Posted on 05/19/2021 6:18:12 AM PDT by Kaslin
In early May, the U.N. released a report updating its investigation into the horrid crimes perpetrated by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria terrorists against almost every group in northern Iraq and eastern Syria. The goal of the investigation is bold -- to hold accountable the ISIS thugs who committed the atrocities.
For several reasons, I was interested in the report's update on the genocide ISIS thugs committed against Iraqi Yazidis when the terrorists invaded northern Iraq in 2014.
Genocide is the correct word. If it describes the 1994 campaign of mass ethnic murder waged by radical ethnic Hutus against ethnic Tutsis in Rwanda, then it definitely describes the mass murder and rape Islamic State monsters committed against the vulnerable Yazidis. ISIS' mass murder and campaign of rape against the Yazidis had both ethnic and sectarian (religious) dimensions. It is deeply regrettable that political propagandists have used the word to shock and manipulate, labeling speech they dislike as "genocidal." Real genocide is an unspeakable physical horror.
The Yazidi are ethnic Kurds but they are not Muslim. Their religion connects to older Middle Eastern and Mesopotamian beliefs. They worship the Sun (or a peacock fire angel) but water is also sacred. Scholars speculate their faith has proto-Zoroastrian roots. Evidence suggests they have lived in what is now northern Iraq for several thousand years. Sunni Turks and most Sunni Kurds regard them as heretics but not a threat. The exact number of Yazidis is uncertain, perhaps 200,000, though some sources claim twice that number, arguing many Yazidis hide their faith because they are vulnerable and subject to discrimination.
According to ISIS-aligned Muslim clerics, Yazidis are pagan heretics, so killing them and raping and enslaving the women is justified.
So ISIS' ideologues entered northern Iraq and decided to exterminate them.
In August 2014, an ISIS force drove off a Sunni Kurd militia defending the Yazidi town of Sinjar.
The ISIS killers quickly executed 2,000 Yazidi men and began a systematic campaign of rape and enslavement of Yazidi women. The genocidaires also damaged and destroyed Yazidi cultural and religious sites. By the end of 2014, ISIS fighters would massacre at least 5,000 Yazidi men in the Sinjar region. An estimated 7,000 Yazidi women and children were enslaved. Eventually, nearly 10,000 women and children would be enslaved. More than 50,000 would flee into the mountains, facing death from exposure.
In 2016, the Yazidi death toll was estimated at 10,000. An estimated 2,000 Yazidi women remained enslaved in 2016.
The U.N. investigators treated the attacks against Yazidi in the Sinjar region as one of "two core investigative priorities."
The investigation has paid off. The investigative team "has identified 1,444 potential perpetrators, of whom 469 have been identified as having participated in the attack on Sinjar and 120 in the attack on the village of Kojo."
Using testimonial, documentary, and digital evidence, investigators have identified several hundred ISIS murderers by name (perhaps more). An interview with a former ISIS member "currently detained in a third country" yielded organizational information. The report adds, cryptically, there are "14 primary persons of interest."
Prosecutors intend to use the evidence to charge and convict the perpetrators in court. The report mentions several Iraqi courts with jurisdiction. The Iraqi government, with the help of the U.N. and Australia, is training and supporting Iraqi investigative judges to handle ISIS criminal cases.
Priority cases include those against ISIS "members who played a leading role in the implementation of sexual slavery practices." Investigations and prosecutions are "being taken forward in a number of European and North American jurisdictions." These ISIS members face charges of terrorism, genocide, and pillaging as well as enslavement.
Justice? Slow and uncertain. But it appears some of the most hideous crimes against humanity committed in the last decade may be punished.
Trump promised a safe zone.
The author, Austin Bay:
Austin Bay is the author of three novels. His third novel, The Wrong Side of Brightness, was published by Putnam/Jove in June 2003. He has also co-authored four non-fiction books, to include A Quick and Dirty Guide to War: Third Edition (with James Dunnigan, Morrow, 1996).
Bay writes a syndicated column on international affairs for Creators Syndicate. He is a commentator on National Public Radio’s Morning Edition, covering foreign affairs but often addressing issues in Texas that have a national interest. Bay has appeared as a guest commentator on Fox News Channel, CNN, C-SPAN, MSNBC and ABC News’ “Nightline,” as well as on numerous regional radio and TV shows. As a journalist, he has filed reports from throughout Europe, Central America, Africa, Southeast Asia and the Middle East. He is a contributing editor to FYEO, an Internet foreign affairs newsletter found at www.StrategyPage.com, and writes a weblog on his home page, www.austinbay.net.
He did NOT convey what happened on Shingal.
He has very shallow knowledge of the subject he writes about.
Kurds claim that the Azidi’s are ancestors of the Kurds. And they protect them.
The Kurdish YPG and PKK did not run from the ISIS Terrorist. They prevented the Azidi’s from all being slaughtered, the price they paid was around 900 lives of their forces.
Some Iraqi Pesmerga did run from ISIS, and left the Azadi defenseless.
From the Ezidi’s themselves:
Yazidi Betrayal and Massacre
https://reaperteam.org/yazidi-betrayal-and-massacre-is-on-barzani-and-islamic-state/
No he did not.
Campaigned on it.
Here is the source of all that crap
The Associated Press characterized Trump's decision as “essentially abandoning Kurdish fighters who fought alongside American forces in the years long battle to defeat Islamic State militants.” According to The New York Times, Trump “had given his endorsement for a Turkish military operation that would sweep away American-backed Kurdish forces near the border in Syria.” Trump later denied he was supportive of the Turkish operation.
(Yes Media Matters sucks too)
ISIS would never have been destroyed unless President Trump armed and supported the Kurds. And yes President Trump wanted US out of the Middle East. (It is quicksand among many poisonous snakes)
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