If ISIS is perpetrating genocide, is Canada morally obligated to fight?

A new report says Islamic State committed genocide, and argues that countries like Canada must therefore hold them accountable



The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum today issued a report concluding that the so-called Islamic State committed genocide against the Yazidi people of Iraq, and that the genocide is ongoing.

Thousands of Yazidis were massacred when the Sunni Muslim extremist group overran northern Iraq last summer. Thousands more Yazidi women and girls were enslaved and are still in captivity. Tens of thousands were ethnically cleansed and are now living in displaced-persons camps in Iraq.

The report, which focuses on the experiences of ethnic and religious minorities in Iraq’s Ninewa province, says Islamic State also committed war crimes and crimes against humanity in its treatment of the Christian, Turkmen, Shabak, Sabaean-Mandaean and Kaka’i people of the region.

It says Islamic State’s violence against Shia Turkmen and Shia Shabak “raises concerns about the commission and risk of genocide,” but concludes that further investigation is needed.

Related: Inside Canada’s new war

The museum’s Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide undertook a research trip to northern Iraq this September, which informs the report. Naomi Kikoler, deputy director of the Simon Skjodt Center and the report’s lead author, says its conclusions impose moral obligations on countries such as Canada, which are parties to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. One of the pillars of the convention, which became effective in 1951, is that perpetrators of genocide must be held accountable and punished.

“There’s been virtually no effort to systematically document the crimes that have been perpetrated, to preserve evidence, to secure and preserve forensic evidence, to ensure that mass graves are being protected so we can actually have successful prosecutions in the future,” Kikoler says. “This is one area where Canada can play a crucial role in supporting financially, but also sending experts to areas that have been liberated from the Islamic State.

“Also, in keeping with the emphasis of [Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s] government on humanitarian assistance, there is a great deal more that can be done to help survivors of Islamic State crimes, most notably the women, children and men who have been kidnapped and have subsequently been freed or released by Islamic State. They need considerable help, when it comes to providing psycho-social support to help them return to their communities and live lives and rebuild their own well-being.”

Related: The evolving rights of Yazidi women

Kikoler says governments that are confronting Islamic State as a terrorist group should also prioritize strategies that will provide ongoing protection to the minority communities that are its victims.

Today, Kurdish and Yazidi forces launched a military offensive to retake the Yazidi homeland of Sinjar from Islamic State. The campaign is supported by Western air strikes.

Canada has been part of the U.S.-led air campaign against Islamic State for more than a year, but Trudeau has promised to end Canada’s participation in it. He says Canada’s mission to train Iraqi Kurdish forces will continue.



  1. The title asks “if” genocide is being committed, and I hardly imagine, given by what is known, that anyone could not believe that genocide has taken place. It, then, continues to ask if Canada is morally obligated to fight. Canada is a signatory to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, therefore, we are morally obligated to fight. The final question really requires a definition of the word “fight”.

    For example, are we required to muster a strong fighting force that maximizes our full military capabilities, or should we simply apply our expertise as ‘peace makers’?

    The Prime Minister seems to want to remove our air force from the area, and I agree that, although our brave pilots are doing there best, it is debatable whether their presence is affective. On the other hand, the Minister of Defense, noting his brave front line fighting experience, has indicated his present belief in strategies of prevention and defense rather than attacking a war in progress.

    Unfortunately, while the countries in the area, generally, are doing very little, the Prime Minister should apply (together with the US) diplomatic pressure on them to ‘cleanup their own backyard’.

    In the end, we must assume that our government knows more about the situation than we do, and that they will do whatever they consider to be morally correct … short of ‘boots on the ground’.

    • Countries in the area are doing very little. That about sums up the problem, and until the countries in the area take a positive role in cleaning up their own backyard, anything Western countries do in the area will at best be counterproductive. A Western imposed solution could only be effective if we collectively, the U.S., Britain, France, Russia, Australia, Canada and more were to take over the entire region militarily, appoint a military government and impose tight military control over the entire area for the foreseeable future. Generations would pass before any positive change would occur, and perhaps never. I would cite Cyprus as an example on a infinitely smaller scale, or perhaps the Palestinian refugee situation. No, much better to leave them alone and let them sort themselves out. Use our resources to provide humanitarian aid like food, shelter, medical aid, but keep them in the area with the hope of returning them home when the insanity ceases.

  2. Genocide is no reason to whip out our CF-18s. Rather, we must send in our military personnel, preferably unarmed, to peacekeep and render humanitarian aid. Perhaps they can also vet who among the denizens of the wilder ISIS-controlled areas we should fast track for passageway to our communities and neighbourhoods.

    • “…passageway to our communities and neighbourhoods.”

      Quick Ponoka, RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!

    • You should look up the definition of peacekeeping. You don’t send soldiers, especially unarmed ones (maybe you should volunteer?), as peacekeepers into the middle of an ongoing war absent an signed truce.

  3. Where were the jews when millions were slaughtered in Cambodia.How about the genocide in the former Yugoslavia.Don’t recall them having a problem with South Africa either.The jews have been slaughtering Palestinians for decades now and don’t have a problem with that either.No we amorally obligated to fight amerikan sponsored terrorists in an amerikan made war.

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