Raqqa, Syria – `Raqqa is being slaughtered silently´, an activist group operating in Syria, reported that the Assad regime bombed yesterday a school in the Syrian ISIS stronghold of Raqqa in which an indefinite number of Ezidi women and children were held in captivitiy. The bombing is said to have targeted the Sukainah school.

Airstrikes of Syrian army against ISIS stronghold Raqqa
Airstrikes of Syrian army targeting ISIS stronghold Raqqa

After the airstrike targeted the school which has been turned into a prison, some of the women and children reportedly managed to flee and hide in the surrounding neighborhoods. ISIS terrorists, however, besieged the area, managing to recapture and deport them subsequently to unknown places. The actvist group´s statement cannot be verified but coincides with reports of Ezidi women who were freed from the town and spoke of several hundred of enslaved women still being held captive there.

RIBSS is both critical of the regime and opposed to the ISIS rule in Raqqa. Some of its actvists partially report directly from the town itself. It is unknown whether some of the women and children were killed in the aerial bombardement.

Atfer the terrorist militia ISIS overran the Ezidis´ main settlement area Shingal in northern Iraq on August 3, it abducted several thousand Ezidi women, including many underage girls and children. The total number of abducted individuals is estimated to be about 5,000.

According to the Sinjar Crisis Management Team (SCMT) led by Murad Ismael and Matthew Barber from the US, ISIS elements in Iraq have proceeded to relocate kidnapped Ezidi women, girls and children  from the village of Kucho to Tal Afar. In Kucho, ISIS terrorists carried out a massacre against at least 412 Ezidi males. Prior to that, the village had been besieged for over two weeks and forced to convert to Islam. The terrorists finally massacred a third of the village´s population and enslaved its women and children.

The relocation to Tal Afar now decreases the chances of a liberation. It is uncertain whether the kidnapped women and children will remain in Tal Afar or be deported by terrorists to other towns and places. ISIS positions in Tal Afar were intensively bombed in recent days by coalition forces and the Iraqi army. Quite often, the terrorists use the kidnapped women and children as human shields to prevent airstrikes. Most whereabouts of the women are known but it is exceedingly difficult to arrange their liberation.

In its magazine `Dabiq´ the terrorist organization justifies the enslavement of Ezidi women, girls and children who are considered as`absolute infidels´ in accordance with Shariah law. The reintroduction of slavery also revives a hitherto no longer practiced Islamic `tradition´. Women are being raped or sold to third parties after their abduction – in some cases, to buyers from Saudi Arabia. Senior Islamic scholars from around the world condemned the actions of the terrorist militia against the Ezidis and also referred to the enslavement as un-Islamic.

ezidiPress