# Her brother’s keeper? Iraq’s only female cabinet minister could lose her job over alleged family tie



## Disir (Jan 3, 2019)

Iraq’s prime minister is weighing whether to accept the resignation of his education minister after allegations surfaced online that her brother had been a senior figure in the Islamic State’s de facto capital of Mosul.

Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi’s decision could have a far-reaching impact on a society that is emerging from a costly war against the militants and is struggling to heal from the deep social and political divisions caused by the Islamic State occupation.

Shaima al-Hayali, an academic from Mosul University, was barely one week into her ministerial post when members of a rival political bloc alleged that her brother had been an administrator for the Islamic State in Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city. Her case is the highest-profile instance of what human rights groups and some Iraqi politicians have described as overzealous collective punishment of people whose family members worked with the militant group, whether by force or choice.

Thousands of Sunni Iraqis have been convicted and sentenced to death or life in prison for having ties to the Islamic State in trials that legal experts say are designed for revenge, not due process. Hundreds of thousands — the majority women and children — have been prevented from returning to their homes and languish in decrepit camps for having a relative accused of fighting for the Islamic State. The Iraqi government has been unable to rein in tribal courts that have permitted revenge killings against people with even the most tenuous links to the extremists.

The combination of state and street retribution has raised concerns that Iraq is creating a pariah class whose suffering and lack of integration could undermine stability — while fueling the next wave of militant insurgency.
Her brother’s keeper? Iraq’s only female cabinet minister could lose her job over alleged family ties to ISIS. - The Washington Post

If the guy willingly joined that might be an issue. If he was forced to join that is a whole 'nother ball game.


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