Wars are demons which are always meant for destruction. The only way they know to achieve their wishes is complete destruction. Women, men, children and even nature are also being ruined by bombs, guns and shots. The purpose of wars may vary.It depends upon the motives of each group. The memoir The Last Girl by Nadia Murad is a journey from a peaceful life at Kocho to a strange life in Germany as a refugee. The protagonist Nadia draws a complete picture of devastation of an area,people and their minds. The war took place in Kocho where they practiced genocide to wipe out one of the ethnic minorities in Iraq, that is Yazidi.Surviving a war is such an easy task when it is compared to the life of survivors Because the days after war is like a life without life.
The memoir is divided into three parts. The first part deals with Murad’s peaceful life in the Yazidi village Kocho and she included several incidents and disputes related to nearby Sunni villages and terrorists attacks she evoked. She narrated the occupation of Islamic State in Kocho in August 2014 and successive massacres inflicted by ISIS. Men were killed and women were used as sexual slaves when they refused to convert into Muslim community. In second part, Murad conveys her experiences as a brutally treated woman by ISIS militants. The days she spent in the camps were horrible. Once she tried to escape, she was failed and was raped by the guards and moved to an ISIS check point and again raped by many. Third part is the continuation of her struggle to escape from that hell. The second attempt was a successful one and with the help of a family, she went to Kocho and started a new life.She defined the circumstances as incredible.
The Last Girl is a thunderous ode to a woman’s will to struggle, to survive and to emerge victorious through unimaginable trauma and torture. Moreover, the story offers a powerful insight into how the Yazidi suffered incomparable cruelty, how a woman braved the worst of human conditions and was able to share her story with the world. It is not just a story of a Yazidi woman who suffered being a sex slave and monumental tragedy in the hands of the ISIS, instead the work is a testimony of the ancient Yazidi community, and their unceasing predicaments that are ignored by the larger mass. Nadia's unflinching portrayal of her own story is the strong weapon, she has against terrorism. Even though, genocide is not something that just happened yesterday, it is an unnoticeable part of history. The work is like a mirror set against the reality which reflects the terrible beauty of the world. Rape has been used as a tool in war time for millennia. It is used as an instrument in genocide. Because it is one way of advancing the destruction of a community. Rape has a huge capacity to destroy asmuch as a bullet can destroy. The memoir contains open wounds and painful lessons,as Yazidi activist, Nadia Murad learns how her own story can become a weapon against her co-opted for any number of political agendas.
Usually, the world celebrate and remember the victorious pages of history. In those victories, the minorities are often denied their right to live by the hands of powerful majority. Their voices are crushed under the authoritative orders and the world does not see any representatives from them. In this context The Last Girl becomes very relevant. It is a memoir of a girl from Yazidi community, a minority section of Iraq, which explains the traumatic situations of Yazidis and their fearful life in their home country Iraq. She dared to speak against ISIS and their cruel agendas.
Nadia is the first Yazidi woman who begins an open fight with such a huge organization and stood for a healthy living of Yazidis. She fought with herself to overcome the trauma and successfully nurtured the confidence within her to create a protective layer around her community. The UN Goodwill Ambassador for the dignity of survivors of human trafficking, Nadia is not just a survivor, she is a winner of human rights. As a research topic, the work is viewed in the angle of trauma which reflects throughout the lives of victims who subjected to the effects of war.
