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Sabaya Review

By David Kempler

Heroism of the Highest Level

Yazidis are a mostly Kurmanji-speaking minority in the Kurdish regions of parts of Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Turkey. The majority of Yazidis remaining in the Middle East today live in northern Iraq. They are monotheistic, and for centuries they have faced persecution as their religion is perceived as heretical by Islamic clerics. In 2014, ISIS (Daesh in Arabic) carried out a genocide of Yazidis.

Thousands of Yazidi men from the Sinjar province of Iraq were tortured, slaughtered, and mutilated after being murdered. Women and girls as young as 10 were then abducted and turned into sex slaves for Isis. They were raped, bought, and traded among members of ISIS, and referred to as sabaya.

In his powerful new work "Sabaya," Swedish-Kurdish director Hogir Hiron has somehow managed to film a fly-on-the-wall documentary of a group of people attempting to rescue the Yazidi girls and women still being held by ISIS, while embedded with them during the actual rescue attempts.

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All of this takes place in and around the Al-Hol Camp in northeastern Syria. The Camp has 73,000 captured ISIS supporters living in tents along with their captured women, and it's guarded by Kurdish forces.

Mahmud and Ziyad are two endlessly brave men who reside at the nearby Yazidi Home Center. Their entire lives are spent attempting to rescue the sabaya, knowing that if they are caught they will be tortured and murdered. It's a life I can't imagine living. Every time they go to the Camp, bullets and bombs are flying and arson is a common occurrence throughout the area.

The two men are helped by Mahmud's wife Siham, his mother Zahra, and a group of female infiltrators, some of whom are former sabaya. These women secretly embed themselves into the camp to find Yazidi women to rescue and smuggle out.

"Sabaya" is one of the most unobtrusive and powerful documentaries I have ever seen. It's almost unimaginable that these rescue operations are being attempted. That this is being captured on film is so astounding that it's sometimes tough to accept that what you're watching can possibly be real. If you are partial to documentaries, you should see this. It's an amazing achievement.

What did you think?

Movie title Sabaya
Release year 2021
MPAA Rating NR
Our rating
Summary Insanely powerful documentary about attempting to rescue girls and women in Syria being held by ISIS.
View all articles by David Kempler
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