Yazidi people in Shengal (Sinjar) began the day in silence on the 11th anniversary of the genocidal onslaught launched by ISIS on August 3, 2014.
People in the Yazidi town turned their faces toward Mount Shengal as they remembered those who lost their lives in what is known as the 74th genocide suffered by the Yazidis throughout history.
Under the leadership of the Shengal Autonomous Administration, everyone from Herdan to Borik, Guhbel, Duhola, Dîgur, Sinûn, and Xanesor to Shengal center, Girzerik, Tilezêr, Sîba, and Mediban, observed a three-minute silence at 10:00 a.m. as they paid tribute to their loved ones.
Background: Genocide of the Yazidis in Shengal
On 3 August 2014, the Islamic State attacked the Shengal region in northern Iraq with the aim of wiping out the Yazidi community, which had already been persecuted for centuries. Through systematic massacres, rape, torture, expulsion, enslavement of girls and women and the forced recruitment of boys as child soldiers, the Yazidis experienced what they call the “Ferman” – the 74th genocide in their history. According to the UN, at least 10,000 people were killed, about half of them children. Even among the thousands who starved, died of thirst or died of their injuries while fleeing to the mountains, almost all of them were children (93 percent). ISIS forced boys as young as seven to work as child soldiers in its training camps. Girls were raped and sexually enslaved, and more than 400,000 people were driven from their homes.
According to estimates by the Yazda organization, around 2,700 Yazidi are still missing today, including around 1,300 who were children at the time of their abduction. Many of them are still systematically raped and kept and sold as slaves. Therefore, this genocide in its form also represents a femicide. The organization Nadia’s Initiative assumes that 300 to 400 girls and boys under the age of 18 are still in the hands of ISIS. More than 3,500 Yazidi have been rescued, including 2,000 children.
Source: ANF News
