Tuesday, January 10, 2023

Turkiye Attacks Christians, Yazidis, and Kurds

 


Zeynab Serekaniye’s grave is seen in Tal Tamr, Syria on Sept. 4 after she was killed by a Turkish drone strike. Her mother placed a bride’s veil on the grave, saying: “I did not imagine that I would bury my daughter with her unfulfilled dreams. I wanted my daughter to wear this veil at her wedding, not to bury her underground.” SOLIN MUHAMMED AMIN FOR FOREIGN POLICY


Many in the West heard of the severe atrocities the jihadists of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) committed against the religious minorities of the Fertile Crescent, especially Christians and Yazidis. Several Western governments later classified these atrocities—which included massacres, crucifixion, torture, and sex slavery—as genocides.

Today, however, few are unaware that these same genocidal atrocities have resumed against the very same religious minorities who most suffered at the hands of ISIS in northern Syria—this time by another Muslim force with caliphal aspirations: Turkey, under the leadership of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Between November 20-25, 2022, Turkey launched 2,500 attacks—air, mortar, drone, artillery, etc.—several miles deep into Syria's northern border. Governed by the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES), this also happens to be where most of the formerly persecuted religious minorities, Christians, Yazidis, and Kurds, live.