One of the world’s oldest religious communities is threatened with annihilation. Half a million Yazidis are fleeing from IS terrorists. The Islamic State is hunting them down. For the devout Muslims, Yazidis are devil-worshippers who must be forced to convert or be killed. Over 5,000 Yezidis have brutally fallen victim to this crusade – the estimated number of unreported cases is even higher. This war also affects Yazidis in Germany. Many of them are living here while their relatives are dying in northern Iraq or Syria.

HÁWAR is the story of the Yazidis Duzen Tekkal and her father Seyhmus and their journey back to their roots. Journalist Duzen, who lives happily with her family in Germany, travels for the first time to the origin of her religion, to the Yazidi homelands in northern Iraq. To the place where the Islamic State terror militia is committing inconceivable atrocities.

The whole world is familiar with the images and propaganda videos of the perpetrators. This documentary film shows the other side of the story which has not yet been told: the genocide against the Yazidis. It a story of the fate of fathers, mothers and children who have endured and who are still enduring terrible atrocities. They have abandoned all hope of being saved. They remain faithful to their beliefs, because that is all they have left – until they die. HÁWAR clearly shows how, even 70 years after the holocaust, genocide is still a gruesome reality while the whole world stands by and watches. In the Kurdish language, “Háwar” has always meant “cry for help”. Today, this word is synonymous with “genocide”.

QUOTES FROM THE FILM:

We are dying of hunger and thirst. Our children are suffering dehydration. We had to abandon our children along the way.” (Yazidi refugee in the Sinjar mountains)

“We are in danger. We can’t manage alone. We can only pray that someone will help us.” (Baba Sheikh, religious leader of the Yazidis)

“The IS terrorists are questioning our beliefs and forcing us to convert to Islam. I would rather die than convert and profess to their religion.” (Young female Yazidi refugee)

“My family lives in Germany and I am here to help my people in Shingal. These IS terrorists are animals. Many women and children have been taken away and killed. Thousands are still imprisoned and hundreds of corpses scattered throughout the mountains.” (Kasim Schescho, gardener from Germany and leader of Yazidi troops)

“I would rather wish they were dead than in the hands of these beasts!” (Yazidi father whose daughters have been captured by IS terrorists.)

“We are fighting for our people. We can’t keep running away. If we give this up, we will no longer have a history.” (Fahim Khalaf, student from Germany and Yazidi fighter)

“They commit offenses against us, they marry us. There is no abuse they don’t inflict. I ask only one thing: Get us out of here!“ (Cathrin, Yazidi in IS captivity)

“Here in the mountains you see thousands of dead bodies. Women, older men, children – they all died of thirst while fleeing. Anyone who goes there will be reduced to tears.” (Abdul, Yazidi refugee)

“They took my honor. That’s what causes me the most suffering. I wished they would kill me but they unfortunately didn’t do me that favor.” (Nazdar, Yazidi rape victim, who was bought free from IS captivity.)

“The IS terrorists ordered us to stand in a row one behind the other. I then recited my profession to my Yazidi faith and lay down on the ground. Then they shot at us. When they opened fire a bullet hit me in the neck.” (Miran, Yazidi survivor)

“I speak here in the name of humanity. Save us! Mr. Chairman, we demand that the Iraqi parliament intervene immediately and stop this massacre.” (Vian Dakhil, Yazidi member of Iraqi parliament)

“At the beginning of the week, a young Iraqi woman shouted out to the world that no one was coming to help. Well, today America is coming to help.”
(Barack Obama, President of the United States)

“We are prepared to provide weapons and ammunition for the fight against the IS terror militia to a limited extent and in close collaboration with our partners and the armed forces in the autonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan.” (Dr. Angela Merkel, German Chancellor)

“The West and the USA could end the suffering of the refugees within a week. But they’re not taking action and simply remain silent. Our call to the USA, Australia and Europe: make way for our refugees! Open your borders and doors!” (Vian Dakhil, Yazidi member of Iraqi Parliament)

Duzen Tekkal grew up with her family in Hanover as one of eleven children. Her parents came to Germany from Turkey in the 1970s when guest workers were being recruited. Even back then, they were discriminated against as Yazidis and had to follow their religion secretly in their home country – only in Germany did they become free. Today, the Federal Republic of Germany is one of the largest Yazidis enclaves. The strict Yazidis faith still has an influence on Duzen Tekkal’s life. The 36 year old studied Political Sciences and German and now works as a TV journalist for the nation’s major television channels. For the first time, Duzen Tekkal travels together with her father Seyhmus to the roots of their origins in northern Iraq and the journey could not be a sadder one.
The Islamic State terror militia is now rampaging around the holy pilgrimage sites of the Yazidis. The barbaric attacks of the IS have brought tragic fame to the small religious community overnight.

It all began at the end of 2012, shortly before Christmas, at the Tekkal’s large kitchen table in Hanover. The family has come together because father and daughter are planning to soon embark upon a journey. Seyhmus Tekkal wants to show his Duzen the roots of the Yazidis faith, in Iraq, where the pilgrimage sites of the Yazidis are located. But these roots are in immense danger. In August 2014, when father and daughter leave, they arrive in the middle of a war. Because although they had planned to begin their journey in times of peace, everything had changed.

In the night, IS terrorists invade the Yazidi town of Shingal. Whole families are torn from their sleep and executed. In the blink of an eye, children become orphans. During that night, people died out of fear. Although Yazidis have lived in harmony next door to Muslims in Shingal for years, the IS suddenly turns neighbors into traitors. Hundreds of refugees seek protection in the mountains, only to perish from hunger and thirst.

For Duzen Tekkal, what was supposed to be a journey back to her roots becomes an assignment as a war correspondent. A camera team accompanies her and her father in northern Iraq. Together with Yazidi fighters, she crosses the dangerous IS territory and visits a refugee camp in Zakho at the border of Iraq and Turkey. 40,000 people who have lost everything are having to survive in this overcrowded city of tents. Simply because they are Yazidis, just like Duzen. She meets children who have endured and are still enduring unimaginable suffering. Duzen Tekkal is the first German journalist to speak to rape victims and women who have escaped from the clutches of the IS. Women whose lives and honor have been destroyed.

Actually a place of peace, Lalish is the spiritual center of the Yazidis. It is the history and the future of their faith. This last bastion lies north-west of the town of Sheikhan, a one-hour car ride from Mosul and thus in the IS hinterland. There, for the first time in her life, Duzen encounters Yazidi religious leader “Baba Sheikh”. This is the man who Yazidis idolize like Catholics idolize the Pope. He is in deep despair. He can sense that his religion is threatened with complete annihilation.

At the foot of the Sinjar mountains, Duzen Tekkal meets Kasim Schescho, who has been leading Yazidi fighters in northern Iraq since the IS troops invaded Shingal. Schescho, who is actually a gardener from Bad Oeynhausen, traveled to Shingal to support his religious community in the fight against IS. He originally only wanted to visit his home in Iraq with his son Fahim. Now, the two Germans are fighting side-by-side against the IS terrorists. Overnight, 23-year-old student Fahim from Germany has become a fighter against the IS.

Vian Dakhil, a Yazidi member of parliament, is responsible for US President Barack Obama learning about the fate of her religious community. Her emotional speech in Iraqi parliament drew the eyes of the world to northern Iraq. The German Yazidi Duzen Tekkal meets Iraqi Yazidi Vian Dakhil. In an interview, she issues a dramatic call to Europe: “Open your borders, help the victims of rape and the refugees who have lost everything!”

Back in Germany: Duzen Tekkal again visits Fahim, the son of the troop leader. This time in Hanover. Just a few days beforehand, he had been fighting against the IS in Iraq. Now he’s back at his vocational school. A balancing act which can hardly be accomplished. In the middle of the meeting they learn that German Chancellor Angela Merkel has announced that for the first time since the Second World War, Germany will deliver weapons to the Kurdish fighters for self-defense. But the Kurdish fighters are leaving the Yazidis to fend for themselves. At this point, the Sinjar mountains are completely surrounded by the IS.

Things happen so quickly that Duzen Tekkal returns to northern Iraq with her father and travels to Dayrabun, to the border triangle of Turkey, Syria and Iraq. This is where the military base of the Kurdish fighters is situated. Here, the Yazidi refugees are flown in from the Sinjar mountains and the fighters against the IS are flown out. The Yazidis are happy and grateful for the support. For some, help arrives just in time but for others, it comes too late. In August 2014, when the IS overran many Yazidi villages and murdered the inhabitants, the 10,000 Kurdish soldiers responsible for protecting the Yazidis fled. Surrounded and without protection, they were left at the mercy of the IS terrorists. How long will the help from the Kurdish fighters last this time?

The film ends in a small village in south-east Turkey. This is where Seyhmus Tekkal grew up and where his parents lie buried. Father and daughter visit the grave of her grandmother, who also had to fight against oppression, violence and injustice because of her religion back in her day. For Yazidis, the battle remains ongoing.