Without Educated Girls – There Is No Ezdixan

Having more educated and well-established individuals benefits all Ezidis (mlete Ezdia) across the world. With more empowered Ezidis, we stand a better chance of protecting ourselves, having our voices heard internationally, and perhaps even achieving our collective dream of rebuilding our ancestral homeland, Ezdixan. But we cannot achieve this by relying solely on men. We need both male and female Ezidis who are educated, respected, and hold high-level positions. That is the path to true success and prosperity. Forcing girls into early marriages solely to bear children—children who, due to a lack of access to proper education and career development, are unlikely to become strong contributors to our society—while expecting men to shoulder all the burden, is naïve. Just look at any successful nation: observe how their women equally contribute to solving collective problems. See how strong and prosperous those societies are.

The Unbreakable Spirit of a True Artist

In 2007, Hales fled to Germany with her mother and sister—a country she eventually came to not only appreciate but, one might say, love, for both its freedoms and its values. As a Ezidi, an ethnoreligious group that has faced centuries of persecution, the concept of freedom holds great significance for Hales. She came to deeply understand the value of freedom through the atrocities committed by Islamist groups. The most recent of over 70 Ezidi genocides occurred on August 3, 2014, with thousands of women still held captive by ISIS. “We have lived in captivity long enough; now it is time to stand up for our freedom and our rights,” says Hales.