Persecution of Yazidis by ISIL refers to the genocidal persecution of the Yazidi people of Iraq, leading to their exile, the abduction of Yazidi women, and massacres of at least 5,000 Yazidi civilians, during what has been called a "forced conversion campaign" being carried out in Northern Iraq by the militant organization the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL or ISIS), starting in 2014.