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Why Kurdish Women Joined The Fight Against ISIS

Groups of female Kurdish fighters, known as Women’s Protection Units, have been fighting on the front lines against ISIS for years. While they have been glamorized by Western media, little is known about the women and their motivations for fighting.

Amy Austin Holmes (@AmyAustinHolmes), a professor at American University in Cairo, spoke with a number of the women and shares their stories with Here & Now‘s Robin Young.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Fighters from the Kurdish female Women's Protection Units (YPJ) gather during an exercise at a training facility in the northeastern Syrian Kurdish town of Derik, on June 1, 2017. (Delil Souleiman/AFP/Getty Images)
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Fighters from the Kurdish female Women's Protection Units (YPJ) gather during an exercise at a training facility in the northeastern Syrian Kurdish town of Derik, on June 1, 2017. (Delil Souleiman/AFP/Getty Images)