Inside the horrific world of ISIS

28 July 2016

Sold in a slave market, imprisoned and beaten, Farida Khalaf went through four months of hell on earth. This is her shocking story as told to Andrea C. Hoffmann

"Put your right hand at the back by the trigger," my dad said. "And now aim at the mulberry tree over there. Fire!" The loud bang echoed through our garden. "Women need to know how to use a weapon in an emergency, too," he said, taking back the Kalashnikov, but he didn't specify what this emergency might be. And it didn't cross my mind that it could be connected to the fact that we were Yazidis rather than Muslims. The catastrophe awaiting us was completely beyond my imagination.

When our world collapsed

Back then, in early summer 2014, we lived a quiet life in a village called Kocho in northern Iraq. My mother was a housewife; my father a border guard in the Iraqi army. I was 18 years old, had just finished my penultimate year at secondary school and, like any girl in the world, was looking forward to the summer holidays. I'd only heard of the terrorist group ISIS from the television. It had just attacked the city of Mosul, but like all the bad news on TV, this miraculously seemed to have nothing to do with my own reality.

But as we played football in our garden, tragedy was already brewing in the mountains: the ISIS fighters conquered our area with breathtaking speed and had soon surrounded Kocho. Many of our people wanted to flee, but ISIS had agreed an alliance with our Muslim neighbours and so it was impossible for us to escape. The terrorists' ultimatum was this: "If you convert to Islam, we won't harm you." They didn't spell out the alternative, but they didn't have to.

We had three days to consider the ultimatum, which we let pass without doing anything. No one in our village converted to Islam. Given the terrible consequences, this behaviour might seem incomprehensible, but for us Yazidis - an ancient oriental religion and one of Iraq's oldest religious minorities - there is nothing worse than betraying your religion. We would never repudiate the ancient teachings of the angel Melek Taus and Sheikh Adi. They are what bind us spiritually.

From the roof of our house, I watched as they advanced into the village with their armoured vehicles. At every junction, men dressed in black and armed with machine guns leaped out of the cars. They hoisted the black ISIS flag on our school building, and in the classroom where I'd just received another top mark in maths, they herded us villagers together. Once again, they ordered us to convert to Islam. We were all terrified, but still we firmly refused.

The terrorists divided us into groups and led the men out into the fields. In a mass shooting, they killed 500 inhabitants of Kocho, including my father and eldest brother. But I only found this out later. The last thing I saw was my mother in the schoolyard. She was torn away from me by force as me and my school friends were ordered to get on a bus. If we struggled, they shoved us and hit us with their guns. I screamed, tried to resist and for the first time felt the full force of a rifle butt. The terrorists showed no pity.

If we struggled, they shoved us and hit us with their guns.KeepInlineId¬1hgdirDisplayStyle¬1]

When the engine roared into life,

my friends and I tried to smash the windows in desperation. Deep

down we already had an idea that we'd never return to the happy

lives we were leaving behind in Kocho. We spent the entire journey

screaming and weeping.

<h3 class=subheading>The first month[/h3]

The bus drove to Mosul, a city in

northern Iraq, where they took us to a large multi-storey building.

Hundreds of other girls were already being kept prisoner here in

overcrowded rooms. There were carpets on the floor, but it was

almost impossible to lie down because there were so many of us.

Some were not even 12 years old and were begging to be sent back to

their parents. But the terrorists were unmoved; the men just

laughed. They told us we were infidels and therefore had no

rights.

The day after we arrived, we were

transported to Raqqa, the ISIS 'capital' and main trading

centre for women and girls. The terrorists also called it the

'slave market'. It was a foul-smelling old warehouse, close to the

riverside. Men would come several times a day to buy women to cook,

clean and serve them, but the main purpose was sex.

I can remember in perfect detail

the first time I experienced this procedure. We had to line up

in a row, stand straight, chins out, our palms facing upwards.

They even ordered us to open our mouths and show our teeth. I felt

like livestock when the men strutted about, ogling us. That's why I

covered my face with my long hair. Other girls followed my example.

What are you doing that for? You're not Muslims, they barked at

us. Why are you hiding yourselves? Because your gaze defiles

me, I replied, before we were beaten for our defiance.

I despised the buyers. Only once

did I witness a man display something approaching shame: when he

was alone with us he said, If it were up to me, I'd let the lot of

you go. My friend Evin, who was also from Kocho, fell to her knees

before him and begged him to take us. Save us! she pleaded. But

the man just shook his head, sadly.

<h3 class=subheading>The second month[/h3]

Our numbers soon thinned out. The

first to be sold were the really young girls, practically children,

still. But Evin and I could not escape our fate, either. A tall,

bearded Libyan and his friend decided to buy us as a twin pack. I

never found out how much we

were deemed to be worth.

After putting us in black

full-body robes, our 'owners' loaded us into a car. Then we drove

all over Raqqa. I was amazed at how normal the city looked, despite

the ISIS occupation. The streets were full of life, shopkeepers and

stallholders were peddling their goods; you could even buy football

jerseys here.

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The men took us to an abandoned house on the edge of the city that smelled of burnt rubber; half of it had been bombed to pieces. It was clear what their intentions were; they'd even bought fresh bedding on the way there. I lost it when I realised how hopeless my situation was. Keeping my honour is more important to me than anything.

I could see only one way out. In desperation, I smashed the bottle of orange juice one of the men had given me. I picked out the sharpest shard and brought it up to my left wrist. Strangely, calmly and purposefully, like a doctor carrying out an amputation, I drew the glass across my skin until the blood started spurting out. Then I quickly transferred it to my other hand.

Soon I was overcome by dizziness, and a pleasant feeling of numbness spread throughout my body. Now Evin realised that something was not right. She started to scream. "Help! Farida's killing herself!" My last thought was: "Hopefully the men won't hear her." Then I lost consciousness. A few hours later, I woke up in an ISIS ambulance.

The third month

My suicide attempt had failed. But at least the Libyan had lost his desire for me. He sold me on to a middleman, who in turn flogged me to an ISIS unit in the Syrian desert. Known for their ruthlessness, this unit was called 'The Beasts'.

My time there represented the absolute nadir of my odyssey. I was kept in a tiny prison cell and the men treated me with extreme brutality. I tried three times to escape their violent control by taking my life, but failed on each occasion. The men tortured me with sticks and cable whips, and their leader beat me so badly for being stubborn that I couldn't walk for weeks. I had to crawl to the toilet. Close to death, both physically and mentally, I finally had to admit that he was the stronger.

When he'd had enough, he sent me to a military camp near the Omar gas field, where ISIS fighters were housed in barracks that had formerly belonged to the Syrian army. Eight of us Yazidi girls lived together in our own container. My friend Evin, who I was serendipitously reunited with there, looked after me, probably saving my life. Seeing her again felt like a connection to my old world.

Here, too, I changed owners twice. The second of these was very concerned that I convert to Islam. For this reason he forced me to take part in Islamic prayers, and the other girls and I were given regular religious instruction. I took pleasure in using this forum to provoke our tormentors.

"Your religion does not permit you to impose your faith on us," I told them. "It even says this in your Quran." I quoted the second surah: "There shall be no compulsion in the religion." This rattled them. "Be quiet, girl. What do you understand of Islam?" they retorted in irritation. Of course we didn't let them know that we secretly prayed to the sun every morning.

The fourth month

When I was able to walk again, I soon became the ringleader of the girls in the camp. Time and again I exhorted them to resist the wishes of their 'owners'. "Don't do everything they demand of you," I urged. "Spoil their fun." We were beaten for it, but it worked; I knew this from listening in to the men's conversations.

I was beaten so badly that I couldn't walk for weeks.KeepInlineId¬162sinDisplayStyle¬1]

I don't know where my strength

came from but I have always been rebellious and willing to bear the

consequences for my actions. Once, when we were cleaning the camp,

I found a mobile phone in one of the soldier's backpacks. Fuelled

with adrenaline, we used it to try to contact our relatives, but

none of the mobile numbers we knew by heart were working. We were

panicking as we thought that maybe all of our family members were

dead. Then, finally, we got through to someone - Evin's uncle in

Germany. Run away, he begged us. But that was easier said than

done.

We feverishly searched for an

opportunity. Then one day I noticed that the back door of our

container was not properly locked, just tied up with cable wire.

Internally I jumped for joy, but warned myself to be patient; we

had to wait for the right opportunity.

One evening, when the majority of

the soldiers had left the camp to fight, I saw that it had come.

Six of us were prepared to risk it; the other two, who didn't dare,

offered to distract the guards for us. When the men were busy with

them, the rest of us escaped via the back door of the

container.

We set off into the rainy night.

First we crossed the deserted camp, then headed out into the

desert. Sticking to a dead-straight line, we kept going throughout

the night in sheer terror, without a break, until at dawn we came

to the ruin of an abandoned building. Exhausted, we huddled

together, our bodies aching and feet covered in sores.

Still, we were in good spirits - we'd done it. But we had

neither food nor water to fortify us after our exertions and were

absolutely freezing in our soaked clothes. We wanted to move on the

following evening under the cover of darkness, but the youngest

among us couldn't go any further: the 12-year-old girl was too

weak.

We decided our only option was to

seek help in a nearby village. Anxiously, we knocked at the door of

a house, knowing full well that we were putting our lives in the

hands of the people living there. If you're a good man, then

please help us, we implored the master of the house, who gazed at

us in astonishment.

The man wanted to send us away at

once, as he thought it too risky to hide us from ISIS. But his son

could sense a profitable deal. He called our relatives in Iraq and

Germany and demanded €10,000. After some negotiation, they agreed

on a price, which has now become a common procedure.

A pickup truck came to fetch us

and smuggled us through ISIS territory to the border between Syria

and Iraq, where my uncle was waiting. I flew straight into his arms

and couldn't stop crying.

<h3 class=subheading>A new chapter [/h3]

Today I'm living in Germany. I'm

one of the many refugees from Iraq that the country has taken in

over the past year. My family is here, too, although not all of

them: only my mother and younger brothers. When my mother arrived

at the camp, I was overwhelmed with happiness. I wanted to be with

her all the time. My father and eldest brother are probably buried

in one of the mass graves in Kocho.

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I still bear the scars from the cable lashes given to me by the leader of the so-called 'Beasts'. They say that time heals wounds. But some wounds never heal. One can only learn to live with the pain and the memories, which is what I'm trying to do.

I go to German lessons every day. I want to learn the language as quickly as possible and catch up on the schooling I've missed. Afterwards, I'd like to study maths. In my past life, my dream was to become the first female maths teacher in Kocho. But today, I'm no longer sure I'll ever go back there; it seems as if we Yazidis don't have a future in northern Iraq any more. Maybe I'll become a maths teacher for refugees in Germany. There will be many more people who'll be forced to leave my former homeland to stay alive.

Today, our village of Kocho is still under ISIS rule.

The Girl Who Beat ISIS: My Story by Farida Khalaf and co-written by Dr Andrea C. Hoffmann is on sale now