Women Who Escaped From Brutal ISIS Kidnapping Receive Prestigious Award

We all have a well of courage we can draw from in times of need. It’s one of the things that makes humans amazing. We heal. We build. We travel. We dream. And we overcome. 

If your back is ever against the wall and you need to find a way to draw from your well of courage, remember these two young women. Their courage saw them through unspeakable darkness, and even now, on the other side, they’re still showing the world what courage looks like. 

After enduring ordeals few of us can even imagine and then escaping the hands of their brutal captors, two women were honored by the European Parliament with the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought.

Nadia Murad, now 23, and Lamiya Aji Bashar, 18, are Yazidi, a minority facing terrible persecution by ISIS. Although their beliefs are ancient, they blend elements of many Middle Eastern traditions, and extreme Muslims associate them with devil worship.

The two women were captured when ISIS militants overran their village in Iraq in August 2014. 

They were told to convert to Islam or die. All the men and old women were killed and the girls were sold into slavery.

Nadia managed to escape to a refugee camp in November 2014, and from there made her way to safety in Germany.

Since then, Nadia has been an active advocate for Yazidis and for refugees’ and women’s rights. She even launched Nadia’s Initiative, dedicated to helping victims of genocide.  

Although she was taken in the same raid as Nadia, Lamiya was not so lucky. 

She spent years in captivity, tried to escape five times and was sold four times by ISIS before a desperate, harrowing journey finally brought her to freedom…