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Sinjar (; , Thomas A. Carlson et al., "Sinjar – ܫܝܓܪ ” in The Syriac Gazetteer last modified 30 June 2014, http://syriaca.org/place/184.) is a town in the Sinjar District of the Nineveh Governorate in northern Iraq. It is located about five kilometers south of the Sinjar Mountains. Its population in 2013 was estimated at 88,023, and is predominantly Yazidi.
The city came under Ayyubid dynasty rule during the reign of Saladin and was controlled by the Ayyubid ruler of the Diyar Bakr district of the Jazira, al-Ashraf Muzaffar al-Din (). It later was controlled by the ruler of Mosul, Badr al-Din Lu'lu'. The Ilkhanate destroyed the double wall of Sinjar and the mashhad of Ali in 1262; the mashhad was rebuilt afterward by the Ilkhanid's Persian governor of the area Muhammad al-Yazdi. Ibn al-Adim and al-Dhahabi (d. 1348) list several Islamic scholars who hailed from Sinjar, including the polymath Ibn al-Akfani (d. 1348). The geographer Zakariya al-Qazwini (d. 1283) referred to Sinjar as "little Damascus", noting in particular the similarities of Sinjar's ornate Turkish bath with their mosaic-laced floors and walls and octagonal stone pools. During his visit of the city, Ibn Battuta (d. 1369) mentioned that the inhabitants of the city were Kurds, whom he describes as "brave and generous". He also remarked that Sinjar's congregational mosque was encircled by a perennial stream.
The Timurid Empire successors of the Ilkhanids captured Sinjar after a seven-month siege according to oral traditions cited by Evliya Çelebi (d. 1682). The city was later conquered successively by the Turkmen tribes of Ak Koyunlu and Kara Koyunlu before being taken by the Safavid dynasty of Iran in 1507/08. During the Ottoman–Safavid War (1532–1555), Sinjar was captured by the Constantinople (Istanbul)-based Ottoman Empire in 1534. The city became the center of its own sanjak (district) within Diyarbekir Eyalet (province of Diyarbakir). It was later reduced to being the administrative center of its own nahiya (subdistrict) of the Mardin. Writing in the 17th century, Evliya Çelebi noted that the population of the city of Sinjar was composed of Kurds and Arabs from the Banu Tayy tribe, while the Sinjar Mountains were inhabited by 45,000 Yazidi and Baburi Kurds.
After 1830, the nahiya of Sinjar became part of the Mosul Sanjak. During the 19th century, the Yazidis of the Sinjar Mountains often posed a threat to travelers in the region. The governor Dawud Pasha of Baghdad (in office in 1816–1831) was unable to suppress the Yazidis and the Yazidi revolts of 1850–1864 were ended after the diplomatic efforts of the Ottoman statesman Midhat Pasha enabled the authorities to tax and impose customs in the area.
On 13 August 2009, a suicide bombing killed 21 people and wounded 32 in a cafe in the Kalaa neighborhood of Sinjar. On 14 August 2010, a series of truck bombings by al-Qaeda in Iraq in the towns of Qahtaniya and al-Jazira, both in the Sinjar District, killed 326 Yazidis and injured 530 more.
According to statistical survey of the Sinjar District in 2013, the city of Sinjar had a population of 77,926. The ethnic composition of the city consisted of Kurds, Arabs, Turkmens, and Assyrian people and the religious composition consisted of Yazidis, Sunni Muslims, and Christians. There were 23 primary schools, three intermediate schools and seven secondary schools, a hospital, two other health care facilities, three public parks and two sports fields. The town had three churches, a Syriac Orthodox Church, Syriac Catholic Church, and Armenian Apostolic Church, all of which were destroyed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
On the night of 20 December 2014, in the course of a first offensive to retake Sinjar from ISIL militants, Kurdish forces pushed into the city. However, the Kurdish advance into Sinjar was stalled, as they faced stiff resistance from ISIL militants inside the southern half of the city.
On 13 November 2015, a day after launching a major second offensive, Kurdish forces and Yazidi militias backed by US airstrikes, entered the city and fully regained its control from ISIL. Following the recapture, in the nearby hamlet of Solagh, east of Sinjar city, Kurdish forces found a mass grave with the remains of at least 78 Yazidi women from Kocho village believed to be executed by ISIL militants. Following the recapture of Sinjar, Yazidi groups engaged in revenge looting and burnings targeting Sunni Muslims, as well as reprisal killings.
In June 2020, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom accused Turkey that during the Operations Claw-Eagle and Claw-Tiger, Turkey threatened Yazidi families who attempted to return to their homes in the town. Turkey rejected the claims.
In 2021 the Iraqi government called for the local Sinjar Alliance (who had fought ISIS), in Sinjar to withdraw, which was rejected by the Yazidi administration. This has led to international calls for the Iraqi army to de-escalate and withdraw from the region.
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