Tag: Assyrians

Another ancient Assyrian monastery bulldozed

August 21, 2015 Syria Assyrians, Bashar al-Assad, Homs, Iraq, Islamic State, Jacques Mourad, Paolo Dall’Oglio, Qaryatain, Raqqa, Syria

Photographs posted Thursday on Twitter accounts linked to the Islamic State destroyed in the past six months by jihadist fighters. The 5th century Mar Elian Monastery in Syria’s western Homs province was located on the outskirts of Qaryatain city, captured by IS militants two weeks ago from Assad regime control. An . . . Read More

Jihadists release Syrian priest, 22 elderly Assyrians

August 19, 2015 Syria Assyrians, Boulos Yazigi, Catholics, Hasakah, Islamic State, Jacques Mourad, Khabur, Paolo Dall’Oglio, Qaryatain, Sadad, Syria, Yohanna Ibrahim

Five weeks after Fr. Antoine Boutros and his driver were kidnapped on their way to Sunday mass in southern Syria’s Suweida province on July 12, the Catholic parish priest has been released. Disclosure of the 50-year-old priest’s release on Aug. 15 came from the Melkite Greek Catholic Patriarch of Antioch, . . . Read More

Birthday for a missing girl

July 17, 2015 Iraq Assyrians, Christina Abada, Islamic State, Kidnapping, Kurds

July 18 is Christina Khader Abada’s birthday. She’s 4. Her family won’t have a party for her. A soldier of the Islamic State took Christina from the arms of her mother nearly a year ago, and nothing has been heard about the girl since. “My biggest joy would be when . . . Read More

Iraqi Franciscan priest abducted in northwest Syria

July 8, 2015 Syria Al-Nusra Front, Assyrians, Boulos Yazigi, Greek Orthodox, Hasakah, Idlib, Islamic State, Jacques Mourad, Kidnapping, Paolo Dall’Oglio, Syria, Yohanna Ibrahim

Father Dhiya Aziz was kidnapped by militants from Yacoubieh, Idlib Province, where he serves as parish priest on Sat 4th July. The militants were purportedly taking him for a brief meeting with the Emir who exercises authority in that area, which is under the control of the Al-Qaeda affiliate group, . . . Read More

Bishop refutes alleged ‘revenge’ beheading

June 1, 2015 Syria Aleppo, Assyrians, Hasakah, Islamic State, Khabur, Kurds, Syria

The Catholic Bishop of Aleppo has rejected reports of the alleged “revenge” beheading of an Islamic State jihadist by an Assyrian Christian soldier in northeast Syria as “unreliable and unverifiable” rumors. According to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), an unnamed fighter captured a non-Syrian jihadist last week . . . Read More

On trial in Iran for celebrating Christmas

May 28, 2015 Iran Assyrians, Christmas, Evin Prison, Iran, Proselytism, Tehran, Victor Bet-Tamraz

An Iranian pastor is expected to stand trial in Iran soon, five months after his arrest by security forces for “participating in an illegal gathering” as he celebrated Christmas. Victor Bet-Tamraz led the Tehran Pentecostal Assyrian Church before it was shut down by Iran’s Ministry of Interior in March 2009. . . . Read More

‘We are going through a terrible moment’

May 7, 2015 Syria Assyrians, Hasakah, Islamic State, Qamishli, Syria

Archimandrite Emanuel Youkhana leads prayers for the Hassaka, Syria Christians at a mass in the Assyrian Church of the East in Beirut on March 22, 2015.World Watch Monitor Danger levels rose sharply in late April for northeast Syria’s isolated Assyrian Christians, caught for nearly three months now between Kurdish . . . Read More

Syriac priest wrestles with Turkey’s ethnic tensions

April 22, 2015 Turkey Armenian Genocide, Armenians, Assyrians, Diyarbakir, Islamic State, Kurds, Mardin, Middle East, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Syria, Syriacs, Turkey

In the courtyard of the 1,700-year-old church over which he presides, Fr. Yusuf Akbulut beams with pride. He points out that the excellent stone and woodwork is a result of the craftsmanship of his ethnic group, the Syriac Christians of Turkey. “The Syriacs were always the goldsmiths, metal workers, stone . . . Read More

ISIS commentators ‘too simplistic’

April 14, 2015 Iraq Assyrians, Chaldeans, Iraq, Islamic State, Syria, Syriacs

After ISIS’s arrival in Iraq, Assyrian Christians have been “reduced to 1% or less of the general population”, but many commentators are “far too simplistic” in their explanations, says Jeremy Courtney, an American Christian living in Iraq. Assyrians link back to the ancient Assyrian Kingdom of the Bible, across the . . . Read More

Turkey’s Orthodox and Protestants mend centuries of mistrust

April 1, 2015 Turkey Armenians, Assyrians, Diyarbakir, Gaziantep, Islamic State, Mardin, Protestants, Syria, Syriacs, Turkey

On a Saturday in late March, a group of 20 volunteers went to an abandoned church in Turkey’s southeastern city of Mardin. They cleaned out broken chairs, a cracked pulpit, and books that haven’t been opened in decades. In the corner sat a 100-year-old organ. The church, in the heartland . . . Read More

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