Healing Amidst Horror: Dr Nagham Nawzat's Lifeline for Yazidi Survivors

The Day Sinjar Fell

DUHOK, Iraq – On 3 August 2014, Shireen was at home in Sinjar preparing for a high school examination when Islamic State militants entered her house and took her from her family. At 19 years old she was sold as a sex slave to an IS militant in Tal Afar. Three months later she was sold again to Abu Omar in Mosul, becoming his third wife.

Shireen later recounted that Abu Omar told her he loved her, yet she noted that such words did not match the reality of repeated rape. Abu Omar already had two Iraqi wives who lived in a separate house but who beat her during visits. Yazidis revere Melek Tawwus, yet IS fighters told Shireen that the Peacock Angel was the devil and forced her to convert to Islam.

Two Years of Captivity in Mosul

For more than two years Shireen remained inside the house in Mosul. She was required to cook, wash dishes and clean daily. Two guards stood at the entrance, and she was forbidden from stepping outside or even into the garden for fresh air. Abu Omar later brought two other Yazidi girls into the household: one aged six who was made to clean and another aged ten who was raped by him. Shireen tried to intervene but her pleas were ignored.

In 2016 Iraqi forces liberated Shireen during the operation to retake Mosul. After more than two years in captivity she experienced depression and recurring nightmares that blocked sleep. Her uncle and many friends were killed by IS. Her father and one sister remain missing since 2014.

Reaching the Duhok Survivors Centre

After release Shireen travelled to Duhok for a medical check-up with Dr Nagham Nawzat, a Yazidi gynaecologist. Nawzat conducted the physical examination and also listened to Shireen while offering emotional support. Shireen later stated that without this help she would not be alive today and that Nawzat told her she was brave.

Hussein al-Qaidi, director of the Kidnapped Affairs department at the Kurdistan Regional Government in Duhok, reported that 2,023 Yazidi women had been liberated from IS territories as of July 2018. Nawzat, then 42, had provided support to more than half of them, an estimated 1,200 women.

Founding a Specialised Facility

In 2014 IS seized almost a third of Iraq. At least 12,000 Yazidis were killed or kidnapped in what the United Nations has described as an ongoing genocide against the religious minority. The following year Nawzat joined the Duhok Survivors Centre, where she volunteers to deliver healthcare and psychological support to women who survived IS captivity.

The centre, funded by the United Nations Population Fund, remains the only facility in Iraq specialising in gender-based violence. Nawzat employs a post-traumatic medical approach that begins with attentive listening, followed by a thorough physical check-up and continued emotional support. She describes offering survivors the reassurance of a trusted older sister.

International Recognition and Personal Commitment

In March 2016 Nawzat received the International Women of Courage Award from then-US Secretary of State John Kerry for her psychological support to traumatised Yazidi survivors and her work against gender-based violence. Born in Mosul in 1976 to a Yazidi family, she had long wished to study medicine and graduated with a gynaecology degree from Mosul Medical College in 2002.

Nawzat has explained that her goal was always to understand women's health issues, teach health care and provide direct support. Through consistent trust-building at the centre, survivors gradually share their deepest fears and emotions. Her approach has allowed hundreds of women to begin processing experiences that include forced conversion, repeated sexual violence and prolonged isolation.