MOUNT SINJAR, Iraq — Latif Alo is a Kurdish fighter in his early 40s heading toward the town of Sinjar to fight. Driving along the only road leading to the town, Alo has become restless to reach the front line, where fierce fighting is continuing between Kurdish forces supported by US-led coalition airstrikes and Islamic State (IS) militants. He's on a mission, with an old BRNO rifle inherited from his father and a leather bullet vest around his waist.

"I have come here to fight Daesh," said Alo, as smoke rose from the town at the southern foot of the mountain over which the boom of airstrikes reverberated. “They took many of our girls. Our honor has been violated. I have come back here to free them."

During the third week in December, Kurdish peshmerga backed by airstrikes managed to claw back more than 3,000 square kilometers of the Sinjar area in less than 48 hours. Iraqi Kurdish officials hailed it as the biggest victory yet in the global war against Islamic State.

According to a report by Amnesty International, the victory, however, may have come too late for many Yazidis, who have suffered "unparalleled brutality" at the hands of IS members after they overran Sinjar in the summer. With hundreds of Yazidis slain and many women and girls still unaccounted for, more will be needed to restore the minority's confidence in the peshmerga, who had been responsible for protecting them but failed.