Women widowed by ISIL find hope and support in Iraq
Nadyia had to make a decision. Shortly after members of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) seized control of Tall Afar, in north-western Iraq, she says the militants forcibly removed her husband from their home. She could not be certain of his fate – and says she is not to this day; […]Nadyia had to make a decision. Shortly after members of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) seized control of Tall Afar, in north-western Iraq, she says the militants forcibly removed her husband from their home. She could not be certain of his fate – and says she is not to this day; however, judging from what she did know of ISIL’s brutality, she presumed that his abductors murdered him.
She also knew that ISIL employs sexual and gender-based violence as a tool of war and forces women and girls into sex slavery. And so Nadyia felt she had no choice but to flee Tall Afar with her five-year-old daughter – despite the fact that her child suffered from a heart condition. As they travelled the 600 kilometres to safety in Karbala, largely on foot, through combat-ridden terrain, the physical exertion aggravated her daughter’s condition.
Nadyia managed to collect enough money to buy her medication, but it proved insufficient, and shortly after they arrived in Karbala, her daughter died. “We came alone with no hope and to an unknown fate,” says Nadyia. “I lost my husband there, and I lost my only child here.”
