THE MORAL CHALLENGE OF THIS CENTURY

Fear

The Islamic State Sows Terror

As the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) has rampaged through northern Iraq, it has capitalized on fear. Fear of attack, fear of kidnapping, fear of death—all have terrorized residents of the region. Fear drove people from their homes and helped IS control the areas it occupies.

Displaced Iraqis wait to receive food at a camp in Erbil. —Mackenzie Knowles-Coursin for the US Holocaust Memorial Museum

Flight

Forced from Their Homes

Many of the people targeted by the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) had lived in the same areas all their lives; in many cases, their families had been there for centuries. Overnight, they were driven from their homes and villages by IS, forced to flee their businesses, their houses of worship, their families and friends, the social fabric of their lives. Clutching only their most essential possessions, clinging to families that, for some, had been splintered by kidnappings and killings, the fleeing Iraqis have moved from place to place in search of safe haven.

A group of displaced Iraqis at a camp near Erbil. —Mackenzie Knowles-Coursin for the US Holocaust Memorial Museum

Devastation

Communities—and People—Are Gone

The plight of the Iraqi minorities was a tragedy on multiple levels. In at least one case, hundreds of residents of a village were killed by fighters of the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS). But in many other cases, people were driven from their homes, their businesses, their friends, and their houses of worship and forced to begin again. In effect, their cultures and communities were uprooted.

A Sunni man prays as the sun sets over a displaced-persons camp outside Erbil. —Mackenzie Knowles-Coursin for the US Holocaust Memorial Museum

Displacement

Clinging to Identity

Practically overnight, comfortable lives came to an end, torn irrevocably. Uprooted from their homes, businesses, and communities, the people of northern Iraq have found themselves living in horrible, strange conditions, trying to make the best of a world that has been changed by mass violence.

An elderly Yezidi woman tends to a number of young children beside the half-constructed building in which they live in Duhok. —Mackenzie Knowles-Coursin for the US Holocaust Memorial Museum