Remembrance of the Yazidi genocide (Sinjar, 2014)

Culture of origin: Yezidi · Historical

Holiday sources: Yezidism

In the early hours of 3 August 2014 the Islamic State attacked Sinjar, after the Kurdish forces guarding the district withdrew. About 50,000 Yazidis fled onto Mount Sinjar, where they were trapped for more than a week without food or water, and hundreds died in the summer heat. The Islamic State killed Yazidi men who refused to convert and sold thousands of women and girls, some as young as nine, in slave markets. The UN put the dead at about 5,000 in August 2014 and the women and girls trafficked at about 10,800; a 2017 survey estimated 2,100 to 4,400 killed and 4,200 to 10,800 abducted. More than 80 mass graves have been found around Sinjar. A UN commission of inquiry found on 16 June 2016 that the Islamic State was committing genocide against the Yazidis, and on 10 May 2021 the UN investigative team UNITAD reported "clear and convincing evidence" of genocide. On 30 November 2021 a Frankfurt court sentenced the Islamic State member Taha al-Jumailly to life for genocide, believed to be the first such conviction of an Islamic State member. In 2022 more than 2,760 Yazidi women and girls were still missing. The Kurdistan Parliament made 3 August Yazidi Genocide Remembrance Day in 2019, and since 2024 Iraq's government offices stand in a minute's silence at 10 a.m. every 3 August.