Naze aspires to deliver voice of the Yazidis to the world through her art

Art and Literature 10:34 AM - 2021-08-01

Nineteen year-old Naze Sleman is a Yazidi girl from Shingal(Sinjar) who is filled with ambitions and aspirations to deliver the pain, sorrow, and voice of the Yazidis to the whole world.

Sleman is from the Borke village, north of Shingal mountain which is the main land of the Yazidis and is a disputed region located in the north of Iraq. 

Her home town was once a horror seen from a movie and that was when the Islamic State (ISIS) terrorists captured their town in 2014 and committed the most heinous crimes against her people.

Struggling to find ways to express her pain, she began to paint at the age of 16 and that is when she found her passion.

After the atrocities that her people saw, Sleman now wants to move towards demonstrating a new side of Shingal and the Yazidis and works continuously in this regard.

Sleman told PUKmedia that she has painted many personalities, figures, and scenes of Shingal, especially scenes from August 3rd of 2014 when ISIS launched its attack on Shingal.

"I want to deliver the Yazidi voice to the world in color, and show the suffering of Shingali people and the deteriorated situation of Shangal to the global community," she said.

Sleman believes that art has developed in Shingal to some extent, calling on the government and art institutions to support her.

ISIS attack on Shingal

On August 3rd, 2014, ISIS terrorists launched a vicious attack on Shingal which led to the displacement of hundreds of thousands of members of the community. Most of them fled to the Kurdistan Region, while others resettled to neighboring countries in the region or to Western states.

Others were not as lucky and remained stranded in the war zone, where they were subjected to atrocities and mass executions at the hands of the extremist group for years. ISIS militants forced women and girls into sexual slavery; kidnapped their children; forced religious conversions; executed scores of men; and abused, sold, and trafficked women and girls across the areas they controlled in Iraq and Syria.

According to the United Nations, 5,000 Yazidi men died in the massacre and the terrorists have also kidnapped thousands of Yazidi women and teenage girls who have been subjected to horrific atrocities, such as rape, beatings, torture, enslavement and other forms of inhumane treatment.

According to the Kurdistan Regional Government, the terrorists kidnapped more than 6,400 Yazidis, only half of them managed to escape or survive, while the fate of the rest is still unknown.

ISIS gained full control of one-third of Iraq till 2017 when Iraq announced regaining full control of the provinces of Nineveh, Anbar, and Saladin and parts of Kirkuk and Diyala. 



PUKmedia