The Yazidi Tragedy In Sinjar

Women, children and elderly people are rushing to board a helicopter that has landed in the barren mountains.

Those who manage to get on the helicopter will escape death, while those who stay behind will die if they cannot find food or water.
This scene is no different from numerous escape scenes we have seen in connection with the tragedies in Srebrenica, Palestine and Vietnam.
The tragedy of Yazidis in Sinjar continues, despite the claims of other narratives. Those who have sought refuge on the mountain tell heartrending stories.
The UN said that if no action is taken against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), it will continue to slaughter Yazidis, whose sole crime is not being Muslims.
Then why is there the UN?
Does it exist just to defend the interests of the big guns while turning a blind eye to the persecution of the oppressed?
The ISIL attacks conducted within the borders of Iraq, and which could only be halted thanks to US intervention, have shown how weak Iraq's national security system is.
If the Peshmerga and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) fighters had not come to their rescue, thousands of people would have been killed, and a nation that is one of the greatest assets of the Mesopotamian region would have faced extinction. While the Peshmerga and the PKK were fighting ISIL, US warplanes shelled ISIL's positions.
The Kurds were united against a common enemy. In the meantime, Kurdish national unity was remembered once again.
This development also revealed the fact that the Kurds do not have a strong defense system, despite the fact that they have had an autonomous administration for 25 years.
The West still hasn't given the heavy weapons Massoud Barzani asked them for. They have just made plenty of statements expressing support.
ISIL threatened Turkey, saying it would strike İstanbul if Turkey interferes with it. The problem of ISIL holding Turkish diplomats hostage has not been settled yet. Turkey is embracing those who have fled from massacres. Thousands of Yazidis are expected to be hosted in camps to be established in Silopi and Zakho.
Yazidis have relatives in Turkey as well. Yazidis live in more than 50 villages in the Midyat district of Mardin, the Viranşehir district of Şanlıurfa and the Beşiri district of Batman. In the conflict-ridden atmosphere of the 1980s, Yazidis migrated to various European countries, especially to Germany. In Europe, many Yazidis are well-educated. The village of Lalish, near Mosul, is both a homeland and a religious center for Yazidis, as it contains the tomb of Sheikh Adi ibn Musafir (Şêx Adî), the main figure of the Yazidi faith. Unfortunately, Yazidis were exiled from their homeland for thousands of years.
Obama finds the military operation against ISIL in the Sinjar mountains to be successful. But the truth is different. Some Yazidis could not escape using the security corridor established, and their corpses were left in the mountains. The only source of shelter from the sun in these mountains is rocks. The elderly people and children who cannot resist hunger and thirst are left behind in the rocks. Their bodies are not buried. Those who fled ISIL from Mount Sinjar say the mountain is full of corpses, many of which are decaying fast due to the hot weather.
Some 1,500 Yazidis who escaped ISIL's attacks have come to Turkey. The Turkish people welcome them. Some of them have sought refuge in the semi-abandoned Yazidi villages in Turkey.
After getting rid of Western-made dictatorships, the Middle East is now troubled with the tyranny and fanaticism of ISIL-like organizations, which are apparently Western-made.

ORHAN MİROĞLU (Cihan/Today's Zaman)