"The Human RightsTragedy of Our Time" (video)

"The human rights tragedy of our time" is what Muslim persecution of Christians round the world would be called were it not for the fact that this truth violates the western mainstream media's narrative of Christians (and of course Israel) as the persecutors and Muslims as the victims, declares the eminent scholar Raymond Ibrahim in this recent video.

Moodey Views: Bile behind the smile

It seems our old friend, the smiley Jeremy Moodey, is stepping down as head honcho of the NGO Embrace the Middle East (formerly BibleLands) for pastures new.

He  leaves the NGO a nasty legacy of Israel-demonisation:

'While Embrace the Middle East runs schools, and organizes educational programming and other community development initiatives, it promotes an entirely biased and distorted view of the conflict based solely on the Palestinian narrative of victimization and Israeli aggression.

Endorsed the Kairos Palestine document, which promotes BDS (boycotts, divestment and sanctions) and denies Jewish historical connections to Israel. 

CEO Jeremy Moody [sic] has called Zionism “an incoherent and racist theology.”

Moody posted a July 9, 2015 tweet endorsing BDS, stating: “Ten years of #BDS against Israel’s occupation of #Palestine. Major achievements for a movement that is now mainstream.”Moody sent an October 2013 letter to The Methodist Observer “explaining why Embrace the Middle East is encouraging Christians to consider BDS as a non-violent tool to end the occupation.”

Posted an August 17, 2015 tweet alleging, “The reality of Israeli settler- colonialism in #Palestine: bulldozers demolish ancient olive trees nr Bethlehem today.”

Embrace the Middle East published an “Advent Services Resource Pack,” which links “the familiar Christmas story to the stories of those living in the lands of the Bible TODAY,” in an attempt to exploit religious symbols and narratives to demonize Israel.

Publishes lesson plans for teachers to use in schools. One, on the theme of “Walls,” attempts to explain “the difficulties some Palestinian children have in getting to school” due to the security barrier. The lesson plan promotes the Palestinian narrative of victimization and Israeli aggression, while ignoring that the security barrier was constructed in response to a prolonged and brutal suicide bombing campaign by Palestinians groups against Israeli civilians.

Co-signed an August 2015 campaign, calling on world leaders “to press the Israeli government to lift the blockade on Gaza,” while altogether omitting that the blockade was implemented in an effort to stop Palestinian terrorists from smuggling of weapons and rockets into Gaza that would later be used to target Israeli civilians. Co-signatories include a number of other highly biased and politicized NGOs active in the Arab-Israeli conflict: Broederlijk Delen, Christian Aid, CCFD, Diakonia, French Platform of NGOs for Palestine, Heinrich Boll Foundation Palestine, Medical Aid for Palestinians, Medico International, Norwegian Church Aid, Norwegian People’s Aid, Oxfam, Pax Christi, Physicians for Human Rights, Trocaire, Lutheran World Federation, World Vision, and others.'

See more, with links, here

The most cursory glance at Mr Moodey's Twitter page indicates just how one tiny sliver of a country in the Middle East, that belonging to da Joos, tends to occupy his thoughts, and not in a pleasant way.

He's also got his boxer shorts in a twist over definitions of antisemitism, ventilating his views in a letter to a Church of England newspaper  (image on Twitter: the letter, that is, not the boxer shorts).

I wonder whether he would question Muslim definitions of Islamophobia.  (Nah, I don't think so!)

The most recent (at the time I type this) tweet of his relates to Stephen Sizer, whom he's always prone to defend.

That tweet's similar to what Mr Moodey's posted on Facebook (at left, above).

Only the tweet lacks the readers' comments which, though not without challenge from fair-minded folk, trivialise and at least on the part of one Sizer fan, actually deny that the vicar ever linked to that notorious "Israel did 9/11" article in the first place!


Former Foreign Office diplomat Mr Moodey, in his "valedictory despatch" to his NGO, can't resist a parting shot at Israel, heaping upon it most if not all  of the blame for the plight of Christians suffering under the jackboot of Hamas:

"The last seven years have been tumultuous for the region. The so-called Arab Spring, which began in 2011 brought about the downfall of regimes in Egypt, Libya, Yemen and Tunisia; The terrible war in Syria, the most violent and catastrophic conflict for at least a generation; Another brutal, unnecessary war in Yemen.

A succession of wars in Gaza and the effective collapse of any meaningful peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. The apparent abandonment by President Donald Trump of the ‘two-state solution’ in Israel/Palestine, without any obvious plan for what alternative solution to put in its place. The ongoing violence in Iraq and the emergence, seemingly from nowhere, of extreme Islamism in the form of ISIS, or Da’esh as many prefer to call it.

Meanwhile the historic Christian communities of the region have suffered: Persecuted by ISIS in Iraq and Syria, subjected to attacks on their churches and cathedrals in Egypt, humiliated and oppressed by occupation in Gaza, East Jerusalem and the West Bank.

The situation in Gaza is perhaps a microcosm of the wider region. When I arrived as CEO of what was then BibleLands in 2009, the tiny Christian community in Gaza totalled around 1,500. Today that community numbers barely 1,000, as Palestinian Christian families emigrate to escape the blockade and violence, and possibly also Islamist rule in the form of Hamas. At this rate of attrition, the last Palestinian Christian will leave Gaza in just over a decade."

Now let's hear from a specialist in tracing the plight of Christians in the Middle East, a man, writing last year, who knows exactly where the blame for their persecution in Gaza belongs:

'The plight of Christians living in Gaza under the Palestinian authority continues to worsen. According to a new Arabic language report, recent years have “witnessed a critical upsurge against the Christians,” who only amount to approximately 2,500 people—surrounded by approximately 1.5 million Muslims. Local authorities have abandoned the tiny minority to Islamist elements who have “placed great and continuous pressure” on the Christians.

“At times we hear of the bombing of a Christian bookshop and assaults on churches and other Christian institutions; other times we hear of the kidnapping of Christians and the coercion of them to embrace the religion of Muhammad,” says the report.

In mid October, Christians in Gaza led a protest, calling for the return of their kidnapped children and loved ones. They held up signs saying “I am a Christian and boast of my cross.” Bishop Alexios of the region “confirmed that the Christians who converted to Islam did so under threats, coercion, compulsion, and force.” His church also submitted a formal petition to the governor of the region, Ismail Haniyeh, calling on him to investigate matters, but received no response.

Palestinian Muslim leaders say that such Christians convert of their own free will and without pressure; however, these same Muslim leaders refuse to let their Christian families meet with or even learn the whereabouts of these recent converts, so they can confirm if their conversions were committed freely or under duress.

The report adds that Gaza’s Christians are calling on the Christian world to intervene. The bishop said that he is trying to communicate all of this to the Vatican, the United Nations, and the United States.'

 
Active directors of Embrace the Middle East:

Mariam Tadros .
https://site2corp.com/uk/mariam-tadros
Tanas Emill Tanas Alqassis
https://site2corp.com/uk/tanas-emill-tanas-alqassis
Dr Madeleine Davies
https://blogs.reading.ac.uk/english-at-reading/tag/dr-madeleine-davies/
https://site2corp.com/uk/madeleine-davies-1
Dr Kathryn Ann Kraft
https://site2corp.com/uk/kathryn-ann-kraft
Revd Brian Stephen Jolly
https://site2corp.com/uk/brian-stephen-jolly-1
Stephen Philip Dengate
https://site2corp.com/uk/stephen-philip-dengate
Christine Anne Clayton
https://site2corp.com/uk/christine-anne-clayton-1
John Philip Greville Neate
https://site2corp.com/uk/john-philip-greville-neate
Anthony James Ball
https://site2corp.com/uk/anthony-james-ball-2
Richard Brian Mcgucken
https://site2corp.com/uk/richard-brian-mcgucken
Lisa Jane Toner
https://site2corp.com/uk/lisa-jane-toner
Hugh Rowland Bradley
https://site2corp.com/uk/hugh-rowland-bradleyI

(hat  tip: E. Crabtree)

 http://www.embraceme.org/trustees

The Islamist Enemy Within, & Christians Without

On learning that 86-year-old Father Jacques Hamel had murdered in his own church in a village near Rouen by Islamist demons who stormed in during Mass and slit his throat, the president of the World Jewish Congress issued a heartfelt message of condolence:

“This morning, my thoughts and prayers are with the victims of yet another atrocious attack, and with the good people of France who sadly have become so familiar with the reality of terrorism in recent months.

Alas, there is no respite. Every day, these terrorists make it abundantly clear to the world that nothing is sacred to them, that they will not shy away from any execrable affront to the most basic values of our society.

Let’s be clear: this is not a war between religions, but between good and evil. We must stand as one in the face of this great threat. We must not be intimidated, but cherish our freedom, including the freedom to worship. We must speak out and not be silent. We must defend each other, and we must look after one another: one religious community after the other, one country after the other. This evil scourge won’t be defeated unless we are united in our resolve to defeat it.”

 "Not a war between religions".

Many might disagree.

Though perhaps not this chap Sutherland.
He's one of the political elites  who wants Europe to be ever more f*cked culturally enriched.

Remember this?:

And clearly not the Pope:

'Pope Francis has warned that a recent wave of jihadist attacks in Europe is proof that "the world is at war".  However, he stressed he did not mean a war of religions, but rather a conflict over "interests, money, resources".  He was speaking ahead of his visit to Poland to reporters seeking his comments on the murder of a Catholic priest by French jihadists on Tuesday....'

 He's now at work on Polish youth, urging them to welcome "migrants".

Or the repellent Merkel, who has dug her heels in regarding her asylum policy, despite conceding the other day what should have been obvious from the start:

  Reflects Ed West, writing here

 'Fr Jacques Hamel, murdered ... by Islamists in Normandy ... in his life would have seen his country transformed, from the Occupation to the Thirty Golden Years and through to this modern unhappy age. I can’t imagine that a young priest in the age of the Piuses would have expected to end his life in such a manner, near to where Joan of Arc was martyred, but then Europeans are getting used to things that a few decades ago would have been absurd.

After the war, Europeans thought they could escape history, and retire to a secular, progressive world in which historical conflicts of identity would be a thing of the past. But instead of fascism and communism, even older, more retrograde ideologies have sprung up, and history goes on. 

Christianity might be dying of indifference in western Europe but elsewhere it remains a living part of history, and that story includes persecution. Being a priest or a religious remains a dangerous task – earlier this year four nuns in Yemen were murdered, while a number of priests and bishops have been killed in Syria; likewise in Iraq, where some 60 churches were bombed during the conflict, the worst incident being the 2010 Our Lady of Salvation massacre where 52 men, women and children were slaughtered by a then little known outfit called the Islamic State of Iraq. The survivors were given asylum in France, which has always been especially generous towards eastern Christians.  

 Please read the entire article.

As well as this one ("Will Britain at last stand up for Christians?") by Tim Montgomerie, for those who can get access to The Times:

'Could the jihadists inspired by Islamic State stoop any lower? [The killing of Father Hamel proves] once again, that an evil is stalking the continent and it is willing to plumb any depths in its attempts to terrorise and enslave us.

Christians in other parts of the world will not have been surprised at the blood spilt in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray, near Rouen. Some feel that we, in the West, have turned our backs on their sufferings. “We feel forgotten and isolated,” complained Louis Sako, the Chaldean Archbishop of Baghdad: “We sometimes wonder, if they kill us all, what would be the reaction of Christians in the West? Would they do something then?”

While estimates of the global scale of religious slaughter and harassment differ wildly, there is enough evidence to suggest that religious persecution is widespread and growing. The Open Doors charity is a respected and relatively cautious chronicler of persecution and it estimates that an average of 322 Christians are killed every month as a direct consequence of their faith, while 214 churches or Christian properties are demolished, burnt down or in some way destroyed. Overall, Open Doors records, Christians are subject to 772 acts of violence — including beatings, abductions, rapes, arrests or forced marriages — each month.

We are largely familiar with the problems that Christians face in the Middle East. A century ago 14 per cent of all people in the region were Christians. Today it’s just 4 per cent.....'

They should be followed up by this one, by Lawrence A. Franklin, over at the Gatestone Institute, summarised thus:

 'Jesus warned his Apostles that men of faith would kill them, thinking they had done God a favor. Pope Francis, in the Vatican, referred to this killing as "an absurd murder." He could not be more wrong. This was a purposeful act of war against Judeo-Christian civilization. The murder of Father Jacques has great meaning. Our would-be replacements are telling us, "it is time for you to leave the stage of history."

This most recent murder is additional evidence that the old France is dying.' 

This too, by Yves Michaud, also over at Gatestone, summarised this,

'Europeans have delegated to the State the exclusive right to use violence against criminals. But Europeans, especially in France and Germany, are discovering that some kind of "misunderstanding" seems actually to be at work. Their State, the one that has the monopoly on violence, does not want to be at war with its Islamist citizens and residents. 

Worse, the State gives off the feeling that it is afraid of its Muslim citizens. "The concept of the rule of law means that the citizen is protected from the arbitrariness of the State. ... Currently, the rule of law protects the attackers above all". — Yves Michaud, French author and philosopher.'

 And this one, by Raymond Ibrahim, who warns:

 '....Mere Islam ... is responsible for the ongoing terrorization of the West.

If you doubt this, simply turn to a recent study. It found that Muslims of all sects, races, and sociopolitical circumstances—not just "ISIS"—are responsible for persecuting Christians in 41 of the 50 worst nations to be Christian in: Shia Iran is the ninth worst nation, "Wahhabi" Saudi Arabia is 14th, while "moderate" countries like Malaysia and Indonesia are ranked 30 and 43 respectively.

The common denominator in all these nations is Islam—without qualifier.

.... Ugly or not, this truth, that mere Islam—not "ISIS," "Salafism," "Wahhabism," or "Shiism"—promotes hate for and violence against non-Muslims will never be remedied until those in positions of leadership first acknowledge it. And, with the notable exception of Donald Trump, they are very far from doing so.'

As Melanie McDonough observes here:

'We’ve already got self-censorship when it comes to reporting attacks by Muslim refugees [sic] ...  in Germany and Scandinavia, and an almost comical reluctance anywhere in Europe to identify Islamist attacks as such – until IS takes credit for them, even the work of freelances. Plainly we have to guard against language that would demonise an entire community, but within that reasonable limit, we must require both politicians and public service broadcasters to talk plainly. And when Muslim extremists slit the throat of a priest in his own church, we’re looking at religiously motivated murder, entirely of a piece with the same religiously motivated murder of Christians and others being carried out in the Middle East. Shall we say so?

"In Public, Bethlehem Christians Laud Their Happy Coexistence ..."

We're used to slurs against Israel regarding the shrinking Christian population of Bethlehem.

(The accompanying vile pictures/posts are  recent posts by members of Facebook group Christian Friends of Palestine, by the way.)

So it's good to come across a recent article by Robert Nicholson, who sets the record straight.  He writes, inter alia:

'In 1990, Christians made up a majority of Bethlehem's residents; today they make up only 15%. Some say Israel is the reason for the decline, but then why is the Muslim population of Bethlehem growing when both sectors face the same exact set of circumstances? Jewish sovereignty does not, ipso facto, lead to Christian emigration.

Inside Israel, the Christian population has been growing steadily for decades. The decrease of Christians inside the Palestinian territories is due more to rising Islamism and bad governance by the Palestinian Authority. 

It is no coincidence that Bethlehem was mostly Christian until the 1990s. Until then, Bethlehem was ruled directly by Israel. Palestinian Christians (and Muslims) could travel freely inside Israel, visit the beach, and shop in Jewish neighborhoods. That all changed in the mid-1990s when Israel agreed to let the PLO rule parts of the West Bank and Gaza under the Oslo Accords.

 The Palestinian Authority is, by its own constitution, an Islamic state that embodies the principles of shari'a, and Christians are relegated to the status of second-class citizens. It is illegal to convert from Islam to Christianity. Moreover, living as a Christian, one is constantly reminded that he or she is not a member of the majority culture.

 In public, Bethlehem Christians laud their happy coexistence with their Muslim neighbors. They don't have a choice. They are hostages inside their own city.'

Read the entire article here

Two more current nasties from Christian Friends of Palestine members illustrative of the antisemitism that impels many of them.

(That Bruckner dame's incorrigible.)

WCC mischief here

And, with regard to the terrible plight of Middle Eastern Christians generally:

To quote the uploader of that trailer:

"Faithkeepers is an upcoming documentary film about the violent persecution of Christians and other religious minorities in the Middle East.

The film features exclusive footage and testimonials of Christians, Baha’i, Yazidis, Jews, and other minority refugees, and a historical context of the persecution in the region."

Christian Refugees Worry over Mass Muslim Immigration (video)

In Sweden, Christian refugees, perhaps wiser than their indigenous counterparts, voice their fears regarding the impact of Muslim immigration.  Sweden's Jews, of course, are already paying the price for Sweden's suicidal madness.

Hat tip: Vlad Tepes Blog

Meanwhile, yet another ecclesiastical initiative against the little Jewish State.

In Europe, A Spreading Virus (video)

It's reported that: 

"... Professor Nir Barzilai, director and founder of the Institute for Aging Research at Yeshiva University's Albert Einstein College of Medicine ... is overseeing a clinical trial titled "Targeting Aging with Metformin", or TAME, which seeks to discover whether Metformin, a medication prescribed for diabetes, may also delay the onset of aging-related illnesses, such as cancer, heart disease, and cognitive impairment.

The trial is currently in the final stages of planning and is searching for further sources of funding. The planned trial is to involve administering Metformin to thousands of elderly people, some of whom suffer from the aforementioned illnesses, and some of whom have the potential to develop the illnesses. Another group of subjects, identical in makeup to the first, is to be given a placebo as a control...."

Comments (hat tip: reader P) a British woman whose name does not suggest an Islamic identity, though I have no idea of her personal circumstances:

It's in part a reflection of the influences under which European Israel-haters now find themselves that the antisemitism that underlies so much of the anti-Israel movement doesn't always bother, as it once did, to try to disguise itself.

Regarding the spread of the virus of Islamic antisemitism in today's Europe, here's a lecture (the video's 86 minutes long, mind!) by the Syrian-born German-based scholar Professor Bassam Tibi

(The meeting's chairman really should heed the old adage that "brevity if the source of wit": his introduction of the speaker is almost a speech in itself!)

And here's Merkel ...

For Whom The Bell Tolls

Scene: a Christian cemetery on the Croatian/Serbian border.

Dramatis personae: Muslim invaders migrants.

Script: As told to and by the BBC's Orla Guerin.

Many observers will no doubt stare uneasily at that this screengrab from one of  Ms Guerin's BBC news reports about the current invasion of migration of Muslims of eclectic provenance into Europe.

For the image captured may well symbolise the European future.

As we all know, from when she used to demonise Israel on a regular basis, the wild-eyed, doom-laden voiced Guerin (like Bowen, Donnison, Knell, and the rest of the arrogant mob of leftist Beeboids who infest Twitter and the airwaves) has never let the BBC's Charter and producers' guidelines come between her and her personal biases.

Hence tweets such as these from her, feminist though she seems to be:

The other day, I posted a humdinger of a video by Rabbi David Bar-Hayim warning of the dire consequences for the West of the kind of mass Muslim migration we are now witnessing.

Source: Seen on Twitter; provenance unknown

 Here's a look (horrendous to behold) at how one of Europe's northern nations is accelerating its own destruction.

As Denis Prager, himself a Jew, has observed:

'Allowing millions of Syrians and others from the Muslim Middle East into Europe will end up a catastrophe for Europe, and therefore for the West....

How does an ethically motivated person -- Jew or non-Jew -- deal with the emotionally powerful Holocaust argument?

For one thing, the parallels are far from precise.

Every Jew in Nazi-occupied Europe -- man, woman, child, baby -- was targeted for death. The Syrian people are not targeted for death. The only such targets in the Middle East -- aside from the Jews of Israel -- are Christians and Yazidis, every one of whom should most definitely be allowed into Europe and the United States.

The parallel is also imprecise because the vast majority of the Jews of Germany and many other European countries were assimilated citizens of their respective countries, who thoroughly embraced Western culture and values. In contrast, most of the Muslims of the Middle East -- and the largely Muslim population (from non-Arab countries) already in Europe -- hold values that are not merely different from, but opposed to, those of Europe.

It is not as if Europe has no experience with large numbers of Muslim immigrants. And the experience has been largely negative.....'

Read all of Prager's powerful article here

Regarding safe haven for Middle Eastern Christians cruelly persecuted by Muslims (for whom the prominent British publisher Lord Weidenfeld, a refugee from Nazism, has nobly made provision, though not to the liking of Islamophiles who bemoan the "discrimination" against Muslims),  Britain's Sunday Express reports, inter alia, the views of Dr Patrick Sookhdeo, head of the Barnabas Fund:

'According to Mr [sic] Sookhdeo, Britain’s offer to take up to 20,000 Syrian refugees inadvertently discriminates against the Christian communities most victimised by the Islamic State butchers. 

He said: “The British government has said it will take 20,000 refugees and we have said, ‘Will you not take some Christians?’ But we have had no reply. 

“We have even put out a joint statement with Muslim Aid to the Government saying both communities are suffering, can’t you look after both?

 “What David Cameron is doing, we believe, is unfair. 

“He has said he will go to the camps to get the refugees, but the problem is that the Christians don’t like to live in the camp. 

“What they prefer to do is to live in church halls or else with families and the reason is that it is safer for them. What we are saying to the Government is that you need a broader based approach.

“By all means take the most vulnerable people but don’t just take them from the camps because you are only going to get one kind of people. When it comes to other countries they all say that European legislation means you can’t discriminate between one religious community and another but we say surely the most vulnerable are the ones you have got to be taking in.” 

In areas controlled by IS, Christians have been crucified, beheaded, raped and subjected to forced conversion. 

Christian children are also being sold as slaves. 

Mr Sookhdeo added: “It is like going back 1,000 years seeing the barbarity that Christians are having to live under. I think we are dealing with a group which makes Nazism pale in comparison and I think they have lost all respect for human life. 

“Crucifying these people is sending a message and they are using forms of killing which they believe have been sanctioned by Sharia law. 

“For them what they are doing is perfectly normal and they don’t see a problem with it. It is that religious justification which is so appalling.” ....'

See here and also here

Meanwhile, hot off the press by Egyptian-born Christian scholar Raymond Ibrahim, an indictment of Obama:

http://www.meforum.org/5519/obama-betrays-christian-refugees

Yep, #BibiSpeaks4Me

The pro-Israel Dr Ashraf Ramelah is founder and president of Voice of the Copts, which represents the largest Christian community in the Middle East.  Founded in 2007 his non-profit organisation, in its own words,

 "fights the spread of Islamic supremacy and Sharia throughout the Western world through education, advocacy and action .... By drawing attention to the suffering of Coptic Christians in Egypt, it endeavors to educate the Western world as to the chilling effect of Sharia .... [It] focuses on three key issues: freedom of religion, cultural identity and women’s rights".

Recently, Dr Ramelah, on behalf of his organisation, and Michael Mendelson,founder and president of Israel's Voice, jointly sent a letter of support to Binyamin Netanyahu concerning his controversial forthcoming (3 March) address to Congress:

Both sites explain:

 'Netanyahu’s invitation from U.S. Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner to speak before Congress was intended to be for bipartisan purposes — to raise international awareness about the threats posed by global jihad and a nuclear-armed Iran. Yet, his visit has come under attack by the White House administration. Some U.S. members of Congress have already announced they will not attend, and President Obama and Vice President Biden are among those who declined to attend. Several Jewish and so-called “pro-Israel” organizations like J Street, which has started the Twitter hashtag “BibiDoesntSpeakForMe,” have urged Netanyahu to cancel his speech. Opponents have argued his March 3 address has become too politically charged — that it is too close to Israeli elections and U.S.-Iran negotiations — and it is not the appropriate time.

 Israel’s Voice and Voice of the Copts vehemently disagree. The threats posed by Iran’s nuclear program are the most detrimental security risks we could possibly face in our day. As the Washington, D.C., Center for Security Policy analysis clearly confirms, the centrifuges continue to spin, and we have no more time to waste.

 If you agree with our following letter to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, share it and make it viral through email and any and all other social media platforms you use with the hashtag, #BibiSpeaks4Me.” ....'

https://www.facebook.com/events/381547898692826/

Dr Ramelah now writes as follows in the wake of the unspeakable cruelty meted out to members of his religion by ISIS in Libya:

'Once again, tragedy strikes the Coptic community with the brutal murders of twenty-one Christian Copts in Libya. Living under constant threat of a hate-driven and blood-thirsty Islam, Copts of Egypt have learned to expect anything at any time, and mourners go about the streets. A few days ago a young Coptic man was burned alive in the province of Al-Minya. Muslims harassed and targeted this youth in the heart of a peaceful village hoping to spark the retaliation of Copts in order to trigger destabilization of the region. But Copts have not reacted, waiting instead for law enforcement to take its course. 

For more than 1,430 years, Copts have suffered the brutality and aggression of Islamic doctrine along with Jews and other non-Muslims. History shows how Islamic doctrine played an important role during World War One and in World War Two with the massacre of more than six million Jews in Europe.  As well, Muslims become victims of their own system. A video showing a Jordanian pilot hostage set ablaze recently caused Jordan’s leader to respond with military action.

However, one leader who has truly taken the lead against terrorism in the moment is Egyptian president Al-Sisi as the Egyptian military strikes at ISIS in Libya. Al-Sisi’s war against Islamic terrorism began during his presidential election campaign when he asked for the renewal of Islamic discourse and implied that the status of religious minorities should be one of equality as he declared that “there are no religious minorities in Egypt.” 

Voice of the Copts supports Egypt’s President Al-Sisi in his war against Islamic terrorism and hopes that other leaders will follow in his footsteps in order to protect the world from further atrocities. The question that arises now concerns world leaders who listen and take their lead from the Muslim Brotherhood, the Egyptian terror organization banned from Egypt, to actually aid its branches of terror in the Middle East rather than oppose them. Will Egypt’s current strike against Libya be countered by unlikely sources behind ISIS on the ground?

We offer our condolences to the grieving families of those who suffered barbaric acts most recently in Libya and Syria. Also, our sympathy goes out to the family and community members of the young Copt burned alive in Egypt’s Al-Minya Province.'

 Meanwhile, "Is Italy the next breeding ground for Isis?" asks Howard Koplowitz, while, of course, The Man in the White House and his minions duck and weave...

"Violence, Persecution & Fear Has Become The Daily Staple Of Christian Communities Throughout The Middle East. Not So Here In Israel"

In his Christmas message to Christians around the world, Bibi contrasts the freedom of religion inherent in Israel to the countries of the Middle East in which Christians are suffering for their faith:

"I wish Christians in Israel and all over the world a very Merry Christmas.

Christmas is a special opportunity to spend time with loved ones and to celebrate this most festive of holidays.

 And as you gather with your families and your friends to celebrate this Christmas and as you enjoy the blessings of the New Year, I am sure you will remember those who are less fortunate because Christian communities across the Middle East are experiencing a particularly difficult time.

 They experience violence, persecution and fear. This has become the daily staple of Christian communities throughout the Middle East. Not so in here in Israel, the one exception. Because here in Israel, religious freedom is a sacred principle. Israel's Christian citizens enjoy the full blessings of freedom and democracy, their equal rights enshrined in Israeli law.

So on this most important day in the Christian calendar, let us remember the common heritage and values that unite us in the face of extremism and hatred, which we will never accept.

From Jerusalem, the eternal capital of the Jewish People, the city of peace, I join Christians everywhere, and especially those in the Middle East, in a common prayer for a more peaceful and tolerant world.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!"

David Singer: Time to End The Reprehensible International Indifference To Islamic State Horrors

Entitled "Pope Calls On World To End Islamic State Barbarism", this is the latest article by Sydney lawyer and international affairs analyst David Singer.

He writes:

Pope Francis has considerably upped the ante in enlisting spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians – Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I – to sign a joint Common Declaration demanding an end to international indifference regarding Islamic State barbarism being perpetrated against religious minorities in Syria and Iraq.

The Common Declaration constitutes an impassioned plea on behalf of 1.2 billion Catholics and 300 million Orthodox Christians world-wide for concerted international action to eradicate Islamic State.

Whilst two seemingly indifferent Permanent UN Security Council members – Russia and China – and another 129 member States of the UN stand on the sidelines, an American-led coalition comprising the remaining 62 UN member states has been doing the heavy lifting confronting Islamic State outside United Nations' authorisation, prompting the Pope and Bartholomew to declare:  

“While recognizing the efforts already being made to offer assistance to the region, at the same time, we call on all those who bear responsibility for the destiny of peoples to deepen their commitment to suffering communities, and to enable them, including the Christian ones, to remain in their native land. We cannot resign ourselves to a Middle East without Christians who have professed the name of Jesus there for two thousand years. Many of our brothers and sisters are being persecuted and have been forced violently from their homes. It even seems that the value of human life has been lost, that the human person no longer matters and may be sacrificed to other interests. And, tragically, all this is met by the indifference of many.” 

The Pope and Bartholomew have demanded this shocking state of affairs be met by:  

“an appropriate response on the part of the international community.”

No nation should shirk from its duty to eradicate the threat Islamic State poses to the breakdown of world peace and security.  

“The grave challenges facing the world in the present situation require the solidarity of all people of good will”

Islamic State needed to be confronted by Muslims and Christians together:  

"Inspired by common values and strengthened by genuine fraternal sentiments, Muslims and Christians are called to work together for the sake of justice, peace and respect for the dignity and rights of every person, especially in those regions where they once lived for centuries in peaceful coexistence and now tragically suffer together the horrors of war" 

In a further pointed criticism of Russia,  the Declaration stated:  

“We also remember all the people who experience the sufferings of war. In particular, we pray for peace in Ukraine, a country of ancient Christian tradition, while we call upon all parties involved to pursue the path of dialogue and of respect for international law in order to bring an end to the conflict and allow all Ukrainians to live in harmony.”

The grim situation facing Christians in Iraq has been confirmed in a video released on the Orthodox Christian Network by Canon Andrew White, the Vicar of Baghdad.

Canon White – who was ordered to leave Iraq for his own safety by the Archbishop of Canterbury – speaks movingly of the plight of Christians there. Around 250,000 have been displaced by Islamic State in the north of the country – all that remained from the 1,500,000-strong Christian population.

He said:   

"Things were bad in Baghdad, there were bombs and shootings and our people were being killed, so many of our people fled back to Nineveh, their traditional home. It was safer, but then one day, ISIS – Islamic State. They came in and they hounded all of them out. They killed huge numbers, they chopped their children in half, they chopped their heads off, and they moved north and it was so terrible what happened."

Islamic State forced Christians to convert to Islam on pain of death, Canon White added.

He told of the fate of a group of Christian young people: 

"Islamic State turned up and said to the children, you say the words that you will follow Mohammed. The children, all under 15, four of them, said no, we love Yesua, we have always loved Yesua, we have always followed Yesua, Yesua has always been with us. They said, 'Say the words.' They said, 'No, we can't.' They chopped all their heads off. How do you respond to that? You just cry."

Meanwhile US Secretary of State, John Kerry, was depressingly telling a meeting of the US-led coalition that the limited military action being undertaken against Islamic State could see the Coalition’s commitment being:  

“measured most likely in years …”

Kerry however left no doubt on the Coalition’s mission:  

“Our coalition does not summon hate, but rather the courage to build a future that is based on shared interests, shared values, and a shared faith in one another. That contrast in goals marks the dividing line between barbarism and civilization, and it explains both why we dare not fail and why we will succeed.”

The dividing lines have been drawn – demanding that every member state of the United Nations declares on which side it stands and what it will contribute towards eliminating Islamic State.

The international community needs to shed its present indifference and unanimously take up the call of the Pope and Bartholomew to put an end to the horrors represented by the Islamic State and those who are flocking to fight under its flag.

Time to end this reprehensible international indifference – and time to stop crying.

(Below is the Christian scholar Raymond Ibrahim talking about the persecution of Christians in Muslim countries and the western media's general apathy towards the situation, largely owing to a swallowing of Muslim propaganda against Israel and of the mischievous myth that Muslims are the underdogs, Christians the persecutors - D.A.)

"Stop Those Who Want To Destroy The Only Free Jewish State In The [Middle East] Region": A Christian priest 's plea (video)

No prizes for guessing that the speaker in this newly uploaded video is not our old mate Reverend Stephen Sizer, who's just taken leave of Bethlehem where he has been participating in the groundwork of the next "Christ at the Checkpoint" Conference (scheduled for March 2016).

This priest is Father Gabriel Naddaf of Nazareth, who told the UN Human Rights Council last month
what the Israel-demonisers don't want to acknowledge: that there is only one country in the Middle East where Christians are not being persecuted, and that country is Israel,

 

He says, inter alia:  

'While I stand before you today, the earth of the Middle East is soaked with the blood of Christians being killed daily.

Do you know that at the start of the 20th century, Christians comprised 20 per cent of the population of the Middle East?

Today they comprise only 4 per cent.

Do you know that over the past years some 100,000 Christians have been killed annually? And why? Not for a crime they’ve committed, but only for believing in Christ.

In Iraq alone, more than 77 per cent of the Christians have fled during the year 2000, in addition to thousands killed and expelled.

Some two million Christians lived in Syria, but today, they are less than 250,000.

Christians in these countries are treated as second-class citizens; facing racial, religious, economic and social discrimination.

Why is this happening? Only due to their religion, a religion that advocates love and peace between mankind.

Christians in the Middle East are marginalized; their rights denied, their property stolen, their honor violated, their men killed, and their children displaced.

Where will they go? Who will defend them? And who will guard their property?

If we look at the Middle East ... we realize there’s only one safe place where Christians are not persecuted.

One place where they are protected, enjoying freedom of worship and expression, living in peace and not subjected to killing and genocide.

It is Israel, the country I live in....

Christians and Jews live in Israel not only because Christ was originally Jewish, born in Jewish Bethlehem, but because they share a common destiny, and a true hope to coexist in peace.

Does the world acknowledge Israel for protecting its Christians? Many in the international community have chosen to criticize Israel.

This, in my mind, is a double crime: because by doing so, the international community helps those striving to annihilate the Jews, the Christians, the Druze and the Yazidis for political ends.

By doing so, the international community unfortunately contributes to exacerbating the humanitarian crisis in the Middle East.

It causes Christians to leave the land of Christ searching for a safe haven across the world.

It is time for the world to awaken and realize the truth of those striving to destroy the Jewish State.

They are hastening the death sentence of Christians in the Middle East.and the Holy Land ...

 O world leaders and supporters of peace, stop those who want to destroy the only free Jewish state in the region.

It is the only refuge welcoming and protecting all of its citizens. It is the only place that does not attempt to push out Christians, forcing them to leave their land in search of security.

I implore you from the bottom of my heart to hear the cry of the Christians of the Middle East before it is too late, and you may read about them only in the history books..."

Full transcript here

"Israel ... Ensures That Jews Will Never Find Themselves in the Same Boat as the Abandoned & Hapless Christians"

Image credit: http://www.catholicherald.co.uk

Entitled " Jews Condemned Whilst Christians Are Decimated & Dispersed",  this is the latest article by Sydney lawyer and international affairs analyst David Singer.

He writes:


As the war between Israel and Hamas enters its fourth week [a 72-hour ceasfire has of course just come into being] , the frenzied condemnation of Israel for exercising its inherent right of self-defence continues to dominate the media coverage of the conflict.

Ishaan Tharoor writing in the Washington Post wonders why:

 “The world is transfixed by the conflict in Gaza, as the death tolls of both Palestinians and Israelis killed in the fighting continue to rise. It has animated global public opinion and sparked protests in myriad far-flung cities.

But as the rockets and bombs fall, a deadlier war next door rolls on. The Syrian civil war has claimed 170,000 lives in three years; this past weekend’s death toll in Syria was greater than what took place in Gaza. By some accounts, the past week may have been the deadliest in the conflict’s grim history. Meanwhile, the extremist insurgents of the Islamic State (also known as ISIS), have continued their ravages over a swath of territory stretching from eastern Syria to the environs of Baghdad, Iraq’s capital; the spike in violence in Iraq has led to more than 5,500 civilian deaths in the first six months of this year."

 M. D. Harmon writing in the Portland Herald criticises this media blockout:

“Why should it matter if a nearly 2,000-year-old way of life practiced by millions is being exterminated and no one will do anything to halt it?Perhaps because it teaches a wider lesson about what the civilized world faces when it confronts rampant Islamic extremism.

In much of Iraq and Syria today, millions of Christians, whose ancestral presence there predates current Muslim majorities by centuries, are being scrubbed out of their homes.

But, while some in the wider church and the media are paying attention, getting war-weary Western nations to take effective action seems impossible. Even humanitarian aid isn’t being widely discussed.”

 The newly-declared Islamic State (IS) – which includes Mosul – Iraq’s second largest city – already exceeds the area of Great Britain.

Sharia law has been imposed in Mosul – where Christians have lived since shortly after the death of Christ.

Christians were given 24 hours to leave Mosul or convert to Islam and pay a tax – or die.

The letter “N” (for “Nazarene”) has been daubed on Christian homes to denote they are available for looting or destruction.

BBC News reported on 28 July:

 “A senior Christian cleric in Iraq, Patriarch Louis Sako, estimated that before the advance of IS, Mosul had a Christian community of 35,000 – compared with 60,000 prior to 2003.

According to the UN, just 20 families from the ancient Christian minority now remain in the city, which Isis has taken as the capital of its Islamic state.”

 Harmon poses this question:

 “Across the Middle East, a long history of hard-won co-existence faces extinction from a belief system devoted to domination, and this time in control of an “Islamic state.” Will it again strike us directly, as it did 13 years ago this Sept. 11?”

 Nuri Kino – reporting on Fox News – confirms the tragic situation in Syria and identifies those engaged in persecuting these ancient Christian communities:

 “Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, also has been nearly emptied of Assyrians, Armenians and other non-Muslims…

… The prideful tone in which the perpetrators speak whenever I have interviewed them –both Al Qaeda and IS —- is equally shocking. These are mostly disgruntled young men who were teetering on the edges of society in their own homelands, often in European suburbs, and now believe they have the power to do whatever they want in the name of Islam. They can claim any house in IS-controlled areas of Iraq and Syria as their own, and tell the owners to either leave or risk being killed. They can take any woman as their wife…

… At least 700, 000 non-Muslims — Christians, Mandeans, Yezidis and others — have left Iraq by now. No one knows how many have left Syria.”

 Nina Shea reports in the Christian Post:

 “ISIS has set out to erase every Christian trace. All 30 churches were seized and their crosses stripped away. Some have been permanently turned into mosques. One is the Mar (Saint) Ephraim Syriac Orthodox Cathedral, newly outfitted with loudspeakers that now call Muslims to prayer. The 4th century Mar Behnam, a Syriac Catholic monastery outside Mosul, was captured and its monks expelled, leaving behind a library of early Christian manuscripts and wall inscriptions by 13th-century Mongol pilgrims.

Christian and Shiite gravesites, deemed idolatrous by ISIS, are being deliberately blown up and destroyed, including on July 24, the tomb of the 8th-century B.C. Old Testament Prophet Jonah, and the Muslim shrine that enclosed it."

 Patrick Coburn does not mince his words in The Independent:

 “It is the greatest mass flight of Christians in the Middle East since the Armenian massacres and the expulsion of Christians from Turkey during and after the First World War.”

Yet the media shows little interest in exposing the decimation and dispersal of the Christian communities in Syria and Iraq.

Google reports on the Israel-Gaza war outnumber reports on the ISIS-Christian conflict by about 20:1.

The West is equally as disinterested at this appalling ethnic and religious cleansing and forced transfer of Christians.

An impotent United Nations shows its unwillingness to intervene.

Israel meanwhile ensures that Jews will never find themselves in the same boat as the abandoned and hapless Christians.

Mirror, Mirror On The Wall: Who hates the Christians worst of all?

The following is a guest blog by Professor William Rubinstein.

He writes:

Open Doors – an organisation of which I had not heard before a few weeks ago – is dedicated to helping Christians persecuted throughout the world simply for being Christians.  It was founded in the 1950s to smuggle Bibles to Christians in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe (who were, if caught, likely to go on a one-way trip to Siberia) and later extended its activities to Communist China.

Since the 1990s Open Doors has extended its activities to the Muslim world.  So far as I know, this body is totally on the level in what it tries to do, is not a “Christian Zionist” body, and has no connections with the State of Israel or with the American government.  One interesting feature of its website is a list, updated annually, of “the top 50 countries where persecution of Christians is the most intense”, which makes for enlightening reading.

Number One on the latest list, not unexpectedly, is North Korea.  The next ten countries on the list are as follows (in descending order): Somalia, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Maldives, Pakistan, Iran, Yemen, and Sudan.

Every one of these, of course, officially totally or almost totally, Muslim.  The next ten are as follows: Eritrea, Libya, Nigeria, Uzbekistan, Central African Republic, Ethiopia, Vietnam, Qatar, Turkmenistan, and Laos.  Five of these are predominantly Muslim, and two are residual Communist states.  The persecution of Christians in Nigeria of course occurs in the predominantly Muslim north.  The Central African Republic is a typical black African hell-hole, with a Christian majority, but wracked by civil war.  So, too, is Ethiopia, a predominantly Christian state, where non-adherents of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church are persecuted.

And so it goes: of the remaining 29 states on the list, 20 are wholly or almost wholly Muslim.  One of the most interesting of these is number 34, the “Palestinian Territories”, of which Open Doors has the following to say:

“There is noticeably more pressure on believers in Gaza than in the West Bank because the authorities are increasingly under the influence of Islamic extremists…  On the West Bank the situation is different: the ruling Fatah party is based on secular principles.”  

Notably absent from Open Door’s list is Israel, which is given a clean bill of health.  All in all, 36 of the 50 countries where Christians are most heavily persecuted are wholly Muslim, and many others (like Nigeria) have violent, terroristic Muslim minorities.

Can Islam coexist with secular, pluralistic democracy?  It does in places like Turkey and in the Balkan states such as Bosnia where there are a plurality of Muslims; elsewhere, this appears impossible, despite guarantees of religious freedom in the constitutions of most (not all) of these states.

Even if the elites there favour toleration, the impoverished streets and small towns are hotbeds of anti-Christian bigotry, terrorism, and murder, as recent appalling cases in Sudan and Nigeria have shown.

“Political correctness” by the left must not stand in the way of telling the truth.

Adds Daphne: 

While we are on the subject of persecuted Christians, a robust leading article in yesterday's The Times (of London) which concluded that

"A Vatican official speaks of 100,000 Christians being martyred every year, more, surely, than at any time in history. We cannot be spectators at this carnage"

has provoked this worth-reading blogpost on the website of grassroots members of the British Conservative Party.  It concludes:

"It is not just politicians who are to blame. Many of the rest of us have been too reticient about the issue of international Christian persecution – not least in the media. This climate would now appear to be changing. The Times and The Spectator have helped to break the taboo. That is welcome but there is a lot of catching up to do."

As Professor Rubinstein's post above reminds us, in eighth place on the list of “the top 50 countries where persecution of Christians is the most intense” is Iran, while Israel is not on that list at all.
How utterly bizarre it is, then, that Iran's notorious satellite propaganda channel, PressTV, has made a program excoriating Israel in the very field in which Iran (not Israel) is guilty, and that a certain Anglican vicar of this blog's acquaintance has taken a starring role in that program!

It would seem that Israel's enemies are so addled by the appearance in the West of Ms Christy Anastas that they are pulling out all the stops in an attempt to counter her brave veracious account.

Here, too, is something they won't like!

Don't Call Them Persecuted: Anti-Zionist Christians & Selective Blindness

"I met Mori in the basement of a Lutheran church in Berlin’s Zehlendorf district. A 28-year-old refugee who once ran a small business in Iran, he converted to Christianity five years ago and spoke to me on condition that I use only his first name in order to protect his identity. In 2011, delayed on the way to a secret Bible study session, he narrowly escaped when Revolutionary Guards raided his underground Evangelical church. He watched as his friends disappeared into Iran’s prison system; Mori suspects they’ve been killed."

So begins a recent article in the New York Times by Liana Aghajanian  regarding the plight of Christians in Iran.

'When you’re Christian in Iran, you can’t speak. You have to keep quiet and not talk about the truth that you know and that you believe in,” he told me. “There is no such thing as a comfortable life in Iran."

.... Persecution is well-documented. In 2004, Hamid Pourmand, the lay leader of Jama’at-e Rabbani, the Iranian branch of the evangelical Assemblies of God, was arrested with more than 80 other members, charged with apostasy and imprisoned for years before his release. A report last year by Ahmed Shaheed, a United Nations special rapporteur, talks of Christians being “prosecuted on vaguely worded national security crimes for exercising their beliefs,” with more than 300 having been arrested since 2010.

Mori was one of the lucky ones. In 2011, he got a fake passport, paid 7,000 euros to a smuggler and joined the rising flow of refugees...."

Seldom if ever do the zealous opponents of Israel and of Christian Zionism, the ones who are more than happy to appear on the Iranian regime's satellite propaganda channel Press TV in order to badmouth Israel, draw attention in their blogs and tweets to the terrible state of affairs confronting Iran's Christians, much less condemn it.

Some of them occasionally focus on Saudi Arabia (where of course there are no churches) for its human rights abuses, but turn a blind eye to the horrors perpetrated the Iranian regime.  This double standard is hardly coincidental, of course: Saudi Arabia is, for all its faults, an ally of the United States and, behind the scenes, expediently of Israel.  Iran, of course, is the opposite.

Ever wondered, indeed, why some Christians, so eager to condemn Israel and excoriate Christian Zionism, seem so stay more or less shtum regarding the terrible plight of their co-religionists not only in Iran but in the Middle East generally at the hands of the common enemy of both Christians and Jews, despite all that has been written by people such as Egyptian-born Christian scholar Raymond Ibrahim and in the articles carried by the Assyrian International News Agency regarding the Islamic war on Christians in the Middle East?

Well, an article by one of Stephen Sizer's chums, Jeremy Moodey, CEO of Engage the Middle East and like Sizer a seemingly implacable foe of Israel and of Christian Zionism, holds a clue:

"Israeli officials are said to be upset that the Pope will only celebrate public masses in Bethlehem and Amman, and not in Jerusalem, although this may have something to do with the fact that when Pope Benedict celebrated mass in the Holy City in 2009, the event was poorly attended, with many worshippers reportedly turned away by the Israeli security authorities. In its publicity about the visit, the Vatican has referred for the first time to the State of Palestine, a status not recognised by Israel. Characteristically, a key focus of the Pope’s visit will be refugees: he will meet with Syrian and Iraqi refugees in Jordan and also spend time with children from three Palestinian refugee camps near Bethlehem. Strikingly, the three Palestinian camps involved (Dheisheh, Aida and Beit Jibrin) are predominantly Muslim. The Pope’s concern for the underprivileged of all faiths underlines a simple fact about the Middle East that is often overlooked in the raw emotion of the ‘persecuted Christians’ narrative: which is that many more Muslims than Christians suffer from the political turmoil and violence of the Middle East, yet they receive a fraction of the press coverage in the West...." [Emphasis added here and below]

Moodey (whose article has been commended by Sizer on social media) goes on to observe that

"The Pope would do well to heed the plea from his own church leaders in the Holy Land to recognise that persecution and suffering go much wider than just Christians"

and quotes in support of this contention a press release issued by those functionaries last month: 

“the repetition of the word ‘persecution’… usually referring only to what Christians suffer at the hands of criminals claiming to be Muslims, plays into the hands of extremists”...

I wonder what the Christians of Silence (to paraphrase the title of a famous book by Elie Wiesel concerning the trapped and persecuted Jews of Soviet Russia during the refusenik era) would say about that.