Women and girls are kept as slaves and tortured at will by their captors.
Enslaved.
Traded like cattle.
Raped.
Burned alive.
These are only a few examples of the violence and terror suffered by female captives of the Islamic State.
The United Nations special representative on sexual violence in conflict recently toured Yazidi refugee camps in Syria, where she documented the tales of torture witnessed by women who escaped.
In an interview with a Middle Eastern news source this week, Zainab Bangura explained how IS is “institutionalising sexual violence.”
“The brutalisation of women and girls is central to their ideology,” she told Middle East Eye.
Related content: ISIS’ abhorrent punishment for women who breastfeed in public.
Upon capture, Ms Bangura reports the women and men are separated (men and boys over 14 are killed), and then girls are “stripped naked, tested for virginity and examined for breast size and prettiness.”
“The youngest, and those considered the prettiest virgins fetch higher prices and are sent to Raqqa, the IS stronghold,” she said, explaining the market for female slaves.
“There is a hierarchy: sheikhs get first choice, then emirs, then fighters. They often take three or four girls each and keep them for a month or so, until they grow tired of a girl, when she goes back to market. At slave auctions, buyers haggle fiercely, driving down prices by disparaging girls as flat-chested or unattractive.
“We heard about one girl who was traded 22 times, and another, who had escaped, told us that the sheikh who had captured her wrote his name on the back of her hand to show that she was his ‘property’.”
Ms Bangura has worked in several war-torn nations including Bosnia, Congo, South Sudan, Somalia and Central African Republic, but says she has never witnessed cruelty and violence to this extent.
Related content: The details the Islamic State’s official guidelines for rape.
Perhaps one of the most severe cases she recounted was that of a girl who was burned alive after refusing to perform an “extreme sex act.”
Ms Bangura claims jihadis expect to “get” women to keep as domestic slaves, and to satisfy them sexually.
Many of the men are married, but can keep several slaves as well as their wives.
Ms Bangura states hundreds of girls have managed to escape. She told Middle East Eye that some have even escaped with the assistance of jihadist’s wives. Some are rescued by their families after being held to ransom.
The Independent estimates there are between 3,000 and 5,000 women and girls held captive by IS, and most of them are Yazidi.
Yazidis are a non-Islamic ethnic and religious minority, located mostly in northern Iraq.
Bangura is urging the UN and other organisations to provide aid and support to help escaped victims rebuild their lives and overcome their trauma.
Read more:
Four terrified women have told of being enslaved by Australian jihadists.
Girls are being raped and buried alive by the Islamic State. Why aren’t we talking about it?
The creepy blogs luring Australians into joining Isis.
Why young Australian men are becoming radicalised – and how to spot it.
Do you have a news tip? Email us at news@mamamia.com.au.
Top Comments
How long is it going to be before the women of fundamentalist religions rise up and take action ?
How deep is the numbing fear ( that exists within these communities) that prevents women from protecting not just themselves - but their daughters & grand-daughters ?
How long is it going to be before women wake up to the stark reality that they're being exploited by religious hierarchies ?
Religious hierarchies fear the true power of women ........ they know that paternalistic thinking is on the way out............brute force may slow up the progress of women in their quest for gender equality but a major revolution is definitely coming.
Let's hope it quickly reaches the ears & minds of those on the battlefront of this horror.
This is exactly how I felt reading this article. As awful as all this is, it occurred to me it might make women rise up against these oppressive males in the Middle East, after all what do they have to lose if they are already being treated like this.
I know there are already some women warriors in Iraq (I think Kurdish) taking up guns and fighting ISIS.
I normally think of myself as a pacifist, but when you are backed into a corner like these poor women are it's self defence.
I think the reason why a lot of the Middle East is going down the toilet is because at a societal level they have this attitude of oppression. So you get the dictators in charge oppressing the men, then the men feel powerless and feel better if they can oppress women. It's like the poor white trash in Americas South that joined the Klu Klux Klan so at least they could feel better than the blacks.
That is what is happening in many of these Middle East countries, it's dog eat dog. Not suggesting all men there are like that of course, but it's a societal thing. Their societies won't start getting better till the men start treating women as equals and with the same kindness that they wish was extended to themselves by their leaders. And women in these countries need to harden up and realise that if men there can't mature then the women have to take a hard line with them and fight for their rights.
And yet a young Australian woman left her two children to be with these people
They're only women and girls. It's not like there are 3000 - 5000 allied soldiers being held captive. Then the West would rain down their wrath. Wasn't it the Chancellor of Germany who stated that IS could be wiped out very quickly, with the weapons power of Western nations? Obviously they're waiting for something really terrible to happen first.
Let's keep perspective about what's most important, in our 'equal' society.
Only women and girls you say? Violated because they are women and girls, NOT soldiers who apparently in your view are more worthy. Are the soldiers being raped and forced in sexual slavery? Are they being sold and auctioned off from the age as young as 10? Are they being stripped of all their dignity and life energy because of their gender? Are they treated like cattle, being branded as the property of some sick creep? This is an entirely different issue. Prisoners of war (male and female) is equally terrible and wrong. However, sexual abuse on a grand organised scale is absolutely horrendously wrong and an indication of how warped this society is.
Right, not like there are male victims involved being beheaded is there...