Video shows performance art in Iraq depicting how Yazidi women were sold by Islamic State group
- This article is more than one year old.
- Published on June 6, 2023 at 08:56
- 4 min read
- By Devesh MISHRA, AFP India
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"Secularists who find the Kerala story to be a lie can see Muslim women being sold in the market, if you want this to not happen to your sisters and daughters, then beware and make your sisters and daughters aware too," reads part of the Hindi-language caption of a video shared on Facebook here on May 19, 2023.
The 20-second video, which has been viewed more than 450 times, appears to show a crowded market place where several women wearing burqas are chained together. A man appears to inspect the women by lifting each of their veils in turn.
The caption adds: "In this way, the Islamic State sold Yazidi women in all the markets of Iraq and Syria. 7,000 Yazidi women and children were abducted and enslaved. 10,000 were executed for refusing to convert to Islam. Still, 2,713 Yazidis are missing in ISIS captivity."
Yazidis, who follow a non-Muslim monotheistic faith, were brutalised by the Islamic State (IS) group when it swept over the Kurdish-speaking minority's historic home in northern Iraq in August 2014. IS massacred thousands of Yazidi men, enlisted children, and seized thousands of women to be sold into sexual slavery or as jihadists' "wives".
The video was shared following the release of the Hindi-language film "The Kerala Story" in India, which wildly exaggerates the number of Hindu women converting to Islam and joining the Islamic State group. The film has been praised by India's Hindu nationalist Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The same video was also shared alongside similar claims elsewhere on Facebook here and here, and on Twitter here.
But the claim is misleading, the video shows a performance in Iraq.
Performance art in Iraq
A reverse image search on Google led to a video uploaded to TikTok here on May 7, titled: "The unheard screams of the Ezidkhan Angels, Art performance by Aryan Rafiq."
The video used in the false post corresponds to the first 20 seconds of the TikTok video.
Below is a screenshot comparison of the video in the misleading post (left) and the video shared on TikTok (right):
A further keyword search found a poster for the performance posted on the Facebook page of Aryan Rafiq on March 7 (archived link).
Rafiq also posted a longer version of the performance on March 7 in a Facebook post captioned, "Live performance, The Unheard Screams Of The Ezidkhan Angels, By Aryan Rafiq 2023/3/7" (archived link).
The 20-second clip used in the misleading post matches with the footage seen at this video's 3:30 mark.
Rafiq, a Kurdish artist, told AFP that the video shows the performance at Arbil market in Iraq.
The archways seen in the video match up with those seen in this image of the market that was shared on Google Maps (archived link).
"This work was filmed in the market of Erbil (Arbil) in March 2023. My artwork evolves around Yazidi Kurdish women who were subjected to sexual assault and sold in a slave market," Rafiq said on May 23.
"Yazidi Kurdish girls are victims of religion. Because they are of different religions, their lives are exposed to hell," Rafiq added.
Rafiq said she has been staging similar performances for many years on issues including women's rights, religious freedom and the freedom of love.
Noah Sh Qadir, an actor who played the role of the first person to inspect the women at the "auction" and is visible from the 45-second mark of the full video on Rafiq's Facebook page, also told AFP the video shows the performance (archived link).
"I have performed in this artwork and we keep performing like this for awareness purposes," he said on May 23.
International Women's Day
Local Kurdish news channel NRT posted an interview with Rafiq on its verified Facebook page on March 7, 2019 (archived link).
In the interview, Rafiq speaks about the art exhibit and International Women’s Day, which is celebrated on March 8 (archived link).
"On the occasion of March 8, I congratulate the women, especially the Yazidi women victims of ISIS' war. Yazidi women have been subjected to rape and trafficking during the fights against ISIS," she said.
She added that the women depicted in her artwork each had a price tag based on "age and beauty" to accurately portray the way they were sold by IS.
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