On Saturday, the New York Times reported that ISIS is forcing their captured, then bought-like-cattle sex slaves to have abortions and take birth control pills and injections so the perpetrators can maximize their potential acts of rape. Per an Islamic ruling, men cannot rape a slave if she is pregnant (the womb must be “empty”), so killing the baby via abortion or stopping the conception of life via preemptive birth control measures fosters an environment for optimal use of the women who are literally slaves to the ISIS rapists’ every whim.
The Times notes that the “Islamic State leaders have made sexual slavery as they believe it was practiced during the Prophet Muhammad’s time integral to the group’s operations, preying on the women and girls the group captured from the Yazidi religious minority almost two years ago. To keep the sex trade running, the fighters have aggressively pushed birth control on their victims so they can continue the abuse unabated while the women are passed among them.”
The 37 women who were lucky enough to escape the evil clutches of ISIS shared their heartbreaking stories. The women attested that if a female was pregnant when captured, the men would force said women to murder her child in the womb—not matter how far along in the pregnancy she was.
One Yazidi woman, only 20 years old and already in the second trimester of her pregnancy, escaped the abortion-sentence placed on her by ISIS by hiding the abortion pills under her tongue. Her brother explains:
Abdal Ali said his sister, 20, was in her second trimester at the time of her capture in 2014. Still, one commander so urgently wanted her as his slave that he tried to end the pregnancy by giving her pills that would cause her to miscarry.
“She hid them under her tongue, and then when they weren’t looking, she spit them out,” said Mr. Ali, who related the story on behalf of his sister because she is undergoing medical treatment abroad for the injuries she suffered. “They wanted to get rid of the child so that they could use the woman.”
Another Yazidi woman, 20 years old, managed to escape her ISIS oppressors after severely being beaten in the stomach in effort to kill her unborn child.
The young woman first recalled being raped while pregnant: “I was telling him: ‘I’m pregnant. In your book it says that you can’t do this.’ He had bloodshot eyes. He acted like he was high.” He raped her anyway.
“Eventually he drove her to a hospital with the aim of making her have an abortion, and flew into a rage when she refused the surgery, repeatedly punching her in the stomach,” reports the Times.
When he drove her home, she waited until he left and then threw herself over the property’s wall. “My knees were bleeding. I was dizzy. I almost couldn’t walk,” she said.
Weeks later, with the help of smugglers hired by her family, she was spirited out of Islamic State territory. Her belly was sticking so far out that she could no longer see her toes when she finally crossed to safety.
Thankfully, the woman gave birth to a healthy baby boy just two months later.
A 16 year old recalled being given birth control pills, although she explained that at the time she did not know what the pills were for. In what was seemingly a common practice for the sex slaves, the young girl was forced to take one pill daily in front of her “owner.” The box of birth control pills would go with her from man to man as she was sold.
“Every day, I had to swallow one in front of him. He gave me one box per month. When I ran out, he replaced it. When I was sold from one man to another, the box of pills came with me,” said the 16-year-old from Iraq.
The already barbaric practices of the Islamic State are going undeterred, their abhorrent treatment of women becoming increasingly more efficient by the introduction of the evil practice of abortion. These Middle Eastern women are in a tragic cycle of rape, the possibility of carrying their enemy’s child, and then the horrific, violent act of abortion; an endless rotation of violence and oppression.