ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A woman abducted by the Islamic State (ISIS) during the group’s 2014 Yazidi genocide said on Tuesday that she was held by ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and one of his wives after her family members were killed.
Sipan Khalil, now 26, recounted her story of brutal, repeated assaults, including against young girls. She spoke to Rudaw from Berlin, where she has lived for the past four years after escaping ISIS captivity and relocating to Germany.
“In 2014, I fell into the hands of ISIS along with my family in the village of Kocho,” Sipan said. “They killed my father, they killed my brother, they killed many of my uncles, and they killed my cousins.”
During ISIS’s assault on the Yezidi town of Shingal (Sinjar) in Nineveh province, extremists abducted over 6,400 Yazidi women and children, subjecting many to sexual slavery and physical abuse.
Nearly 3,600 survivors have since been rescued, according to the Kurdistan Region’s Office of Rescuing Abducted Yazidis. Germany has convicted several former ISIS fighters of genocide and other crimes against humanity.
Khalil said she was held by senior ISIS fighters including the group’s leader for seven years.
“At first, I was in the house of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s deputy,” she said. “After they were bombed and he was killed, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s wife took me to her house. I used to help her in the house, and I looked after her children.”
Regarding her encounters with Baghdadi, Khalil described him as a "terrorist."
“I will say one thing: Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was a terrorist. And ‘terrorist’ is a very big word,” she said. “We know that when we say someone is a terrorist, it means they have no religion, no conscience and no mercy in their heart.”
She added, “He committed many assaults against Yazidi girls - not only against me, and it wasn't just me who was afraid of his assaults. There were some very young girls, aged 8 or 9. He assaulted them. He was a very bad person, and his wife was even worse than him.”
Khalil said she was held in Baghdadi’s home for six months because ISIS leaders feared she had documented kidnapping victims and perpetrators.
Documenting ISIS crimes in captivity
“They found a notebook on me where I had written things down - which person brought Yazidis, their names... During that time, his wife found that notebook on me and they committed many assaults against me.”
She said she was then kept in solitary confinement.
“They hid me in a cell for a full week. There was no food, I didn't see any light, it was dark,” she said.
She later survived attempted trafficking from a women’s refugee camp after ISIS was defeated by Kurdish-led forces and a US-led global military coalition.
“They tried to sell me to Lebanon, to another country,” Khalil said. “And you could say God willed that a bomb exploded near our car.” The bombing killed her captor and wounded Khalil.
She said a local family helped her return to Iraq.
Khalil said her life has improved significantly in Germany, where she cares for her surviving siblings.
Khalil is studying and working at the Farida Organization, a human rights non-profit founded by Yazidi survivors.
“I take care of my brothers and sisters because my parents are gone - we lost our parents,” she said.
Warnings of ‘a recurring genocide’
Khalil said the images of recent violence against Kurdish residents in Aleppo triggered painful memories of the ISIS assault on Yazidis. Gruesome footage of human rights violations emerged after Damascus-allied armed groups and the Syrian Arab Army seized control of two Kurdish-majority neighborhoods last week, raising fears of ethnic cleansing and persecution of Yazidi communities in northern Syria.
“It reminded me of those days in 2014 when they attacked us Yazidis and killed all of us,” she said. “I say this is a recurring genocide.”
She warned that without international support, similar crimes could be repeated.
“If there is no international support, they will commit many assaults against those Kurds,” she said. “They will commit similar assaults against their women, and they will kill their men - just like what happened to us in 2014.”
Khalil now speaks publicly across Germany to ensure the world does not forget what happened to Yazidis and Kurds under ISIS.
“That is why, at every event that happens in Germany, every conference that happens, we try to show people what happened to us Kurds and Yazidis in Syria and Iraq,” she said. The goal is to ensure “that genocide doesn't happen to us again.”
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