RITE OF SPRING, Kurdistan: 27M

{quote}My name is Ja'id Murad from the village of Tallazir in Shankal. I was 14 years old living with my father, my mother, my sisters and my brother. We had a two room house, a kitchen and a bedroom where we slept. My dreams were the biggest I could ever want thanks to my mother and father who helped me all these years. But one night, at 2 a.m. on August 3, 2014, the terrorist group ISIS attacked my village. I awoke to the sound of gunfire and frightened voices. The women screamed for the men to protect us. We fled the village at 8 a.m. and went north to the farm of my uncle Barakat. We were almost 50 people on the farm when ISIS arrived. They killed my father and 11 of my uncles and cousins. They then took 35 young girls and women from our family. One of them was my sister. They allowed myself and the children and grandmothers to remain because they were too old or too young for sex. We fled to Mt. Sinjar and stayed in the mountains for 10 days without food or water. The temperatures reached above 100 degrees F. Many of us died. After that the Kurdish PKK fighters were able to open a road of safety for us from ISIS. I now live in a refugee camp with the rest of my family. Not a day passes my mother is not crying for the death of my father, uncles and cousins. I am now 18 and my sister and cousins are still kidnapped. I wait for the day when they will be free. We don't want charity. We don't want money. We don't want power. We just want to live with our families in peace. I have the right to live with my sister who has been sold. I have the right to live with my father who has been killed. In my homeland, if you are not muslim they will kill you. Even if you have no religion, no one has the right to kill me. I will wait for my sister and cousins until the last day of my life{quote}.

"My name is Ja'id Murad from the village of Tallazir in Shankal. I was 14 years old living with my father, my mother, my sisters and my brother. We had a two room house, a kitchen and a bedroom where we slept. My dreams were the biggest I could ever want thanks to my mother and father who helped me all these years. But one night, at 2 a.m. on August 3, 2014, the terrorist group ISIS attacked my village. I awoke to the sound of gunfire and frightened voices. The women screamed for the men to protect us. We fled the village at 8 a.m. and went north to the farm of my uncle Barakat. We were almost 50 people on the farm when ISIS arrived. They killed my father and 11 of my uncles and cousins. They then took 35 young girls and women from our family. One of them was my sister. They allowed myself and the children and grandmothers to remain because they were too old or too young for sex. We fled to Mt. Sinjar and stayed in the mountains for 10 days without food or water. The temperatures reached above 100 degrees F. Many of us died. After that the Kurdish PKK fighters were able to open a road of safety for us from ISIS. I now live in a refugee camp with the rest of my family. Not a day passes my mother is not crying for the death of my father, uncles and cousins. I am now 18 and my sister and cousins are still kidnapped. I wait for the day when they will be free. We don't want charity. We don't want money. We don't want power. We just want to live with our families in peace. I have the right to live with my sister who has been sold. I have the right to live with my father who has been killed. In my homeland, if you are not muslim they will kill you. Even if you have no religion, no one has the right to kill me. I will wait for my sister and cousins until the last day of my life".