View From Abroad: Conversion or death

It is a supreme irony that the only good news from the Middle East currently is the US aerial campaign to halt the IS (Islamic State) advance a few miles from Erbil, the Kurdish capital. Even more welcome is the airdrop of food and water to some 40,000 beleaguered Yazidis on top of Sinjar Mountain. These hapless souls are faced with the stark choice of dying of thirst where they are, or descending and getting slaughtered by the holy warriors whose approach led to the Yazidi exodus in the first place. This small, secretive sect of around 800,000 is an offshoot of Zoroastrianism. Established in the 11th century, it is a syncretic faith which contains elements of Christianity and Islam. Mistakenly, many Muslims think of them as devil worshippers. This misunderstanding stems from the fact that although they believe in a supreme being they call Yasdan, they actually pray five times a day to one of his seven angels, a celestial king called both Malak Tawous and Shaytan. Their own name for themselves is “Izidis”, or worshippers of God. Living quietly in north Iraq, they have played little part in the country’s turbulent history, and few knew or cared about their existence. But the rise of religious intolerance after the American-led invasion of 2003 ended their isolation. In 2007, a series of devastating bombings in their city of Sinjar left some 800 dead, causing many to migrate to Europe. But in the last few days, the very existence of this peaceful community has been placed at risk by the rapid advance of IS into north Iraq, and the fall of Sinjar to this army of fanatics. Faced with the stark choice of death or conversion, they have fled to the top of the nearby Sinjar Mountain, to where they believe Noah’s Ark finally came to rest after the Flood. Although the term is much misused, genocide actually means a deliberate effort to destroy an entire people. This is what Yazidis are facing today at the hands of IS. There are reports of hundreds already slaughtered, and 400 Yazidi women forcibly converted to Islam and handed over to IS warriors as ‘brides’. Humanitarian airdrops may prevent the immediate death by dehydration of the men, women and children stuck on the mountaintop. However, there will have to be a corridor to allow them to escape this death trap where daytime temperatures soar over 45 degrees. Currently, both the Iraqi army and the Kurdish peshmergas are under growing pressure from IS, and cannot respond to this urgent threat. While other states have talked about providing humanitarian aid, nobody has yet offered to put boots on the ground. So American transport planes are currently the only lifeline the Yazidis have. And although US drones and F-18 jetfighters may briefly stem the IS tide, this aerial campaign cannot be sustained indefinitely. As President Obama said recently, American aircraft won’t become “the Iraqi air force”. Meanwhile, Iraqis continue to squabble over the formation of a new government, although parliamentary elections were held three months ago. Nouri al-Maliki shamelessly tries to cling on to power despite having presided over the huge military debacle caused largely by his practice of selling senior army positions to the highest bidders. While this power struggle plays out in Baghdad, another minority has been forced to flee from their homes by the tens of thousands. In its recent rapid advance into northern parts of Iraq, IS has also captured the largely Christian town of Qaraqosh, as well as its surrounding villages. But as these are ‘people of the Book’, they were given a third choice besides death or conversion: the payment of jaziya, the ancient Islamic tax on non-Muslims. In this case, this was fixed at $450 per head each month. As this is obviously beyond the reach of most people in the region, tens of thousands have fled before the IS terror. Ever since the 2003 invasion, over two-third of Iraq’s Christian population of 1.5 million have left the country. They were part of an ancient, pre-Islamic community that had played an active role in the professions, politics, business and the arts. Now the ones left behind live in fear of their lives due to the rising tide of sectarian violence and intolerance. Over the last month, many people with a conscience have protested against the indiscriminate Israeli bombing of Gaza that has caused nearly 2,000 deaths in that tiny strip of land. As I write this, tens of thousands of protesters are marching in London past the American embassy to Hyde Park. While I applaud these protests, I wonder where are the demonstrations against the IS campaign of ethnic cleansing? Surely, our humanity ought to include all those suffering from oppression, and those threatened by ‘conversion or death’ at the hands of blood-crazed madmen. Muslims are constantly complaining about Western Islamophobia, but turn a blind eye to the many incidents of far worse treatment of non-Muslims in Islamic countries. Pakistan heads the list of states hostile to religious minorities, with Ahmadis, Hindus, Sikhs and Christians routinely killed or incarcerated on trumped-up blasphemy charges. Unless we stand up for these communities, we have no right to complain when Muslims are viewed with suspicion elsewhere. Published in Dawn, August 11th, 2014