Because of this connection to the Sufi Iblis tradition, some followers of Christianity and Islam equate the Peacock Angel with their own unredeemed evil spirit Satan, which has incited centuries of persecution of the Yazidis as ‘devil worshippers’. Persecution of Yazidis has continued in their home communities within the borders of modern Iraq, under both Saddam Hussein and fundamentalist Sunni Muslim revolutionaries. In August 2014 the Yazidis were targeted by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL, in its campaign to ‘purify’ Iraq and neighboring countries of non-Islamic influences.