The Israeli military said on Thursday that it had rescued a 21-year-old Yazidi woman who had been held captive by Hamas in Gaza for more than a decade after being trafficked by ISIS, in a “complex operation” coordinated with the United States and other international actors.
The woman, Fawzia Amin Sido, told CNN that she was kidnapped by ISIS as a child in August 2014, when the group captured the city of Sinjar in northern Iraq. ISIS executed Yazidi men and boys and committed acts of sexual violence and rape against women and girls, among other crimes, as CNN has reported.
Sido said she was then trafficked to different locations across several countries over the next few years.
She told CNN that she stayed in Rafah in southern Gaza for a year, where life was “unbearable,” moving around frequently since the Israel-Hamas war broke out in October 2023 until Tuesday, when she said an NGO rescued her.
“Hamas constantly harassed me due to my Yazidi background and contact with my family, even going so far as to format my phone during their investigations,” she said.
“Upon her entry into Israel, she continued to Jordan through the Allenby Bridge Crossing and from there- returned to her family in Iraq.”
The IDF said her captor was killed, “presumably during IDF strikes” in Gaza, allowing her to flee to a hideout.
Fawzia did not mention a strike when she spoke to CNN, saying only that she was rescued in Rafah by an NGO, which she couldn’t recall the name of. “From there, American officials took me and helped return me to Baghdad,” she said.
The United States and Iraq confirmed they had coordinated to help evacuate Sido out of Gaza.
“We were contacted by the Iraqi government, who was made aware of the fact that she escaped, that she was alive, and that she wanted to come home to her family, ” State spokesperson Matthew Miller said Thursday.
Iraq’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Sido was freed after more than four months of efforts from Iraqi government agencies working with American and Jordanian authorities.
An Israeli diplomat, David Saranga, released a video of Sido reuniting with her family members. Saranga said her captor was “a Palestinian Hamas-ISIS member.”