About The Yezidis

The Yezidis – a minority population of the historical region of Mesopotamia, modern Kurdistan (from the Kurdish "Land of the Kurds").

The main territory of residence of the Yezidi people is in the north of Iraq, the areas of Ain Sifni, Sinjar and Dohuk.

Lalish(Dohuk province) is the main shrine for the Yezidis.

The history of the Yezidis is ancient and tragic. Being an autochthonous population of Mesopotamia and living on the same land for thousands of years, the Yezidis in modern history not only do not have their own state, but since the birth of Islam in the 7th century were constantly subjected to genocide by the Muslim majority surrounding them. Such a policy has been going on for centuries.

With the expansion of borders of the Arab caliphate in the 7th century, the population of the conquered lands was subjected to violent Islamization and assimilation. Those who refused to betray the faith of their ancestors were mercilessly destroyed. The Yezidis were not an exception, they were among the first to undergo Arab-Islamic expansion. The Arabs inflicted upon them one of the most powerful blows.

If during the first Arab caliphs - the Umayyads, the Yezidis still held, and during the Abbasid times tried to keep the stubborn pressure on their Islamization, then when the Seljuk Turks appeared in the Middle East arena in the 11th century, the position of the Yezidis became much worse. The Turks began to impose Islam with more merciless methods.

In the Middle Ages, in the territory of historical Kurdistan, there were many independent and semi-independent Kurdish principalities. The Yezidis - in the Middle Ages were an influential force in the Near and Middle East. They possessed several principalities. The population of such emirates as Sheikhan, Marwan with its capital in Diarbakr, Kasser (present-day Syria), Mosul, Hakari, Badinan, Batman, Botan, basically consisted of adherents of the Yezidi faith. The Ottoman sultans respected and maintained good relations with the Yezidi emirs.

The boundaries of the Yezidi principalities stretched from Antakia and Aleppo to Diyarbakir and Jizra, including Mosul, Zakho, Irbil and Soran. Numerous Muslim tribes, Christian nations and Jews also lived on their territories. The Muslims considered the Yezidis to be atheists and in every possible way opposed their superiority. The predominance of Yezidi emirs always aroused discontent and often aggression on the part of the surrounding Muslim emirs.

After receiving the approval of the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman, the Muslim emirs unleashed a joint war against the Yezidis.

The Yezidi emirs were the protection and support of the Yezidis. After their elimination, the position of the Yezidis in the Ottoman Empire deteriorated sharply. The Muslims, led by their emirs, began to make devastating raids on the Yezidis. The culmination of the fall of the Yezidi influence was the fatwa of 1545, declared by the Islamic sheikh AbusudAfandi. The fatwa officially legalized the killing and enslavement of the Yezidis, as well as the forcible seizure of their lands and property. The Yezidis literally began to hunt. The Yazidis everywhere were persecuted their lands, houses and property were appropriated, women (even married ones) were abducted, by those Muslims who first had written sources, and religious attributes were pitilessly destroyed.

In an effort to maintain their position, the Kurds, the Muslims and Yezidis, entered wars not only with the Ottomans, but also with each other. Due to constant internecine wars between the Kurds, the Muslims and Yezidis, the Yezidi principality of Sheikhan, however, like other Kurdish principalities in the XIX century, was destined to fall under the full authority of the Ottoman Empire.

The process of Islamization took a mass character, not only individuals, but many Yezidi tribes were forced to accept Islam. It is known that according to the Shari'ah, the way out of Islam is punishable by death regardless of the country of residence. This aroused fear of former Yezidis-newly converted Muslims, so the former Yezidis-Kurds quickly found themselves involved in the Islamic world, recognized as Muslims, but who had no civil rights, and most importantly the right to identity and language.

Attempts by the Ottoman authorities to forcibly impose Islam, deprive the Yezidis of their national and cultural rights have repeatedly led to numerous uprisings. However, the Yezidi uprisings for preserving their identity have always been brutally suppressed.

With the formation at the beginning of the 20th century of new independent states in the Near and Middle East - Iraq, Turkey and Syria, the attitude towards the Yezidis has not changed. In Iraq, local authorities took on the change of their identity from Kurdish to Arabic. In Turkey, the negative attitude of the authorities led to the fact that since the 60's Yezidi families fled to Europe, and practically in this country the Yezidis did not remain. In Syria, the Yezidis are a powerless minority, are deprived of civil rights and many still do not have the passport of that country. In all these countries, not only administrative and punitive measures are being conducted against the Yezidis, but also a massive ideological attack. Muslim mules Yezidis attributed a number of negative qualities and the image of the Shaytaan. Yezidism was fanned with negative myths and legends, in which it is asserted that the Yezidis are atheists, savages, robbers, bloodsuckers and devil worshippers.

As a result, Muslims, even those who have never seen Yezidis, accuse them of all their sins. And, despite the peaceableness of their religion and tolerance to other nations, the Yezidis are constantly subjected to religious discrimination and genocide by the Muslim majority. During the 14 centuries of the existence of Islam, the Yezidi were victims of 74 (muslims) acts of genocide.

It is difficult to say how many Yezidis were at the time of coming to Islam in the Mesopotamia (in 7th century), but it is obvious that since the birth of Islam the Yezidis are getting smaller every year. To date, the approximate estimate of the number of Yezidis in Iraq is about 800 thousand people and almost as many are scattered throughout the world. According to various sources, today there are from 1 to 1.5 million Yezidis on the planet. Since the official Yezidis census has never been conducted, there is no precise data on their numbers.

Systematic attempts by the authorities of Iraq, Turkey, Iran and Syria to forcibly impose Islam on the Yezidis, depriving their ancestral religion has led to insurrections. Although these uprisings have always been brutally suppressed by Arab, Ottoman-Turkish troops, resistance has never ceased and continues to this day.

Since the beginning of the twentieth century, the Yezidis in Iraq, Syria and Turkey, under the influence of democratic processes among the Muslims Kurds , who proclaimed the Yezidis are originaly part of the Kurdish people, have joined the national struggle for self-determination and independence, with the hope that they will gain a worthy existence in an independent Kurdistan. This was facilitated by the fact that the most ideological content of Kurdish Islamism was a new tolerant thinking and loyal attitude towards the Yezidis, probably due to the political and social conditions of their lives. For several centuries the Kurds have been under the foreign power and do not have political independence. In the era of Islamic domination, the Kurdish people more than once raised uprisings for their national rights, but at best they resulted only in temporary success and are brutally suppressed.

Since 2014, the Yezidis have been subjected to genocide in Iraq by the terrorist organization "Islamic State". As a result of these attacks, tens of thousands of Yezidis were killed or taken prisoner and forcibly converted to Islam, their cities and villages in the Shangal region were completely destroyed. Despite the democratic changes in the world, the Yezidis in their historic homeland continue to be killed.