Persecution News Updates
June 17, 2008:
Can you imagine never being able to return to your home country, because you would face arrest and imprisonment?
"The court will annul my marriage, I will be deprived of my kids, I will be with no ID or passport, and my properties will be confiscated."
This Muslim-background believer and his family had to flee their home country of Jordan after his own father accused him of apostasy.
Abbad was raised Muslim, but in 1993 the young man met Christ
"I had an encounter with the Lord Jesus Who changed my life, filled my heart with love and gave me the grace of enjoying life."
The next year he married a Jordanian girl from a Christian family. They were blessed with two children. However, the convert was shunned by his relatives, especially his father, who claimed "suspicious organizations" were paying Abbad to follow Christ.
In March a younger couple -- both converts from Islam -- sought shelter with Abbad. When the young woman's family found her, they broke in and began attacking Abbad, wounding his chest and right eye as well as striking his wife and 10-year-old son. When he went to the police station, he found his father -- registering a complaint against him and demanding custody of Abbad's children. He was brought before a Sharia court and ridiculed for his conversion.
"When [the judge] saw how persistent I was, he accused me of contempt of court and ordered that I be imprisoned for a week, although I told him that I had been attacked and needed medication."
On the way to jail, he fainted. Police refused treatment, but finally called an ambulance when he fainted again 3 hours later. He spent the night handcuffed to a hospital bed.
Abbad was freed after a relative paid his bail.
He and his family left the country three days later.
Only a few days ago, his marriage was formally annulled by a Sharia court on the basis of his "apostasy." If this believer ever returns to Jordan, he will be arrested -- for following Jesus.
-- with information from Compass Direct News Service and other sources
May 29, 2008:
On the evening of May 2, Muslims from a neighboring village perpetrated a deadly assault on a remote, predominantly Christian village in Indonesia. In this town of some 2300 people, most of the Christian families were left homeless after the mob burned 120 houses, three churches, and the village school, destroyed crops as well as 20 fishing boats.
But the most egregious aspect of the attack was against the people themselves. 56 people were injured by the Muslim mob; four were killed. One woman was tortured, and her six-year-old granddaughter's stomach was cut open, before both were murdered. An elderly man was burned after his throat was cut, as was the fourth victim, a younger man.
Meanwhile, on another Indonesian island, Muslim radicals tried to burn down a church building after they heard the congregation planned to build a new structure. Islamic leaders claim that in this village "everybody is Muslim."
Terrible violence was perpetrated against Indonesian believers between 1999 and 2001. Attacks in recent months lead some to fear that the cycle may be starting again.
-- adapted from Barnabas Fund, AsiaNews, and BosNewsLife
May 8, 2008:
Shortly before 6 p.m. on Tuesday, May 6, three men drove up in a blue car to a church in Turkey's capital, Ankara. A heavy-set man about 45 years old went up to the locked church building and began to ring the doorbell repeatedly.
"Where is the pastor? We are searching for the pastor," he said to a church member nearby who was cleaning his car.
The church member, who happened to be waiting outside the building for a friend, explained that the church was closed and the pastor was not around. He suggested that they return on Sunday, when the church would be open for worship.
"So are you involved here?" demanded the inquirer.
"Yes," responded the church member. "Why are you looking for the pastor?"
Ignoring the question, the suspect again asked where the pastor could be found. When the church member again suggested they come back on Sunday, the man demanded, "Tell us! We are going to get rid of that pastor!"
Turning around, the suspect returned to his car and consulted with its two occupants. Then another middle-aged man got out of the car. Holding a pistol in his gloved right hand, the assailant began walking toward the church member, shouting and pointing the weapon at him.
"I ran toward a crowded area 20 meters away," the church member said. "The suspect followed me for awhile. Then we both stopped. He stared at me for a few seconds and then went back to his friends at the car, and they drove off" -- before police could be summoned.
The semi-official Anatolian News Agency claimed in its report yesterday that the attackers were drunk. But the church member who interacted with them said he had no indication that the men were under the influence of alcohol.
Together with two of his church members, the church's pastor spent most of last night with police officers investigating the incident. "The police seem to be taking the incident and the threat seriously," he said. "Unfortunately these things keep happening here in Turkey. I hope that the state will do something, because we are not in any position to protect ourselves."
He added: "The Turkish people must decide. Are they going to keep killing us, or are they going to allow us to worship in peace?"
-- adapted from Compass Direct News Services
April 18, 2008:
Exactly one year ago, three Christian leaders -- two Turkish, one German -- were martyred in Malatya, Turkey. Necati Aydin, Ugur Yuksel, and Tilman Geske were tortured and had their throats cut.
Since then Turkish believers continue to face escalating persecution. A pastor's windshield was smashed in. A church building's entrance was hit with Molotov cocktails and set on fire. Anonymous callers have repeatedly threatened a Christian radio station. The television show Valley of the Wolves portrays Christians as terrorists and lawbreakers and encourages violence against them. Newspapers show pictures of pastors -- making them clear targets. The leader of a congregation in one city was called in to identify the boy who was plotting to kill him. A priest in another city was stabbed in the stomach by a man who said he wanted to convert. One of Smyrna's partners received an e-mail telling him to leave the country or have his throat slit.
A year later, the families of Malatya's martyrs still feel the pain of lost husbands and fathers. Necati was married and had two children. Tilman was married and had three children. Ugur was to be married last September. Today especially they need the prayer of their Christian brothers and sisters around the world.
The trial of the five young men accused of murdering these believers drags on in spite of errors, challenges, and delays. Turkish Christians have serious questions about the impartiality of the judges. And threats against those who follow Jesus continue.
Our God is faithful and able. In the midst of trials and tribulations, our Turkish brethren value your prayers.
March 20, 2008:
Eight Muslims stormed into two churches during Sunday morning worship, in a coordinated attack. They barred all doors and windows, then began to strike worshipers with razor-sharp machetes and knieves.
One believer died after a blow nearly beheaded him, according to an eyewitness. The attacker's machete "almost separated his head and neck," an eyewitness said. "The machete blade was so sharp and shining. We had nothing in hand to protect ourselves."
Another two Christians each lost a hand, and a 5-year-old boy is still hospitalized after his arm was slashed to the bone. Other victims sustained wounds on their hands, necks, foreheads, legs, arms, shoulders and backs.
Every time the attackers struck someone, survivors said, they shouted "Allah Akbar!" ("Allah is greater.") According to one of the injured Christians, "When we asked why, they responded by machete."
"We were praying, and suddenly I heard people shouting 'Allah Akbar,' said one father whose little son was critically injured in the attack. He was then shocked to hear a deep cry from his son.
"My wife assumed our boy was dying.... It was something terrible to see it [happen to] your own child." The boy survived, but he remains in hospital care with his arm in a cast.
Eventually members of the local militia (volunteers armed by the government to handle small incidents in their villages) arrived at the scene and started firing their guns in the air. "But it didn't stop them," said one wounded Christian. Finally, he said, the militia aimed at one of the attackers, and then they fled.
A Christian policeman was by gunfire. The militiaman who shot him says he had been aiming at an attacker but hit the officer by mistake. However, one eyewitness says that after shooting the Christian, this militia member stood by while the assailant regained his machete and slashed the downed policeman on his legs and arms.
"He himself was a Muslim with sympathy [for the attacker]," the Christian eyewitness concluded.
According to one visitor, these two church congregations include "an increasing number of converts from Islam." Local Muslims reportedly hope to destroy Christianity in the region.
The Ethiopian Islamic Affairs Supreme Council continues to express concern over "increasing external Wahhabi influence" on Ethiopia's Muslims by "Saudi-funded entities and non-governmental organizations."
-- adapted from Compass Direct News Service