World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples - Iraq : Yezidis

Updated October 2014

Profile

The Yezidi religion, with 4,000 year-old origins, seems to be a synthesis of pagan, Zoroastrian, Manichaean, Jewish, Nestorian Christian and Muslim elements. Yezidis are dualists, believing in a Creator God, now passive, and Malak Ta'us (Peacock Angel), executive organ of divine will. They believe they are descended from Adam but not Eve and are thereby different from the rest of humankind. Excommunication, therefore, has dire implications. Conversely, one cannot become a Yezidi and marriage outside of the community is forbidden. The name probably derives from the Persian ized (angel, deity).

Iraq'a Yezidis are concentrated in Jabal Sinjar, 150 kilometres west of Mosul, with a smaller community in Shaikhan, the Kurdistan foothills east of Mosul, where their most holy shrine of Shaykh Adi is located.

The Yezidis are by and large impoverished cultivators and herdsmen who have a strictly graded religio-political hierarchy and tend to maintain a more closed community than other ethnic or religious groups. Historically, they have been subject to sharp persecution owing to their heretical beliefs and practices. According to current statistics, there are approximately 500,000 Yezidis in Iraq.

For ethnic reasons Yezidis are caught between Arabs and Kurds in Iraq. Many Yezidis suffered in Saddam Hussein's genocidal Anfal campaign alongside the Kurds and were forced to define themselves as Arabs. Yezidis speak Kurdish and are granted full religious freedom under the Kurdish regional government in which they also hold two ministerial posts, but certain Yezidi representatives have criticised Kurdish officials for poor treatment of the Yezidi minority.

Historical context

Yezidis traditionally were tribally organized. Some tribes were willing to combine in confederation with Muslim and Christian tribes under an acknowledged paramount chief. Until the nineteenth century they were a formidable presence around Mosul, but endured devastating assaults from Sunni Kurdish tribes and Ottoman troops, partly because of the disorder created by Yezidi tribes but also because of growing religious antipathy, heightened by European interest in the Yezidis.

Following the formation of Iraq, the Yezidis proved resistant to both British and Iraqi efforts to extend direct administration to the region. Iraqi efforts to introduce conscription led to repeated risings, notably 1935-40, critically at a time when the Shammar bedouin were encroaching on traditional Yezidi pasturage. Conscription was closely associated with Ottoman rule, removed vital manpower, and exposed Yezidis to cohabitation in barracks with 'sons of Eve'.

The Yezidis have always remained on the fringes of Iraqi society, but because of the strategic position of Jabal Sinjar they received unwelcome attention from Hussein's state security. Under the Ba'ath, repeated efforts were made to Arabize the area and also to persuade Yezidis that they were really Arab. Reaction was mixed, but some Yezidis support the Kurdish national movement. Yezidis reluctantly served in the army against Iran, and the community escaped the Anfal, the Kurdish genocide, in 1987-8.

Current issues

During the reign of Saddam Hussein, Yezidis were sometimes considered as Arabs rather than Kurds, and therefore were used as a community that would tilt the balance in the northern Kurdish areas toward Arab control. This politicization of their ethnicity has been detrimental to Yezidi security.

In the wake of the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, Yezidis also faced increased persecution by religious extremists who incorrectly regarded them as 'devil worshippers' due to a misinterpretation of their religion. A Yezidi council member for the Nineveh Plains was assassinated in April 2006, one of 11 Yezidis reported murdered between September 2005 and September 2006. In April 2007, suspected Sunni militants-thought to be Al Qaeda in Iraq-pulled 23 Yezidi men from a bus and executed them. The same group of extremists targeted the Yezidi community with the single most devastating terrorist attack of the Iraq war in August 2007; four truck bombs killed 215 Yezidis in two villages in the Nineveh Plains, along the Syrian border. A July 2008 report from Iraq's Ministry of Human Rights stated that between 2003 and the end of 2007, a total of 335 Yezidis had been killed in direct or indirect attacks. Although there was a general reduction of violence in Iraq during 2008, attacks against Yezidis continued, including the shooting deaths of seven family members by armed militants in December 2008. At the end of the year, a car bomb in the predominantly Yezidi town of Sinjar, just outside Mosul, killed several people and wounded more than 40 others.

Under persistent pressure to assimilate with Iraqi Kurds, particularly in the northern territories, abduction and forced marriage are particular risks for Yezidis. Yezidi activists have reported that, since 2003, there have been numerous cases of Yezidi women being abducted and forced to marry members of the Kurdish security force Asayish. Yezidi families are threatened with reprisals if women and girls refuse marriage with militia members. Such marriages effectively seal off these women from their families and communities as Yezidi beliefs prohibit marriage outside the religion, and those who undertake such vows thereby renounce their faith and must identify as Kurdish.

As a small non-Muslim minority, Yezidis have been particularly affected by the recent surge of terror attacks in the country. While Kurdish, Shi'a and Sunni communities have developed their own armed groups as a means of self-defence, marginalized minorities such as Yezidis have found themselves with little effective protection in this deteriorating security environment. For instance, during 2013 there were numerous attacks on Yezidi students attending Mosul University. By the end of the year, approximately 2,000 Yezidi students had stopped attending their classes at the university.

Attacks on Yezidis continued into 2014, with Islamic State's seizure of the town of Sinjar causing up to 50,000 Yezidis to flee their homes and take shelter on a mountain in northern Iraq. The limited amount of humanitarian aid that was dropped by American and Iraqi aircraft was not enough to prevent scores from losing their lives. Other attacks included the killing in early May of six Yezidis from Sinjar in the Rabia region near the Syrian border, where many Yezidis migrate seasonally to work as farmers. Insurgents issued a warning to Yezidi families to leave the area within 24 hours or they would be killed. International rescue operations have since been carried out, but swathes of Yezidi people continue to be either internally displaced in Iraq or seeking refuge in neighbouring countries due to ongoing threat of IS.

When IS captured Mosul on 10 June 2014, many of the city's remaining Yezidis left for good. IS insurgents kidnapped 14 Yezidi soldiers in Husaiba and demanded that they convert to Islam. The IS members reportedly removed the eyes of the 13 soldiers who refused before burning them all to death. On 10th June, IS took over the Badush prison, where they executed nine Yezidi prisoners along with hundreds of Shia. In the beginning of August, IS captured Zumar and seized control of all of Sinjar, home to most of Iraq's Yezidis. Up to 200,000 people fled for their lives. According to Yezidi human rights activist Mirza Ismail, the attacks included beheadings and other mutilations of Yezidis.

In some cases, IS members carried out summary executions in retribution against Yezidi men and boys who had fought to defend their villages. One such massacre took place in the village of Qiniyeh, south-east of Sinjar, in August. According to the testimonies provided by survivors to Amnesty International, IS brought a group of men and boys, some as young as 12, to the edge of the village, where they shot up to 85 people dead. The massacres continued into the middle of August, with a second attack in Kotcho reportedly resulting in deaths of 500 people. IS separated the women from the men, took women and children captive and shot the men in head. There have also been reports of women and children being buried alive in mass graves.

An estimated 2,500 Yezidis have also been kidnapped, according to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Women and children are apparently being detained in a variety of locations and there have been multiple reports of sexual violence against women in detention. Women have also been forced to marry IS fighters or sold in markets as sexual slaves. There have also been reported rapes of women living in IS-controlled areas.

According to a report by HRW, hundreds of Yezidi men, women and children were still being held hostage in detention facilities and makeshift prisons by October 2014. Conditions in these facilities are reportedly poor, with escapees deploring the lack of food or water and overcrowding. Young women and teenage girls have been systematically separated from the rest of their families, before being forcibly converted to Islam and married to IS fighters. Yezidi activists have reported that some captives have escaped, but are forced to remain in hiding.

The prevalence of rape committed by IS fighters against Yezidi women and girls remains unknown, although Yezidi activists claim that the number is likely to be higher than reports suggest due to the stigma surrounding rape in the Yezidi community. Fear of reprisals against women and girls who speak publicly of sexual assault could also prevent women from reporting abuse.