Sex Slavery is "Condoned and Encouraged" in the Islamic State

The men of ISIS are routinely raping pre-teen women, claiming the practice is condoned and encouraged by their religion!

In case you missed this story in the The New York Times  you have to read it. This is how it starts:

QADIYA, Iraq — In the moments before he raped the 12-year-old girl, the Islamic State fighter took the time to explain that what he was about to do was not a sin. Because the preteen girl practiced a religion other than Islam, the Quran not only gave him the right to rape her — it condoned and encouraged it, he insisted.

He bound her hands and gagged her. Then he knelt beside the bed and prostrated himself in prayer before getting on top of her.

When it was over, he knelt to pray again, bookending the rape with acts of religious devotion.

“I kept telling him it hurts — please stop,” said the girl, whose body is so small an adult could circle her waist with two hands. “He told me that according to Islam he is allowed to rape an unbeliever. He said that by raping me, he is drawing closer to God,” she said in an interview alongside her family in a refugee camp here, to which she escaped after 11 months of captivity." Continue reading the main story

The question now is what can anyone do to stop this abhorrent practice?

The Obama administration is already bombing ISIS targets in Iraq. American troops are training and advising the Iraqi army, and the U.S. is arming some Syrian rebels.

The only other alternative would be for the U.S.  to wage war against ISIS. Putting American troops on the ground there will end up killing thousands of soldiers and civilians. And what will it achieve? We've already seen the mess caused by the wars the U.S. waged in Iraq and Afghanistan. In the end, the situation in the Islamic State will be no better after a war. 

All we're left with is deep loathing for the rapists who use religion to justify violent sexual acts against young women. We are left with an even deeper sadness. And prayers for the young women who are enslaved and brutalized.