Tag: Chaldeans

Kurdish government opens church for refugees who fled IS

July 12, 2017 Iraq Ankawa, Bashar Warda, Chaldeans, Islamic State, Kurds, Peshmerga

Iraqis displaced by IS and Catholics in Kurdistan have welcomed the opening of a 1,300-seater church by the regional government there, although a US report has voiced concern at “religious abuses” and discrimination against non-Kurds there. The 30 June opening ceremony was attended by Chaldean Catholics from the Kurdish region, . . . Read More

More Iraqi towns ‘freed’ but Nineveh Christians not confident about safe return

October 25, 2016 Iraq Bartella, Bashiqa, Chaldeans, Islamic State, Karamles, Middle East, Mosul, Nineveh Plains, Peshmerga, Qaraqosh, Tel Kaif

The heavily damaged and burnt Tahira (Immaculate) Syriac Catholic Church in Baghdeda.World Watch Monitor As prayers were offered in Syriac in front of the altar of the trashed church of Mart Shmoni in the recently freed town of Bartella, more homes where Christians used to live in Iraq’s north-eastern . . . Read More

Kurdish YPG ‘occupy’ Assyrian villages in northeast Syria

October 4, 2016 Syria Assyrians, Chaldeans, Hasakah, Islamic State, Khabur, Kurds, Syria

As fighting intensifies to retake areas of north-eastern Syria from the so-called Islamic State (IS), the media spotlight shows the complexity of the military picture. The Khabur River region in Syria’s Hasakah province was attacked by IS in February 2015. Thirty-five Assyrian villages were emptied; days later IS kidnapped and . . . Read More

Frontier town sees first Communion despite IS

August 18, 2016 Iraq Alqosh, Assyrians, Chaldeans, IDPs, Iraq, Louis Raphael I Sako, Nineveh Plains

A Christian town some 50km north of the Islamic State’s Iraq stronghold of Mosul has celebrated its first Communion Mass, completing the initiation of a hundred boys and girls in the faith. In what was described as a “historic moment”, Chaldean Catholic Patriarch Louis Raphael Sako presided over the ceremony . . . Read More

Turkey: churches targeted during attempted coup

July 19, 2016 Turkey Armenians, Balikesir, Bursa, Catholics, Chaldeans, Coup, Diyarbakir, Greek Orthodox, Malatya, Surp Giragos, Trabzon

Santa Maria Catholic Church in Trabzon, Turkey, in a 2007 photo.World Watch Monitor Two churches in cities in eastern Turkey infamous as the sites of historic killings of Christians were vandalised during the attempted coup on 15 July, reports Middle East Concern. One of the attacks took place in . . . Read More

Iraq’s Christians ‘could be gone in 5 years’

May 16, 2016 Iraq Assyrians, Chaldeans, Iraq, Islamic State, Jizya, Kirkuk, Middle East, Mosul, Nineveh Plains

ISIS’ jihadist actions mean Christians could disappear from Iraq in five years, says an Iraqi Assyrian priest. Fr. Martin Hermis Dawood told the Telegraph the latest phase of Islamic extremism has only precipitated the trend of Christians exiting their ancestral lands. “Everyone sees himself outside Iraq in a few years. . . . Read More

Turkey seizes six churches as state property in volatile southeast

April 6, 2016 Turkey Armenian Genocide, Armenians, Assyrians, Chaldeans, Diyarbakir, Kurds, PKK, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Surp Giragos, Syriacs

The 1,700-year-old Virgin Mary Syriac Orthodox Church in Diyarbakir was one of the churches seized.World Watch Monitor After 10 months of urban conflict in Turkey’s war-torn southeast, the government has expropriated huge sections of property, apparently to rebuild and restore the historical centre of the region’s largest city, Diyarbakir. . . . Read More

Belgium rescues Aleppo Christians from Syria

July 8, 2015 Syria Aleppo, Chaldeans, Human rights, Lebanon, Middle East, Refugees, Syria, Yazidis

Some 240 people, mainly Christians, have been brought out of Syria’s second city of Aleppo and taken to Belgium, the government in Brussels says. All the families had fled their homes and were at risk of repeated human rights abuse, a spokesman told the BBC. Civil society groups helped take . . . 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

US ‘passive’ on IS’s ‘war on Christianity’

March 13, 2015 Global News -- No Particular Country Assyrians, Chaldeans, Genocide, Islamic State, Middle East, Syria, USA

The Islamic State is “crucifying Christians and demolishing ancient churches” in a “war on Christianity” in the Middle East, according to an opinion piece on the US-based website, Foreign Policy. Why, the title asks, is this being met with silence from the halls of Congress to Sunday sermons? In-house writers . . . Read More

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