* Murder and Rape of Iraq's Christians Now the Norm *

http://www.iris.org.il/blog.html

 

 

     * Murder and Rape of Iraq's

       Christians Now the Norm *

 

Koran-inspired attacks on infidels are the reason that

minorities are fleeing every Muslim-majority area of

the world, with only one exception--Israeli Jews.

Despite this, Western governments and even Christian

groups themselves are largely silent:

 

Iraq's outnumbered Christians and other religious

minority groups are targets of a terror campaign and

are facing a dire situation where killings and rapes

have become the norm, a panel of witnesses testified

yesterday on Capitol Hill.

 

In a hearing convened by the U.S. Commission on

International Religious Freedom, Canon Andrew White,

vicar of St. George's Anglican Church in Baghdad, and

four other panelists unfolded tales of horrors

overtaking Christians, Yezidis (angel worshippers) and

Mandaeans, members of a pacifist faith that follows the

teachings of John the Baptist.

 

"The situation is more than desperate," said Mr. White,

who described how Christians in Baghdad have been told

to convert to Islam or be killed. Hundreds of those who

could not afford to flee the country are living in

churches without adequate food or water, he said.

 

"In the past month, 36 members of my own congregation

have been kidnapped," he said. "To date, only one has

been returned."

 

Michael Youash, director of the Iraq Sustainable

Democracy Project, called the situation "soft ethnic

cleansing." The "de-Christianization of Iraq" is not

far off, he predicted, saying that Washington has

refused to help Iraqi Christians, whose common faith

with many Americans has made them loathed by Muslim

radicals.

 

"The State Department just dismisses this as part of an

overall conflict," he said. "But Christians are being

disproportionately targeted. The attacks are purely

vindictive and vicious. They are meant to give a

message."