The Genocide of the Yazidis by ISIS

The International Research Network on Researchers Confronting Extreme Violence (RICEVE), dedicated to analysing and problematising the indirect effects of extreme violence on those who study it, is organising, on the premises of the Fondation Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, a study day entitled: "The Genocide of the Yazidis by ISIS: Going Through the Law, Beyond the Legal Approach".

The study day will be held in French.

"Born out of a collective reflection following the trial of Sabri Essid (16–20 March 2026, Paris Criminal Court), a French fighter for ISIS who was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment for his participation in the genocide of the Yazidis in the mid-2010s, this study day revisits the extreme violence that took place in the Sinjar region beginning on 3 August 2014 — mass killings and enslavement — by placing the voices of survivors, particularly women and adolescents, at the center of this first gathering.

The aim is to reflect on the act of bearing witness, the intimate implications it entails, and the fate of such testimony once it is taken up by judicial institutions. This reflection is structured around the tension between self-narrative, the experience of violence, and also the possibility of moving beyond it. While the law remains an essential framework for recognizing the facts and understanding the nature of the violence — in this case, “genocide through attacks on physical and psychological integrity” — the conference seeks to move beyond a strictly legal perspective in order to rethink not only the specific nature of the violence inflicted upon the Yazidis, the forms of engagement involved, and the role of associations and NGOs, but also the lived experiences, subjectivities of survivors, and the reorganization of the Yazidi community in exile."

→ Discover the programme

Speakers

• Manon Pignot
• Cloé Drieu
• Juliette Duclos-Valois
• Samih Taha
• Lilou Gadiolet
• Farhad Shamo-Roto
• Estelle Amy de la Brétèque

The RICEVE programme, an international network of researchers working on and in contexts of extreme violence, seeks to examine how scholars—whether historians, sociologists, anthropologists, political scientists, legal scholars, and others—may be confronted with violence and atrocities such as crimes, genocides, torture, wartime rape, executions, and more, in their fieldwork. RICEVE is dedicated to analysing and problematising the indirect effects of extreme violence on those who study it.

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