WATCH: Yezidi girl abducted by ISIS in 2014 reunited with relatives in Kurdistan Region
ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – An 11-year old female member of the Yezidi (Ezidi) religious minority who was kidnapped six years ago by the Islamic State and lost her mother and brother in an airstrike returned to meet extended family in the Kurdistan Region’s Duhok province on Wednesday after being located in an infamous displacement camp in Syria.
The emergence of the Islamic State and its violent assault on Iraq’s Ezidi-majority city of Sinjar (Shingal) in August 2014 led to the displacement of hundreds of thousands of members of the Ezidi community and the killing of thousands.
The girl, Malek, and her family were among those who the extremist group kidnapped and taken to Syria where they endured a life too difficult for most to comprehend.
She spent almost half her life surviving under the Islamic State’s brutal rule.
Malak 11 years old #ezidi arrived finally back to her community after 5 years she got found in the al hol camp.
— DelalM (@MDelal1978) February 12, 2020
Her mother and brother got killed in #Syria and the rest is living in the IDP Camp in Duhok#yazidis are celebrating her coming back ❤️? Welcome back my dear pic.twitter.com/sITrz30ZEs
As a result of being brought up under Islamic State rule, Malek lost her ability to speak Kurdish now and only speaks Arabic. She told Kurdistan 24 that she was “very happy” to return to her relatives at long last.
Friends and relatives of the girl were waiting to welcome her back from Syria with joy and celebration. Nineteen of Malek’s relatives were also abducted by the Islamic State, and the fate of several of them is still unknown.
“Thank God, today we are happy with her return. She was six years old the last time I saw her,” an older female relative told Kurdistan 24. “She has lost her father, mother, and brother.”
“We are truly happy that Malek is back. She was the youngest in our [extended] family. Our Ezidi relatives have been with us all this time and they have been supportive. Malek was first sent to Shingal [from Northeast Syria], and thank God she is finally here,” a younger female relative told Kurdistan 24.
“Hopefully other abductees will be back too.”
A young man said, “It is a tragedy that her mother and brother were killed in an airstrike in Hajin, and her father is missing up until now. She must not lose hope, and must start a new life.”
For more than a year, Malek lived among the families of Islamic State fighters in Syria’s sprawling al-Hol Camp, enduring multiple hardships.
Al-Hol witnessed an increase in numbers of residents in the spring as Syrian Kurdish-led forces, backed by the US-led coalition, took control of the Islamic State’s last bastion of Baghouz.
The camp was built to hold 40,000 individuals, but currently hosts over 66,000 displaced persons, among them 46,000 Iraqis. The local Kurdish-led administration has also limited support available to the camp, making life there even more difficult.
According to some of the victims, fear, the disowning of children, and forced religious conversion are among the primary reasons Ezidi women and girls cannot leave al-Hol and return to their hometown of Shingal. Also, Ezidi orphans that have lost their parents have been left to try to survive at the overcrowded camp.
Read More: Fear, disowning of children among reasons Yezidi women cannot leave Syria camp: advisor
Originally Malek is from the center of the city of Shingal, where she was abducted along with her family as a young child.
According to the Kurdistan Region’s office in charge of kidnapped Ezidi’s repatriation, at least 3,528 Ezidis have been rescued or otherwise located so far from an estimated total of 6,417 missing.
Editing by John J. Catherine