The Ezdina Organization recently released a booklet entitled "I am a Yazidi, I invite you to get to know me" as part of its activities within its project "Hope" in northeastern Syria.
The booklet aims to introduce the Yazidi religion and its rituals, in addition to introducing their customs and traditions and their relations with other components. The booklet also includes articles by three writers talking about their view on the Yazidi religion.
The booklet includes an introduction and three sections, where the introduction to the booklet indicates that it summarizes the most important real information related to the Yazidi religion, and answers the most sensitive questions that were raised about the Yazidis, in addition to that the booklet corrects the misconceptions prevailing towards this religious minority living in several countries including Syria.
The first section contains information related to the Yazidi religion, the history of its emergence, the concept of Satan among the Yazidis, the most prominent feasts among the Yazidis and how they celebrate their rituals, and it answers questions such as “Is Yazidism a religion or a sect? What does Satan mean to Yazidis? Do Yazidis fast? Do Yazidis have prayers? How do they learn their religion and why do they not tell anyone about it? Do they have Hajj ceremonies, and where and how they perform the pilgrimage? What does reincarnation mean for them? Do the Yazidis have Zakat in Islam?
The first section also deals with the lack of interest in national religious diversity within the agendas of the Syrian state institutions, which leads to the transformation of the Yazidis in the eyes of some to strangers and in some cases to "infidels" or enemies, and summarizes the implications of the Syrian governments' denial of the importance of religious diversity, and their failure to make room for this diversity to appear and be discussed in public in terms of the emergence of bad stereotypes towards religious and national minorities stemming from unwitting ignorance of the truth of these components.
The second section of the booklet includes correcting the wrong stereotype towards the Yazidis and the violations committed against them, the places and cities in where the Yazidis are spread in Syria, the reason for the terrorist attacks on the Yazidis, the reason for accusing the Yazidis of worshiping Satan, the role of media platforms in distorting the image of the Yazidis, and how it contributed Yazidis in Syria through their religious rituals by strengthening civil peace, how successive governments have abused governance in Syria to the Yazidis, what happened to the Yazidis after the outbreak of the popular uprising in 2011, and what happened to them in the cities of Afrin and Serê kaniyê/Ras al-Ain, in addition to talking about Yazidi female survivors who influenced local and international communities.
The third section contains three articles by writers talking about the Yazidis and their view of the Yazidi religion, whom are are Dr. Mohammad Habash, who obtains a degree in Islamic law from the University of Damascus and obtains three bachelors degrees in Arab and Islamic sciences from the universities of Damascus, Tripoli and Beirut, as well as a master’s degree, and he was issued a printed book on issues of Islamic enlightenment, he was also famous for his articles in Arab newspapers, and for his many programs on Arab satellite and radio stations, where Habash began his article with the phrase "Yazidism, a history of oppression and a future of hope".
The second article on coexistence between Yazidis and Muslims in Syria was written by the Syrian Kurdish journalist Sardar Malla Darwish, who is the director of the Aso News Network, he hails from the city of Serê Kaniyê/Ras al-Ain, which was a city that brought together the components of the Syrian people from Arabs, Kurds, Armenians, Muslims, Christians and Yazidis.
While the article of the writer Luqman Suleiman came under the title "Yazidi Kurds and I", the writer Suleiman was born in the village of Hamza Beg in the Dêrik region in 1962, has resided in Germany since 2012 and has several books printed in the Kurdish language. His novel "Şengal" published in 2018, which talks about the Yazidi genocide that befell the Yazidis in the city of Şengal/Sinjar.
It is noteworthy that the Ezdina Organization printed 500 copies of the booklet to be donated to international and local organizations and media institutions operating in northeastern Syria.
Also that the Ezdina Organization opened its office on the first of last August in the city of Qamishlo/Qamishli, and launched the "Hope" project in the region, as part of an academic and professional work program aimed at increasing the community’s awareness of the Yazidi identity and promoting rapprochement between the religious components in northeastern Syria by respecting pluralism, accepting the other and rejecting hate speech and violence.
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