The Yazidis, the rage, the silence of the Ummah..

Less than a week back, the world witnessed a remarkable series of coordinated demonstrations. In Washington, in London, in Paris, in Sydney and tens of cities around the world, protestors marched to express solidarity with the people of Gaza in what was widely labelled as a “Day of Rage”.

Yet, even as these protests were happening, another tragedy was unfolding less than a thousand miles north-east of Gaza. Hundreds of women and children were being summarily executed, some buried alive.  Hundreds others were being captured, branded as slaves & sexually assaulted. Such was the severity of this crisis that  the UN warned of an imminent genocide. The horror shows no signs of abating.

Almost “200,000 people, mostly Yazidi, have been forced to leave their homes around the town of Sinjar since an ISIS attack on 3 August”. Earlier this week, a heart-rending account of the plight of these innocent people caught in the cross-fire of Jihad moved me to ask a simple question, where is the condemnation by Islamic scholars and leaders of this barbarity?

Multiple accounts mention how the Yazidis have been particularly singled out for massacre and how the Jihadis “have been more ruthless in their pursuit of them than they have against other minorities”.  As Saneev Sanyal noted in his poignant piece aptly titled, “The massacre of the Yazidis”, “The Christians of Mosul were given the choice to convert, pay the jiziya tax or leave. The Yazidis were given no such choice and are often killed on sight as “devil-worshippers”.

And yet, I could not find statements of condemnation by leaders of the Islamic world against this atrocity being committed in the name of Islam. Even as we were witnessing one of the most appalling and barbaric episodes in modern history – unrivaled in scale and utterly terrifying in its nature – voices of condemnation from the Islamic world were either non-existent  or too weak to matter.

Perplexed, I asked commentators on twitter to help me point to instances of clear and categorical condemnation of monstrosities being unleashed in the name of Islam. Numerous tweets and re-tweets later, all I had were barely 2 links, one of which predated the hell of Mt. Sinjar.

Why does it matter? It matters because ISIS claims to be inspired by Islam. Therefore the challenge to them cannot be limited merely to the political – or the military. It needs to be at the level of ideology too.

I therefore felt that it was incumbent on Islamic scholars and leaders world-wide to unequivocally condemn this barbarism.  I was not alone.  Three days back, in an unexpected deviation from “from its customary language in the highly sensitive area of inter-faith relations” the Vatican asked “…religious leaders, and above all Muslim religious leaders” to “take a clear and courageous stance…(and be) unanimous in their unambiguous condemnation of these crimes (by ISIS) and denounce the invoking of religion to justify them”.

There were some positive stirrings last week (e.g. the condemnation by British Imams and by Cairo’s Grand Mufti) but I am yet to see a direct statement (leave alone statements) specifically condemning the cruelty towards Yazidis (save a statement by the Arab League, another by a chaplain at a US University and a third that predates the ISIS assault on Sinjar).

Why am I so interested in the Yazidis? The Yazidis matters because they have been bearing the brunt of this madness. In the deadly drama unfolding in Iraq & Syria, they are the ones paying the heaviest price.

And yet, the Islamic world prefers silence in the face of this matter of rage.  In the meantime, the usual arguments get parroted. “This is not Islam”; “ISIS is not following true Islam”; “They (the killers) are not Muslims” and the more outlandish ones, including the familiar “This is a Zionist conspiracy to malign Islam and Muslims”

What is it that is stopping community leaders and Islamic scholars from condemning this murder and mayhem? What is stopping them from issuing a fatwa against ISIS? What is stopping them from publicly excommunicating Al-Baghdadi?

What is stopping protests and speeches against the ISIS – for their killings of not just the Yazidis but also Christians and Shias and Sunnis who are deemed to be un-cooperative? Or is the Day of Rage reserved only for Israel?

Why this thundering silence from the Ummah? I wonder. I sigh. And I remember a question I asked almost two years ago, “Is the problem at the heart of Islam, the silence of sensible Muslims?”.  Have a peaceful weekend. Jai Hind, Jai Bharat!

Related Posts: Condemnation of ISIS Cruelty towards the Yazidis and Is the problem at the heart of Islam the silence of sensible Muslims?

Cross-posted at ToI blogs