic problems,” he said, using the traditional name of Karabakh. “But if there are such requests we, as a state committed to democratic and humanitarian standards, we try to help as many people as we can.”

Asked whether the Karabakh Armenians are willing to resettle Iraqi Yezidis in the territories under their control, Babayan said: “If such requests, we will see how we can give them.”

Officials in Armenia, home to a large community of Yezidis were more cautious. According to the Armenian Foreign Ministry, no Iraqi Yezidi have fled or have sought asylum in the country so far.

Boris Murazi, a Yezidi activist, confirmed that. He argued that going in Armenia is not easy for his family because they can not receive Armenian visas at the border and have to make a long journey through Turkey and Iran and Georgia. In the words of Murazi, Iraqi Yazidis stayed away from Armenia so far also because of the “delay” of the reaction from the Armenian government to their suffering.

It was only on Monday that President Serzh Sargsyan expressed deep concern about the massacres and deportations of Iraqi Yezidis.

“Better late than never,” said Murazi. “It is good that the authorities have realized that they can not be indifferent to the fate not only of the Yazidi, but also citizens of Armenia who demanded that authorities cease to be indifferent.”

Indeed, a growing number of Armenians and the media asking Yerevan to take a more proactive civic activists. Several activists have set up a Facebook group to raise funds for loans to spend Iraqi Yezidis in Armenia.

“Armenia should open its borders to refugees and Yezidis accept the largest possible number of them,” said Bayandur Poghosian, member of the “Help your brothers Yezidis.” Poghosian acknowledged that the Armenian government is short of money to be able to help them financially. That is why, he says, activists are asking for private donations.

Wednesday, August 20, 2014,

If Armenian Genocide had been denounced, Yazidis would not be suffering now – Ruben Melkonyan

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The developments in the Middle East are the result of the West’s double-standard policy, expert in Turkic studies Ruben Melkonyan told reporters on genocide-YazidiMonday.

What is happening to Yazidis now is identical to what is going on in Syria.

“The West is arming Islamists on the one hand, and is criticizing and bombing on the other hand. Turkey has played a great role in supporting Islamic extremists, and it was with Turkey’s support that they entered Kessab. And the extremists committing the Yazidi genocide now are being supported by Turkey,” Mr Melkonyan said.

Armenians, as a genocide survivor nation, must support Yazidis to prevent what happened early in the 20th century from recurring in the 21st century.

“If the Armenian Genocide had been denounced, Yazidis would not be suffering now. We are going to witness such atrocities until the Armenian Genocide has been denounced,” he said.

Source: tert.am

 

Identity crisis among Kurdish Yazidis in Armenia

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By Deniz Serinci 

YEREVAN, Armenia,— In the small Caucasian country Armenia there is a dispute over the identity of the area’s Yazidis, a religious minority found only among the Kurds, thorough kurdsworld644history mistakenly believed to be “devil worshippers” and persecuted for some of their beliefs.

Last week Yazidis in Armenia held a protest in front of the UN Office in Yerevan against the recent attacks on Yazidis in Iraq. The protest was led by The Yezidi Union in Armenia, which are known for sharing the view that Yazidis have no connections to Kurds. The approximately 40,000 Yazidis came to Armenia as refugees from the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century and are the largest minority group in the mainly Christian country.

During a visit, Aziz Tamoyan, the director of the Yezidi Union in Armenia, told Rudaw:
“We are not Kurds. They speak Kurdish, we speak Ezdiki. They come from the Middle East, Yazidis come from the ancient Babylonians.”

Tamoyan showed the Union’s newspaper “Yezidikhaya” which on the front page write “My nation is Yezidi, my language is Ezdiki and my religion is Sharfadin”, a term for the belief. In 2002 the National Assembly of the Republic of Armenia at the request of a group of Yazidis of Armenia, headed by Tamoyan have recognized Yazidis as a separate ethnicity and their language as Ezdiki. This is now taught in Armenian universities, where ‘Kurdish’ and ‘Ezdiki’ are taught as different languages.

In addition they have their own flag, consisting of a white and red color, and a yellow sun. The flag is similar to the Kurdish flag, but missing the green color, as this color in their opinion symbolizes Islam.

Kurdologist Garnik Asatrian from Yerevan State University supports the Yezidikhaya project’s denial of being Kurdish, although disagreeing voices refer to the fact that Ezdiki sounds just like Kurmanji-Kurdish.

“Yazidis and Kurds are completely different ethnic identities. Language is not a decisive criterion, some people in Africa speak English, but has nothing to do with British,” Asatrian told Rudaw.

However, the Yezidikhaya project is not, condoned by academic specialists on Yazidis outside of Armenia, who say that Yazidis speak Kurmanji Kurdish and belong essentially to Kurdish culture.

Philip G. Kreyenbroek is professor and director of Iranian Studies at University of Göttingen and told Rudaw:

“Obviously the Yazidis are Kurds. Their common language, including that of their sacred texts, is Kurmanji Kurdish, and they originate in the Lalish area in Northern Iraq.”

He says the denying of being Kurdish is due to the Armenian genocide in 1915 during the reign of the Ottoman Empire, in which the Kurdish Hamidiyye regiments played an important role in killing Armenians.

Barzoo Eliassi, researcher at University of Oxford, agrees with Kreyenbroek.

“There are no doubt Yazidis are Kurds. Kurdishness is not a homogenous category. Turks and some Kurds were involved in genocidal acts against the Armenians in 1915. So for Yazidis, to avoid being Muslim and Kurd, mean avoiding double stigmatization in the Armenian context,” he told Rudaw.

Matthias Bjornlund, a Danish historian and author to books about Armenia, believes Yazidis in Armenia feel a need to distance themselves from Non-Yezidi Kurds, some of which helped to carry out the genocidewAgainst Against Armenian in 1915. After the Nagorno-Karabakh war 1991-94 between the Armenians and Muslim Azerbaijanis Yazidis once more felt pressure to appear loyal.

“The war has contributed to an increasing number of Yazidis in Armenia saying they are ‘pure’ Yezidi, rather than Kurds, because it is less controversial and not associated with Islam,” Bjornlund told Rudaw.

Titale Kerem is editor of the newspaper Riya Taze, the world’s longest-lived Kurdish newspaper, founded in Armenia in 1932. He describes himself as a “Kurd by ethnicity and Yezidi by religion”.

“Of course we are Kurds. We speak Kurdish. However many Yazidis hold grudges due to past massacres against them by non-Yezidi Kurds and therefore will not be associated with them,” he told Rudaw.

Aziz Gerdenzeri is a Yezidi Book Author, theater writer and doctor, born in Georgia, but lived for many years in Armenia and Central Asia. He believes that some Yazidi groups after political events have begun to consider the word “Kurd” as synonymous with “Muslim” and therefore reject a relationship with the Kurds.

“Yezidi and Kurds are one and the same nation. We have the same language, history and traditions. But due to historical massacres against Yazidis, people perceive the word ‘Kurd’ as ‘Muslim’,” he told Rudaw.

Outside Armenia most Yezidi associations do not share their views of their co-religionists in the Caucasian country. Chairman of Ezidi Culture Association in Denmark, Yilmaz Yildiz is questioning why generations of Yazidis have fought side by side with Muslim Kurds as Kurdish partisans, Peshmergas in Iraq, Turkey and Syria if they themselves were not Kurds.

“The Yezidi are and have been part of the Kurdish resistance movement throughout Kurdistan, simply because they consider themselves indigenous Kurds and are part of the Kurdish community. When Saddam Hussein killed Yazidis during Anfal, it was because of their Kurdish identity and not because they were Yazidis. When he burned their houses and gave their land and villages to the Arabs, it was because they were Kurds,” Yildiz told Rudaw.

“If they Yazidis are not Kurds, why do we talk the same language as all other Kurds? Why do we not have our own common language?” he added.

 

Deniz B. Serinci, a freelance Danish professional journalist. You can visit his official website at: www.serinci.dk.