[3] In August 2014, the Siege of Mount Sinjar raged between Sunni militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the Kurdish Peshmerga, leading to a mass exodus of residents, especially from the Yazidi community, branded by the Islamic State as "devil worshippers", after the Peshmerga was defeated.

[7] The New York Times reported that ISIL killed dozens of Yazidi men and forced their women to marry jihadi fighters.

PKK, YPG and YPJ joint forces were able to stop additional attacks on two more villages after Peshmerga fled the area.

The district's economy is primarily based on agriculture with the main crops being barley, figs, wheat, and tobacco.

In the villages of Ain al-Ghazal and Hayali exist oil fields, which were closed because of the Iraq war.