Yazidi families continue to return to Shengal despite Turkish attacks

ISIS mercenaries brutally attacked Shengal and South Kurdistan on 3 August 2014, killing thousands of Yazidis and kidnapping thousands of women. Tens of thousands of Yazidi families in Shengal were forced to migrate to camps in Rojava and South Kurdistan due to the attacks.

Shengal Autonomous Administration is preparing to welcome and support families returning to the region. According to the information provided by the residents of Shengal, 5-10 families leave the camps every day in South Kurdistan to return to their villages in the north and south of Shengal mountains.

However, the invading Turkish state constantly attacks Shengal.

A citizen named Feqîr Ilyas, who returned to his home in Xanesor in September 2020, told ANHA that he was very happy to return and called on the refugees staying in the camps to do the same.

The invading Turkish state attacked the old bazaar in the center of Shengal on 16 August and targeted the vehicle in which Said Hesen, one of the commanders of the Shengal Resistance Units (YBŞ), was traveling in. Said Hesen and his nephew, Isa Xwede, a YBŞ fighter, lost their lives in the attack. Turkey then targeted the hospital in the village of Sikêniyê on 17 August. Eight people, including YBŞ fighters and health workers, lost their lives.

Ebdo Şukur, spokesperson of the Shengal Assembly Migrants Reception Committee, told ANHA that the return of refugees to their lands is the greatest response to the attacks by the invading Turkish state.