Description
Book Synopsis In 2014 the jihadists of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) were consolidating their control over a vast area of the Middle East. They singled out the Yazidis, adherents of an ancient monotheistic religion, for annihilation. Unlike Christians or Jews, who were seen as people of the book, Yazidis were classified as pagans and therefore subject to extermination. The men were to be executed and the women and children enslaved. In August ISIS fighters attacked Sinjar, an Iraqi city inhabited mostly by Yazidis. Some 50,000 panic-stricken civilians fled to Mount Sinjar in 110 heat with no food or water. The ISIS militants quickly surrounded the mountain and after several days people began to die of exposure, exhaustion, and dehydration.
This is a history of the ISIS attack on the Yazidis and the American response, which represented the opening salvo in the war against ISIS. With a potential genocide looming, President Barack Obama ordered the U.S. military into action
Table of Contents
- Table of Contents
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1. Tribalism, Saddam Hussein, and the Genesis of ISIS
- 2. ISIS Devastates the Yazidi Community
- 3. Genocide in the Middle East through the Ages
- 4. Yazidi Stories of Survival and the War Against ISIS
- 5. Fighting the Islamic State in the Chaos of Syria
- 6. A Complicated Part of the World
- Chapter Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
