The Truth about the Yezidis

Please cut and paste the content of this letter into your email program, and/or send it to your Congressmen and Senators using the links on the "Help the Yezidis" page! 

THANK YOU!

Dear Congressman/Senator,

It has come to my attention that there is a group of people living in Northern Iraq who have been suffering extreme persecution and outright genocide from their neighbors in the region for a very long time.  Recently their situation has escalated to the level of a true crisis.  These people are the Yezidi or Yazidi sect.  They were the recent victims (August 14th, 2007) of the largest suicide bombing to date in the entire Iraq conflict.  They are a very ancient religious sect, predating both Islam and Christianity, though the Yezidi themselves do not deny either faith but have taken on various of their aspects.  Their origins are traced by many scholars to ancient India.  The modern media usually labels them simply an ethnic or religious minority.

The people of this sect are facing extermination at the hands of Moslem extremists who apparently view them as infidels, heretics and soft targets.  The Yezidi are also persecuted by the Turks, the Kurds, and haven't been able to purify their drinking water since Saddam Hussein poisoned their drinking wells several years ago.  The Yezidi in Iraq are facing all these problems alone - cut off and surrounded by factions who view them as at least infidels and perhaps even devil worshipping heretics, a willfully incorrect notion that affords the Moslems some token justification for their extermination.

There appears to be so much misinformation concerning these people and their religion that it has been impossible so far for them to receive any attention, much less any aid.  When aid such as food deliveries have been attempted, their food caravans are seized and diverted by their neighbors (whether Kurdish, Turkish or Iraqi Moslem - Sunni or Shiite).  Yezidis are not able to even visit their family members within Moslem controlled areas.

Our nation, the nation responsible for the current government of Iraq, was founded upon principles of RELIGIOUS FREEDOM.  We all as U.S. citizens share the benefit of religious tolerance and freedom today.  This principle does not appear to have any substantial foothold yet in the unstable fledgling government of Iraq, and the Yezidis are certainly  far from the fortunate position we now occupy thanks to the vision of our founding fathers.  They are not even being granted that first of  "inalienable rIghts" Jefferson so boldly declared to be truths self evident - namely LIFE.

I urge you to take action and see to it that these people at least receive legitimate relief aid.  Even better would be taking political steps to ensure their protection in some way by the Iraqi government forces.  These are human beings enduring suffering almost unimaginable to us - and adherents of a very ancient and venerable religious tradition.  A very good source of information on the Yezidi people and their traditions is the website: www.YezidiTruth.org

With great thanks,

A CONCERNED CITIZEN