ABSTRACT
In August 2014, the self-styled Islamic State (IS) initiated a genocidal campaign against Yezidis, a religious group in northern Iraq. In addition to mass executions, a distinctive feature of this campaign was the mass enslavement of around 6,500 Yezidis, mostly women and children. The IS justified this practice on the grounds that Yezidis are a community of “devil worshippers” with no rights or protections under an Islamic government unlike “people of the book” such as Christians. In fact, Yezidis have a long history of persecution at the hands of local and imperial rulers fostering a strong sense of “victimhood”. Given this historical context, how could we make sense of the IS violence? Does it present a rupture with past practices or an outburst of deep-seated communal hatreds? This chapter addresses this question on the basis of original archival and field research involving documents in primary languages and dozens of in-depth interviews with a diverse group of Yezidis. It identifies similarities and discontinuities characterizing anti-Yezidi violence to inform scholarly understandings of religious coexistence.
