Shelters for Women in Iraq

The situation for women in Iraq is beyond distressing. It is desperate. ISIS, a brutal jihadist group, has made women direct targets of its extremist agenda, forbidding them from going to work, school or even being in public without a male "guardian." One of our local partners told us that women doctors and professionals in Mosul, including her own sister, were publicly whipped for not covering themselves up.

Women have been systemically raped, kidnapped and sold into sexual slavery by and for ISIS fighters. Large aid agencies and governments have not been able to reach ISIS-controlled areas to deliver urgently-needed humanitarian aid and shelter for these women — but you have.

Thanks to your support, MADRE and our local partners, the Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq (OWFI), are delivering humanitarian aid and safe passage — even to women in ISIS-controlled areas. Together, we’re operating the only women's safe-house network in northern Iraq for women fleeing sexual violence there.

With your help, women in Iraq have access to safety and to the services they need to rebuild their lives out of crisis and into peace. Thanks so much for supporting this life-saving work.

P.S. MADRE’s latest op-ed on our work in Iraq, More Powerful Than ISIS, has been published on the Huffington Post! We were also published in openDemocracy, analyzing "The stories we tell about ISIS and women" and the ways these promote Islamophobia. I hope you’ll take the time to read these pieces and share them with your networks. Thank you!

When ISIS militants invaded Iraq earlier this summer, the whole world was taken by surprise. No government or big aid agency was prepared for the crisis. But because of you, we were able to respond immediately. Thanks to our on-the-ground partners who are able to reach Iraqi communities other organizations cannot, we were able to send emergency aid, including food, water and medical care to women and children most in need.

For example, the UN and other large relief groups have not been able to get aid into the town of Samarra, currently surrounded by ISIS forces. But just last month with your support and through the local connections of our partners at the Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq (OWFI), we were able to deliver food packages and other aid to 120 families there.

And that’s not all you’re helping us do. As deadly violence against women by ISIS intensifies, we’ve continued to expand our secret shelter services. Your support enabled us to open the only women’s shelter in ISIS-controlled northern Iraq, offering vital emergency refuge to women escaping rape, kidnapping and forced marriage.

Thank you. Your support truly strengthens our sisters in Iraq who are working around the clock to respond to this urgent crisis.