Minority Brief Profile: Iraq’s Yazidi May 2020
th th Yazidis count seventy-two genocides against their community in the 18 and 19 centuries, prior to the seventy-third attempt in 2014 by ISIS.
The United Nations determined in June 2016 that Yazidis were victims of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes committed by ISIS.
Men and women who survived these crimes are plagued with symptoms of severe trauma and face unemployment, poverty, and homelessness.
IRAQ’S YAZIDIS: A BACKGROUND The Yazidi of Iraq is one of the oldest ethno-religious minorities in the Middle East. Predominantly located in Northern Iraq, Yazidis are ethnically Kurdish and speak Kurmanji (northern Iraqi Kurdish). Before the 2014 Islamic State’s (ISIS) incursion in the Nineveh province, the Yazidi community of Iraq numbered around 1 600,000. Yazidi leaders estimate that there are now about 400,000 – 500,000 Yazidi still residing in Iraq, 2 primarily in the north and approximately 360,000 remain displaced.
The origins of the Yazidi religion is believed to date back to the 11th century, though some trace their origins 3 to the ancient Sumerian period. Their religious beliefs are syncretic and share many elements with Zoroastrianism while observing many Abrahamic customs, such as baptism, circumcision, and not eating 4 pork. Yazidis are endogamous, rarely intermarry with other Kurds, and conversion to the Yazidi religion is 5 prohibited.
6 Under Article 2 of the Iraqi Constitution, Yazidis are guaranteed freedom of religious belief and practice. This gives the religion legal recognition in Iraq allowing it to appoint legal representatives and perform legal 7 transactions as well as give adherents of the faith access to their own personal status courts.
Despite constitutional guarantees, the Yazidis have been subjected to severe persecution, stemming from decades of conflict between the Yazidi community and various Muslim entities. The Abbasid Caliphate launched a series of armed campaigns to suppress and eliminate the Yazidis in Kurdistan and around Mount
1 Shak Hanish, Christians, Yazidis, and Mandaeans in Iraq: A Survival Issue, Digest of Middle East Studies, Spring 2009. 2Iraq 2018 International Religious Freedom Report, State Department,4 (2018), https:// https://www.state.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/IRAQ-2018-INTERNATIONAL-RELIGIOUS-FREEDOM-R EPORT.pdf [hereinafter IRF 2018]. 3 YezidiTruth, The Yezidis, YezidiTruth: The Truth About the Yezidis, http://www.yeziditruth.org/. 4 BBC News, Who, What, Why: Who are the Yazidis? BBC News, August 8, 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-28686607. 5 Yasmine Hafiz, Yazidi Religious Beliefs: History, Facts and Traditions of Iraq’s Persecuted Minority, Huffington Post, August 13, 2014, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/13/yazidi-religious-beliefs_n_5671903.html. 6 Constitution of the Republic of Iraq (Dustur Juinhuriyat Iraq) of September 11, 2005, art. 2 (hereinafter Iraqi Constitution). 7 IRF 2018, 5.
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8 Sinjar. These operations continued under the Ottoman Empire, who along with Kurdish authorities 9 committed brutally violent campaigns against the Yazidi. Yazidis themselves count seventy-two genocidal 10 massacres against their community in the 18th and 19th centuries. This extensive history of suffering is a key 11 component of Yazidi identity and is memorialized and recounted through oral traditions.
ARABIZATION AND THE FALL OF THE BA’ATH REGIME 1932, after the termination of British mandatory rule in Iraq, ethnicity became a central part of Iraqi national and international politics as the Iraqi government attempted to unify Iraq’s groups under the banner of 12 national solidarity. In 1934, Yazidi Kurds resisted universal conscription to the military, particularly in the 13 Sinjar area. Their resistance was a symbol of reconstructing ethnic political and cultural solidarity vis-a-vis an 14 oppressive state and played a major role in developing ethnic politics in Northern Iraq.
During Saddam’s mid-1970s Arabization policies, as well as being caught in the middle of the Iran-Iraq war, Yazidi villages were razed and Yazidis being forced to migrate to urban centers, the practice of Yazidi faith was restricted, Yazidi history was prohibited from school education, and Yazidi people were physically 15 separated from their holy sites.
The US invasion of Iraq and the toppling of Saddam’s government worsened Yazidi conditions, exposing them to attacks by armed insurgents. Al-Qaeda in Iraq was responsible for the most deadly suicide bomb attack during the Iraq war, which devastated two Yazidi villages, killing approximately 500 and wounding 16 17 1,500. Attacks against the Yazidi have continued since, leading to contemporary targeted violence by ISIS.
8 M. Th. Houtsma, E. J. Brill's First Encyclopedia of Islam 1913-1936, Vol. 4, 1136, (1993), http://www.brill.com/encyclopaedia-islam-1913-1936-ej-brills-first-9-vols. 9 Avi Asher-Shapiro, Who Are the Yazidis, the Ancient, Persecuted Religious Minority Struggling to Survive in Iraq? National Geographic News, August 11, 2014, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/08/140809-iraq-yazidis-minority-isil-religion-history/. 10 Raya Jalabi, Who are the Yazidis and why is Isis hunting them? The Guardian, August 11, 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/07/who-yazidi-isis-iraq-religion-ethnicity-mountains. 11 Asher-Shapiro, supra note 9. 12 Nelida Fuccaro, Ethnicity, State Formation, and Conscription in Postcolonial Iraq: The Case of the Yazidi Kurds of Jabal Sinjar, 29(4) Int’l. J. Middle East Stud., 559, (1997) https://www.jstor.org/stable/164402?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents. 13 Id. 14 Id. 15 Joshua Castellino and Kathleen A. Cavanaugh, Minority Rights in the Middle East, http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199679492.001.0001/acprof-9780199679492. 16 Al-Jazeera, How suicide bombings shattered Iraq, Al-Jazeera, October 24, 2010, http://www.aljazeera.com/secretiraqfiles/2010/10/20101022161025428625.html. 17 Peter Henne and Conrad Hackett, Iraqi Yazidis: Hazy population numbers and a history of persecution, Pew Research Center, August 12, 2014, http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/08/12/iraqi-yazidis-hazy-population-numbers-and-a-history-of-persecutio n/.
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RD THE 73 ATTEMPT On August 3, 2014, the Islamic State seized Sinjar City and neighboring villages in northwestern Iraq, whose 18 population was about 308,315, predominantly Yazidis. The Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga withdrew their forces without warning, and in a few hours, ISIS kidnapped and killed thousands of Yazidis. Yazidi men were executed in droves, women and young girls were raped and taken to slave markets for ISIS fighters, and young boys were recruited into ISIS training camps. Anyone captured was forced to convert to Islam or face death. Quickly, the town of Sinjar was deserted as over 200,000 civilians fled to Mount Sinjar and the neighboring Dohuk Province of Iraqi Kurdistan. Those who fled to Mount Sinjar were stranded for a few days, facing horrific conditions with high temperatures, no water, food, or medical care. Many displaced 19 Yazidis died of starvation, dehydration, and other health conditions.
Shortly after the offensive, Iraqi, Australian, U.K. and U.S. planes dropped food, water, and humanitarian aid 20 to those stranded on Mount Sinjar. On August 7, 2014, the U.S. declared that it would begin targeted airstrikes against ISIS in order to prevent the escalation of genocide against the Iraqi people trapped in Mount 21 Sinjar. Additionally, the Turkish Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), with the help of the YPG (a Syrian 22 branch of the PKK) set up a safe corridor to evacuate people from the mountain to Syria. After a few days 23 of fighting, the Peshmerga were finally able to liberate Sinjar in November 2015.
24 In August 2016, the United Nations estimated that 5,000 Yazidi were killed. As of May 2017, a study published in PLOS Medicine put that number at 9,900 killed in a matter of days when violence broke out in 2 5 August 2014.
18 Human Rights Office, A Call for Accountability and Protection: Yezidi Survivors of Atrocities Committed by ISIL, Human Rights Office, August 2016, http://www.uniraq.org/images/humanrights/UNAMI%20OHCHR_Report%20Yezidi%20Survivors%20A%20Call%2 0for%20Justice_FINAL_12Aug2016.pdf (hereinafter UNAMI Report). 19 Valeria Cetorelli, Isaac Sasson, Nazar Shabila, and Gilbert Burnham, ISIS’ Yazidi Genocide, Foreign Affairs, June 8, 2017, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/syria/2017-06-08/isis-yazidi-genocide. 20 BBC, 10 days in Iraq: Aid drops, airstrikes and 200,000 new refugees, BBC, August 19, 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28761383. 21 Barack Obama, Statement by the President, Office of the Press Secretary, August 7, 2014, https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2014/08/07/statement-president. 22 Tracey Shelton, ‘If it wasn’t for the Kurdish fighters, we would have died up there’, Public International Radio, August 29, 2014, https://www.pri.org/stories/2014-08-29/if-it-wasn-t-kurdish-fighters-we-would-have-died-there. 23 Jason Hanna and Ed Payne, Kurds say they’ve liberated Sinjar from ISIS, CNN, November 13, 2015, https://www.pri.org/stories/2014-08-29/if-it-wasn-t-kurdish-fighters-we-would-have-died-there. 24Id. 25 Lizzie Dearden, Almost 10,000 Yazidis ‘killed or kidnapped in Isis genocide but true scale of horror may never be known,’ Independent, May 9, 2017, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/isis-islamic-state-yazidi-sex-slaves-genocide-sinjar-death-toll-n umber-kidnapped-study-un-lse-a7726991.html.
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Of that figure 3,100 were murdered, with almost half executed by gunshot, beheading or being burned alive, while the rest died from starvation, dehydration or injuries during the I[SIS] siege on Mount Sinjar.
Researchers estimated that 6,800 other Yazidis were kidnapped in the brutal campaign, with 26 over a third still missing at the time of the survey.
According to UNAMI/OHCHR sources, ISIS killed between 2,000-5,500 Yazidis since this incident, and approximately 6,386 Yazidi men and women were abducted, of which 2,587 have escaped as of mid-May, 27 2016.
Almost 500,000 Yazidis are now refugees or internally displaced persons dispersed throughout the region in 28 Turkey, Syria, and other more stable regions of Iraq. Many displaced Yazidis are facing unemployment and lack of food, as well as homelessness where many have taken to the streets, abandoned buildings, and open 29 areas for refuge. Those who survived the massacre are plagued with symptoms of trauma and adequate 30 treatment is difficult to obtain. While much of the media spotlight has focused on the sexual violence and 31 subsequent trauma experienced by women and girls, men and boys have also experienced horrific violence.
Despite efforts to defeat ISIS in Iraq, the protection of the Yazidis and their land has become a flashpoint for 32 tensions between the Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq and the PKK. On March 16, 2017, the Kurdistan Region’s President Masoud Barzani, urged the PKK to leave Kurdish territory in Iraq, 33 citing ongoing tensions and fear that it may erupt. H owever, the Yazidis objected, arguing that it was the 34 PKK who saved them when the Peshmerga fled ahead of the ISIS offensive. Recent fighting between the Peshmerga and PKK has left the Yazidis caught in the middle urging them to focus on fighting ISIS instead 35 of each other. Some Yazidis report harassment by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Peshmerga and Asayish forces (the primary intelligence agency operating in Iraqi Kurdistan), citing that they have 36 prevented them from returning to their liberated homeland by closing roads. The United States Congress
26 Id. 27 UNAMI Report, supra note 19. 28 Uzay Bulut, Displaced by Islamic State, Yazidis Find Harsh Conditions in Turkey, VOA News, October 9, 2016, http://www.voanews.com/a/displaced-by-isis-yazidis-find-harsh-conditions-in-turkey/3543639.html. 29 Yazda, The Yezidi Humanitarian Crisis and Genocide in Iraq, Yazda, https://www.yazda.org/refugees-and-immigration/. 30 Id. 31 Human Rights Council, U.N. Doc. A/HRC/32/CRP.2, Thirty-second Session, “They came to destroy”: ISIS Crimes Against the Yazidis, June 15, 2016, http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/HRCouncil/CoISyria/A_HRC_32_CRP.2_en.pdf (hereinafter HRC Genocide Determination). 32 Rudaw, KRG renews call on PKK to withdraw troops from Yezidi City, Rudaw, March 17, 2017, http://www.rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/170320174. 33 Loveday Morris, Yazidis who suffered genocide are fleeing again, but this time not from the Islamic State, Washington Post, March 21, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/yazidis-who-suffered-genocide-are-fleeing-again-but-this-time-n ot-from-the-islamic-state/2017/03/21/6392fe26-0353-11e7-9d14-9724d48f5666_story.html?utm_term=.1c398480709c. 34 Id. 35 Id. 36 IRF 2018, 1
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proposed concurrent resolution 152 supporting the creation of a Nineveh Plain province independent from Mosul, which was proposed by Iraq’s Council of Ministers on January 21, 2014, and the right to 37 self-determination. In support of a semi-autonomous Nineveh region is the belief that the province would have the ability to develop their own security forces to protect their borders and to manage a provincial 38 budget to address chronic underdevelopment the region has faced over the years. However, policy experts have warned against this division arguing that it will intensify differences and conflicts between the two ruling governments, Baghdad and KRG, as well as between the minority groups, differences that already 39 existed prior to ISIS.
GENOCIDE LABEL On September 24, 2015, two Yazidi groups, Free Yezidi Foundation and Yazda, met with the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda and submitted a report detailing alleged atrocities against 40 Yazidi in Iraq. Although Iraq is not a signatory to the Rome Statute, the report argued that the ICC did have jurisdiction over some 5,000 – 7,500 foreign ISIS fighters including about 2,000 from France, Britain, 41 Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands. The KRG and former ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo 42 supported this effort. The United States Department of State, on March 17, 2016, formally declared that ISIS is “responsible for 43 genocide against groups in areas under its control, including Y[a]zidis, Christians, and Shia Muslims.” John Kerry, former secretary of state in the Obama administration, further emphasized that ISIS is also responsible “for crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing directed at these same groups and in some cases also 44 against Sunni Muslims, Kurds, and other minorities.” First introduced on September 9, 2015, Concurrent Resolution 75 passed the U.S. House of Representatives on March 14, 2016 with a vote of 393 to 0, detailing the crimes committed by ISIS and designating their actions as war crimes, crimes against humanity, and 45 genocide against Yazidis as well as other religious minority groups in Iraq and Syria. In June 2016, Vian Dakhil, a Yazidi member of Iraq’s parliament, made a statement to the gathered assembly calling the violence
37 Expressing the sense of Congress that the United States and the international community should support the Republic of Iraq and its people to recognize a province in the Nineveh Plain region, consistent with lawful expressions of self-determination by its indigenous peoples, H.Con.Res. 152, 114th Cong. (2016), https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-concurrent-resolution/152/all-info#major-actions. 38 Dylan O’Driscoll and Dave van Zoonen, Governing Ninevah After the Islamic State: A Solution for all components, Middle East Research Institute Policy Paper, 3, 2016, http://www.meri-k.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/What-About-the-Minorities-1.pdf. 39 Id. 40 Toby Sterling, Persecuted by Islamic State, Yazidis turn to ICC for Justice, Reuters, September 25, 2015, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-icc-yazidis-idUSKCN0RO14G20150924. 41 Id. 42 Id. 43 John Kerry, Remarks on Daesh and Genocide, US Department of State, March 17, 2016, https://2009-2017.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2016/03/254782.htm. 44 Id. 45 Expressing the sense of Congress that the atrocities perpetrated by ISIL against religious and ethnic minorities in Iraq and Syria include war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, H.Con.Res 75, 114th Congress, (2016), https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-concurrent-resolution/75.
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46 rd against Yazidi people genocide. M any Yazidi leaders have dubbed atrocities of those two years as “the 73 47 genocide attempt.”
On June 15, 2016, the United Nations singled out the Yazidis as victims of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes committed by ISIS, with the Sinjar massacre as the primary site of violence. Their declaration was based on evidence compiled from interviews with survivors, religious leaders, smugglers, 48 activists, lawyers, medical professionals, and journalists. As of November 2019, UN Investigators have identified 160 ISIS militants accused of massacres of Yazidis in Northern Iraq in 2014 and are building cases 49 against them. As laid out in the 1948 Geneva Convention, the Human Rights Council found that ISIS did intend to destroy the Yazidi only through killings, but also through “sexual slavery, enslavement, torture and inhuman and degrading treatment, and forcible transfer causing serious bodily and mental harm; the infliction of conditions of life that bring about a slow death; the imposition of measures to prevent Yazidi children from being born, including forced conversion of adults, the separation of Yazidi men and women, and mental trauma; and the transfer of Yazidi children from their own families and placing them with ISIS fighters, thereby cutting them off from beliefs and practices of their own religious community, and erasing their 50 identity as Yazidis.” Additionally, Yazidi women were raped and forced to convert to Islam, triggering Iraqi constitutional and civil law that prohibits conversion away from Islam and requiring children of any Muslim 51 parent to convert to Islam.
LOCAL AND INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT Locally, government agencies in Iraqi Kurdistan, specifically the Department of Health and the Department of Combating Violence against Women, have tried to undertake initiatives to rescue Yazidi women from 52 captive by working with smugglers and middlemen. At the forefront of support are humanitarian and advocacy organizations such as Yazda, a multi-national organization committed to both advocating and providing on the ground services for Yazidis. Their humanitarian work focuses on trauma treatment, health care, case management, while their advocacy work focuses on documenting evidence of ISIS crimes, seeking 53 recognition for the genocide, and raising awareness. (However, in January 2017, Kurdish authorities shut 54 down Yazda’s office in Iraq claiming they failed to abide by KRG NGO laws.)
46 UNWatch, Yazidi MP Vian Dakhil Addresses UN Human Rights Council on Genocide Report, UNWatch, June 24, 2016, https://www.unwatch.org/yazidi-mp-vian-dakhil-addresses-human-rights-council/. 47 Asher-Shapiro, supra note 9. 48 HRC Genocide Determination, supra note 30. 49 UN Investigators eye 160 Daesh militants over Yazidi massacres, Middle East Monitor, November 27, 2019, https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20191127-un-investigators-eye-160-daesh-militants-over-yazidi-massacres/ 50 Id. 51 IRF 2018, 1 52 Wilson Fache, How this Yazidi man is saving IS Captives, Al-Monitor, June 9, 2016, http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/06/iraq-yazidi-smugglers-isis-captives.html. 53 Yazda, About Us, Yazda - A Global Yazidi Organization, https://www.yazda.org/about-us/. 54 Emma Graham-Harrison, Charity helping Yazidi survivors of ISIS sexual slavery Shut Down, The Guardian, January 12, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/12/charity-yazidi-survivors-isis-sexual-slavery-shut-down-kurdish-auth orities-yazda-women-children.
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The international community has been heavily critiqued, including by renowned human rights lawyer, Amal 55 Clooney, for failing to act in response following the genocide declarations. In August 2017, the United Nations Human Rights Commission of Inquiry similarly criticized states for not fulfilling obligation to 56 address the largely ongoing genocide of the Yazidi.
Some unilateral initiatives have, however, been taken, such as an agreement by Germany, to house and 57 provide therapy to traumatized Yazidi women. Similarly, Canada vowed to bring 1,200 Yazidi refugees by 58 the end of 2017, a proposition that was initially opposed by Kurdish Prime Minister. In the United States, refugee admission has recently been subjected to a series of executive orders issued under Donald Trump’s administration, which ordered temporary bans. Through ongoing litigation, refugee admission was not fully 59 banned, and despite the fluidity of the situation, Yazidi admission to the US increased in fiscal year 2017. However since then there has been a drastic decrease in refugee admission to the US—in the fiscal year of 60 2018 the US admitted 60% fewer refugees than it did in fiscal year 2017.
61 Nationality FY 2015 FY 2016 FY 2017 FY 2018 Total Iraq 213 393 434 20 1047 Syria 0 24 26 0 50 Total 213 417 460 20 1097
Five years on from when ISIS first swept through Yazidi communities in Iraq and Syria, many survivors returning to their homelands or remaining internally displaced face serious hardships resulting from the 62 63 violence they faced and continue to face. Modern Sinjar has been slow to rebuild and lacks basic resources.
55 Lucy Westcott, Amal Clooney Says U.N. Has Failed Yazidi Women, Newsweek, September 17, 2016, http://www.newsweek.com/amal-clooney-nadia-murad-yazidi-genocide-un-499867. 56 ISIL's 'genocide' against Yazidis is ongoing, UN rights panel says, calling for international action, UN News Centre, August 3, 2017, http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=57304#.WmPWrBM-eRs. 57 Lara Whyte, Germany Opens its Doors to Yazidi Women and Children Enslaved by ISIS, The Guardian, March 2, 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2016/mar/02/germany-opens-doors-yazidi-women-children-north ern-iraq-enslaved-isis. 58 News Release, Canada to Welcome 1200 Yazidi and Other Survivors of Daesh, Government of Canada, February 21, 2017, https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/news/2017/02/canada_to_welcome1200yazidiandothersu rvivorsofdaesh.html; Murray Brewster and CBC News, Kurdish PM opposes Canada's 'organized migration' of Yazidis, CBC News, November 17, 2016, http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/kurds-yazidis-opposition-1.3855910. 59 Arrivals Data is Available for FY and CY 2002 through Present, Refugee Processing Center, search ran in January 2018, http://ireports.wrapsnet.org/Interactive-Reporting/EnumType/Report?ItemPath=/rpt_WebArrivalsReports/MX%20- %20Arrivals%20by%20Nationality%20and%20Religion. 60 Refugee resettlement by the numbers: FY17 vs. FY18 Arrivals Comparison, International Rescue Committee, September 17, 2018, https://www.rescue.org/resource/refugee-resettlement-numbers-fy17-vs-fy18-arrivals-comparison. See also PDF Resource, https://www.rescue.org/sites/default/files/document/3119/refugeearrivalsanalysisoct-aug3.pdf. 61 Arrivals Data is Available for FY and CY 2002 through Present, Refugee Processing Center, search ran in September 2019, http://ireports.wrapsnet.org/Interactive-Reporting/EnumType/Report?ItemPath=/rpt_WebArrivalsReports/MX%20- %20Arrivals%20by%20Nationality%20and%20Religion. 62 COI Note on the Situation of Yazidi IDPs in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, UNCHR, May 2019, https://www.refworld.org/pdfid/5cd156657.pdf. 63 Sinjar: Three years on, Yazidis have nowhere to return, Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), Nov. 8, 2018, https://www.nrc.no/news/2018/november/sinjar-three-years-on-yazidis-have-nowhere-to-return/.
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64 The scars left by ISIS still impact the Yazidi community’s ability to trust its surroundings in Iraq. Some children kidnapped years ago who survived and were rescued have returned traumatized and unable to speak 65 Kurmanji, instead speaking Arabic. Some children remain lost and some were kidnapped so young there is a 66 chance they no longer remember their identity. In addition to children, many adult family members are still missing—“the search for missing Yazidis has fallen mostly to Yazidis and others working to rescue women 67 and children, often paying to buy them back from ISIS.”
Eshhad is the Arabic imperative for "witness" or "testify," which lies at the core of what we do. We document sectarianism against religious, cultural, and ethnic minorities in the Middle East.
For more information about Eshhad, please visit our website eshhad.org.
64 Sara Aridi, Photographing the Yazidis in Iraq as They Struggle to Rebuild Their Lives, The New York Times, Jan. 22, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/22/lens/yazidis-iraq-isis-back-home.html. 65 Jane Arraf, Freed From ISIS, Few Yazidis Return To Suffering Families, Many Remain Missing, NPR, March 14, 2019, https://www.npr.org/2019/03/14/702650912/freed-from-isis-few-yazidis-return-to-suffering-families-many-remain-mi ssing. 66 Id. 67 Id.
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