8/6/2024 Iraq (International Christian Concern) — On Tuesday, Iraq’s Christians in the Nineveh Plains reflected and remembered the Islamic State group’s (ISIS) attack on their communities exactly 10 years ago.
The summer of 2014 was the start of a dark time for Iraq’s religious minorities as ISIS swept across the Nineveh province, capturing Mosul in June and then killing thousands and displacing millions more in attacks in August. Some of Iraq’s most ethnic and religiously diverse communities, such as Mosul, Bashiqa, Sinjar, Bartella, and Qaraqosh, were seized and controlled by ISIS. Iraq’s Yazidis, Christians, and other minority groups were targeted in what would later be internationally recognized as a genocide.
After fleeing ISIS, most members of Iraq’s Christian community found themselves in displacement camps and informal housing situations in Iraq’s Kurdistan region. There, an international coalition pushed ISIS back.
The Nineveh Plains were liberated from 2016 to 2018. During the years since, a remnant of Iraq’s Christians has returned to rebuild homes, churches, businesses, and farms, most of which ISIS destroyed.
International Christian Concern (ICC) has worked with Iraq’s Christians for much of the last decade, helping them both in their displacement and their return to their homes. Although the number of Christians in Iraq has dwindled since ISIS, those who remain continue to face persecution.
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