Persecuted and Forgotten 2013 Report – Situation of Christians in in many countries has deteriorated

The cover image of the report shows the destruction of the Virgin Mary Church in Imbaba, Cairo, Egypt, May 2011ACN News ^ | 10/18/2013

In many countries the situation of Christians has sharply deteriorated. This is the finding of the report Persecuted and Forgotten? which was launched at a meeting in the UK Houses of Parliament on 17th October by the UK office of the international Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN). The report examines the situation of Christians in 30 different countries, including Afghanistan, China, Laos, Pakistan, Vietnam and Zimbabwe. In particular it analyses the situation in a number of majority Islamic countries and in those states whose political systems have a pronounced authoritarian character. The reporting period covers the past two-and-a-half years.

The principal finding of the report is that in two-thirds of the countries where persecution of Christians is most severe, the problems have become arguably even worse. In fact the Church’s very survival in some parts – notably the Middle East – is now at stake.

For Christians the so-called “Arab spring” has in many cases become what the report calls a “Christian winter”. Although the political upheavals have brought suffering to people of all faith communities, nonetheless it is above all the Christian confessions that have experienced the most open hostility and violence. They have become victims of every kind of political, economic, social and religious conflict – for example the conflicts between Sunni and Shi’ite Muslims. As a result, a great many Christians have been forced to flee. The report describes the exodus as reaching “almost biblical proportions”.

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‘Jihad tourism’ is surging

Young Muslims heading to Syria to fight, become adept terrorists, and return to the Western countries that gave them refugeJewishWorldReview.com |

BERLIN—(MCT) By the time Syrian aircraft bombed the house he was in, the man with tattoos of a zulfiqar sword and a teardrop was going by the name Abu Talha al-Almani.

European news reports that he may have been injured in the attack referred to him by a past alias, Deso Dogg, a sometimes troubled, sometimes brilliant Berlin gangsta rapper. But in official German records, he’s Denis Mamadou Cuspert, now 38. And to German intelligence officials and terrorism experts he represents the tip of a very disturbing trend.

Cuspert was hiding in a house in an unnamed area within Syria two weeks ago when he was injured in a bombing that also killed two children, according to rebel reports on social media. But he is only one of an estimated 170 Germans who, German intelligence officials believe, have made their way to Syria in the past year to fight the government of President Bashar Assad, often as part of al-Qaida-affiliated groups. In the past month alone, 50 have gone, German intelligence estimates.

Only a handful have returned so far, said Angela Pley, spokeswoman for the German equivalent of the National Security Agency, but that doesn’t calm German officials who worry that more will and that they will bring back military and terrorist know-how on an unprecedented scale.

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John McCain and ‘Allahu Akbar’

Freedom Center – David Horowitz – September 4, 2013 By Robert Spencer

Tuesday morning, Senator John McCain (R-AZ) got a bit hot under the collar when Brian Kilmeade of Fox News noted that the Syrian rebels whom Barack Obama and McCain want to aid militarily were shouting “Allahu akbar! Allahu akbar!” as rockets hit Syrian government offices. McCain’s response to Kilmeade demonstrated not only his ignorance of Islam, but his abysmal misjudgment of what is happening in Syria. And on the basis of that ignorance, he is aiding Obama’s rush to yet another war.

“I have a problem,” Kilmeade said, “helping those people screaming that after a hit.” That incensed McCain, who shot back: “Would you have a problem with an American or Christians saying ‘thank God? Thank God?’ That’s what they’re saying. Come on! Of course they’re Muslims, but they’re moderates and I guarantee you they are moderates.”

Wrong on all counts. In the first place, it does not mean “thank God,” as McCain seems to have affirmed when he said, “That’s what they’re saying.” Allahu akbar means “Allah is greater” – not, as it is often translated, “God is great.” The significance of this is enormous, as it is essentially a proclamation of superiority and supremacism. Allah is greater – than any of the gods of the infidels, and Islam is superior to all other religions.

Al-Islam.org states this obliquely: “Allahu akbar implies that God is superior to all tangible and intangible, temporal and celestial beings.” This may seem to be an innocuous theological statement until one recalls that Islam has always had a political aspect, and Islamic jihadists always shout “Allahu akbar” when attacking infidels. It is a declaration of the superiority of their god and their way of life over those of their victims. 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta also stated that it was meant to make the infidels afraid. He wrote instructions to jihadists that were found in his baggage: “Shout, ‘Allahu Akbar,’ because this strikes fear in the hearts of the non-believers.”

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The Blood of Christians on Obama’s Hands

Townhall.com ^ | September 10, 2013 | Scottie Hughes

Thirty-five miles northeast of Damascus is a small Christian village built into the mountains of Syria. Until yesterday, the most interesting thing about this town called Maaloula was that its 6,000 residents are among the last in the world who still speak Aramaic – the language Christ spoke as a boy in a carpentry shop, as man giving a sermon from a mount, and on the eve of his death and resurrection when he broke bread and poured wine and said, “This is my body…. This is my blood.”

Yesterday, according to reports by eyewitnesses, the Christians of Maaloula were attacked by a vicious army with no respect for human life and a special hatred for the Christians it calls infidels. They were driven from their homes. They were murdered in their streets.

Based on the recent rhetoric from President Obama and his administration, you might at first assume that the Syrian dictator and his army were responsible for this hate crime against the innocent Aramaic-speaking Christians of Maaloula. But the truth is quite the contrary. As has been the case in many prior attacks on Syria’s Christian minority, the culprits were al-Qaeda-linked rebels – the very same rebels Mr. Obama is preparing to help by bombing the Assad regime.

This past Sunday, as President Obama and his administration ratcheted up the usual media spin machine to promote their agenda, I was hoping pastors across the United States would stand up with moral courage and tell their congregations the truth about the ethnic cleansing of Christians in Syria. I was hoping that they would ratchet up the calls for the truth about who our enemies are. However, this administration and their media puppets have done such a good job of confusing the situation, many of those pastors have no idea who our enemy is.

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The war on Christians – The global persecution of Christians is the unreported catastrophe of our time

5 October 2013- The Spectator

Imagine if correspondents in late 1944 had reported the Battle of the Bulge, but without explaining that it was a turning point in the second world war. Or what if finance reporters had told the story of the AIG meltdown in 2008 without adding that it raised questions about derivatives and sub-prime mortgages that could augur a vast financial implosion?

Most people would say that journalists had failed to provide the proper context to understand the news. Yet that’s routinely what media outlets do when it comes to outbreaks of anti-Christian persecution around the world, which is why the global war on Christians remains the greatest story never told of the early 21st century.

In recent days, people around the world have been appalled by images of attacks on churches in Pakistan, where 85 people died when two suicide bombers rushed the Anglican All Saints Church in Peshawar, and in Kenya, where an assault on a Catholic church in Wajir left one dead and two injured.

Those atrocities are indeed appalling, but they cannot truly be understood without being seen as small pieces of a much larger narrative. Consider three points about the landscape of anti-Christian persecution today, as shocking as they are generally unknown. According to the International Society for Human Rights, a secular observatory based in Frankfurt, Germany, 80 per cent of all acts of religious discrimination in the world today are directed at Christians. Statistically speaking, that makes Christians by far the most persecuted religious body on the planet.

According to the Pew Forum, between 2006 and 2010 Christians faced some form of discrimination, either de jure or de facto, in a staggering total of 139 nations, which is almost three-quarters of all the countries on earth. According to the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Massachusetts, an average of 100,000 Christians have been killed in what the centre calls a ‘situation of witness’ each year for the past decade. That works out to 11 Christians killed somewhere in the world every hour, seven days a week and 365 days a year, for reasons related to their faith.

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In Midst of Syrian Crisis, Netanyahu Holds Bible Study

Teresa Neumann (Sep 19, 2013)

Studying why Moses couldn’t enter the Promised Land, Israeli’s Prime Minister concludes, “Moses could not enter the Promised Land, and we merit that privilege to be here in the land of our forefathers, thanks to him and thanks to the struggle of our people. And we bless every second. It is a great privilege to read this great book [Scripture] and to know that we are fulfilling what God commanded our people … in that way we are fulfilling the legacy.”

(Jerusalem, Israel)—In a recent blog, Joel C. Rosenberg writes, “One of the most interesting but least known aspects in the life of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu [who was not raised in a religious home] is that he has developed a noticeable curiosity in ancient Scriptures.”

Rosenberg goes on to reveal that the Prime Minister started a Bible study with various Jewish leaders and scholars last year that continues to meet in his official residence.

Indeed, multiple sources reveal that as recently as last week, despite the intense saber rattling gripping the Mideast over conditions in Syria, Netanyahu convened another Bible study, the focus of which was why the Lord punished Moses by not allowing him to enter the Promised Land.

The Prime Minister was quoted as saying Moses’ punishment seemed cruel and asked, “What is the logic behind that—it seems unjust?” (more…)

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Arab Christians come out strongly against US strike in Syria

By Christa Case Bryant, Staff writer / September 6, 2013

Activists hold banners, Lebanese flags and pictures of Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad during a sit-in near the US embassy in Awkar, north of Beirut, against potential US strikes on Syria September 6, 2013. As President Barack Obama tries to rally the world around a proposed attack on Syria, Christians and Muslim leaders who met at a conference in Amman this week have come out as strongly opposed.

As President Barack Obama tries to rally the world around a proposed attack on Syria, Arab Christian leaders have come out as strongly opposed, worried an attack could create a backlash against their communities.

At a conference of more than 50 regional Christian leaders and a handful of global Christians and Muslim scholars in Amman this week, the dangers of Western intervention to the region’s Christian minorities emerged as one of the strongest themes. With political Islam on the rise after the Arab uprisings of 2011, the region’s ancient Christian communities are already feeling under threat and have the recent example of the devastation of Iraq’s Christian community following the US-led invasion of 2003 to make them worry about the consequences of action.

“We stress that we reject foreign interference in Syria,” said Ignatius Joseph III Younan, Patriarch of Antioch for the Syrian Catholic Church, in a statement read before the conference, which was sponsored by Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad of Jordan. (more…)

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Sharia Committee Issues Fatwa Against … Croissants

Al Arabiya ^ | Tuesday, 30 July 2013 |

A sharia committee in a rebel-held area of Aleppo issued a fatwa deeming croissants ‘haram’ (forbidden in Islamic law) because of their “colonial” significance, pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat reported on Tuesday.

Croissants’ crescent shape celebrates European victory over Muslims, according to the fatwa (religious ruling).

Rebel-controlled areas of the Syrian city have experienced several strict fatwas recently from Islamic sharia committees.

Such edicts are uncommon in Aleppo’s society, which usually adheres to moderate Islamic teachings, Asharq al-Awsat reported.

A sharia committee in the city issued a fatwa on Facebook prohibiting “Muslim women wearing makeup and tight clothes that reveal physical features from going out.”

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More Western jihadis fighting in Syria than in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia or Yemen

www.jihadwatch.org – Sunday, 28 July 2013

Eventually they will return home — to stop them would be “Islamophobic.” And then then it will get even more interesting. “Worries Mount as Syria Lures West’s Muslims,” by Eric Schmitt for the New York Times, July 27 (thanks to Kenneth):

WASHINGTON — A rising number of radicalized young Muslims with Western passports are traveling to Syria to fight with the rebels against the government of Bashar al-Assad, raising fears among American and European intelligence officials of a new terrorist threat when the fighters return home.

More Westerners are now fighting in Syria than fought in conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia or Yemen, according to the officials. They go to Syria motivated by the desire to help the people suffering there by overthrowing Mr. Assad. But there is growing concern that they will come back with a burst of jihadist zeal, some semblance of military discipline, enhanced weapons and explosives skills, and, in the worst case, orders from affiliates of Al Qaeda to carry out terrorist strikes.

“Syria has become really the predominant jihadist battlefield in the world,” Matthew G. Olsen, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, told a security conference in Aspen, Colo., this month. He added, “The concern going forward from a threat perspective is there are individuals traveling to Syria, becoming further radicalized, becoming trained and then returning as part of really a global jihadist movement to Western Europe and, potentially, to the United States.”

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Channel Seven – Australian woman drugged and rapped in Dubai / Today Tonight – Troubled Suburbs in Sydney

Dear friends & family in Christ,

We’re forwarding the following media reports on the increasing exposure of Islamic Sharia law, close to home in Australia, for your ongoing prayerful action.

1) Channel Seven News on Sunday May 12, 2013 – Reporter: Ross Coulthart – Producer: Ali Russell

“With Dubai emerging as a major stopover point for long haul journeys, five hundred flights a month will deliver over one million of us to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in the next year. Dubai is being promoted as a luxury high-class paradise in the desert, but the reality is brutally different, as Australian Alicia Gali discovered. Gali took a job in the UAE with one of the world’s biggest hotel chains, Starwood. What happened next makes this story a must-watch for every Australian planning on travelling through the region.

Gali was using her laptop in the hotel’s staff bar when her drink was spiked. She awoke to a nightmare beyond belief: she had been savagely raped by three of her colleagues. Alone and frightened, she took herself to hospital. What Alicia didn’t know is that under the UAE’s strict sharia laws, if the perpetrator does not confess, a rape cannot be convicted without four adult Muslim male witnesses. She was charged with having illicit sex outside marriage, and thrown in a filthy jail cell for eight months.”

You may click the following link to read and watch both parts of a very shocking report on the practice of Islamic Sharia law with non-Muslims in Dubai, the so called most moderate city in the Muslim Middle East.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/sunday-night/features/article/-/17094076/abandoned/

 2) Channel Seven Today Tonight Program  ‘Troubled suburbs’ – May 13, 2013 – James Thomas  

“The shock waves of the religious war between the Sunnis and the Shias in Syria are being felt 14,000km away in the suburbs of Australia.

You may click the following link to read and watch the ‘Troubled suburbs’ as Islamic tensions arise with Muslim fighting Muslim in the streets of Sydney.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/today-tonight/latest/article/-/17129164/troubled-suburbs/

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Christians Wash the Feet of Syria’s Most Vulnerable

Charisma News – 4/3/2013 – Wendy Griffith/CBN News

Missionaries from E3 Partners invited Syrians to hear about Jesus and take part in a foot-washing ceremony. (CBN News)

As the world watches Syria implode from a bloody and brutal civil war, missionaries are going to the front lines to try and bring comfort and healing to more than a million people who have escaped the fighting.

Many Syrian refugees are finding comfort in unlikely places. On a recent Saturday, more than 100 burqa-clad refugees filed into a church in northern Jordan for a two-day women’s conference.

It is a bit unusual to see so many Muslim women in church, but then these are unusual times in the Middle East and people are seeking comfort wherever it is offered.

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