Mediha

A young Êzidî woman survived kidnapping and enslavement by ISIS and goes on a brave quest. For justice, for internal healing, and for her missing parents and brother. Heartbreaking and inspiring.

‘Ever since I returned from ISIS, I falter when I speak,’ Mediha Alhamad says at the beginning of the documentary Mediha. Mediha’s early childhood was simple and beautiful in her home village of Sinjar, in Northern Iraq. But when Mediha was 10, she was kidnapped by ISIS and forced into sexual slavery like many Êzidî women and girls.

In Mediha we see her – still only 15 years old – reclaiming her life after her release. It’s an incredibly brave and inspiring journey, which she undertakes with both vulnerability and determination. From opening up about her anxiety attacks to a psychologist, to trying to find her missing mother and young brother. Ultimately, she takes the brave step to try and bring her former captor to justice, something which very few Êzidî women have dared to do. This process, however, means that she has to revisit very traumatic events. ‘I’m scared but I’m trying not to be,’ she says. ‘It’s my dream to speak freely.’