Leyla Qasim (Southern Kurdish

Southern Kurdish

Southern Kurdish , also called Kermānšāhi, belongs to the Northwestern Iranian languages and is predominantly spoken in western Iran and eastern Iraq. In Iran, it is spoken in the provinces of Kermanshah and Ilam. In Iraq it is spoken in the region of Khanaqin , all the way to Mandali, Pehle...

: لەیلا قاسم) was a Kurdish

Kurdish people

The Kurdish people, or Kurds , are an Iranian people native to the Middle East, mostly inhabiting a region known as Kurdistan, which includes adjacent parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey...

 activist against the Iraq

Iraq

Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

i Ba'ath regime who was executed in Baghdad

Baghdad

Baghdad is the capital of Iraq, as well as the coterminous Baghdad Governorate. The population of Baghdad in 2011 is approximately 7,216,040...

. She is known as a national martyr among the Kurds.

Birth and Childhood

Was the third out of five children born to Kurdish farmer

Farmer

A farmer is a person engaged in agriculture, who raises living organisms for food or raw materials, generally including livestock husbandry and growing crops, such as produce and grain...

, Dalaho Qasim and his wife Kanî. She was born in Xaneqîn but was relocated to Irbil when she was four years old. The Qasims lived in wretched poverty

Poverty

Poverty is the lack of a certain amount of material possessions or money. Absolute poverty or destitution is inability to afford basic human needs, which commonly includes clean and fresh water, nutrition, health care, education, clothing and shelter. About 1.7 billion people are estimated to live...

, relying on rations for food and clothes. Leyla and her brother, Çiyako, were taught Arabic and agriculture

Agriculture

Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...

 by their mother when they were aged six and eight.

Political Activism

When Leyla was sixteen years old when Abdul Rahman Arif

Abdul Rahman Arif

Hajj Abdul Rahman Mohammed Arif Aljumaily was president of Iraq from April 16, 1966 to July 17, 1968.-Biography:...

 was overthrown by Ba'ath party leader, General Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr

Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr

General Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr , was the fourth President of Iraq from 1968 to 1979.-Military career:...

. Leyla was disturbed by the violent takeover in the capital. During the late 1960s, Leyla and Çiyako wrote pamphlets on the horrors of the Ba'ath party including the new leader, Saddam Hussein

Saddam Hussein

Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...

 whom they described as being against Kurdish independence.

Leyla spoke to several Kurds in the Northern region of Iraq about the Ba'ath regime and the loose morals of the members. Leyla was told that her words were inspiring sedition.

In 1970 she joined the Kurdistan Students Union and the Kurdistan Democratic Party.
In 1974, while studying at Baghdad University, she tried to assassinate Saddam Hussein. After the failed attempt, she was arrested, tortured and ultimately hanged after a lengthy show trial, broadcasted throughout Iraq. – (41)What Kind of Liberation? Women and the Occupation of Iraq by Nadje al Ali and Nicola Pratt. Berkeley: University of California Press. 2009

She was executed in Baghdad on May 12, 1974.