Tag: Islamic State

Syria’s Christian villages ‘hollowed out’ by IS

August 17, 2018 Syria Assyrians, Hasakah, Islamic State, Khabur, Kidnapping, Syria, Women

Before the war there were many churches in the area around Hassaka who held regular services, like this one in Tel Jezirah. (Photo: World Watch Monitor, 2009)

The Islamic State, following its defeat in Syria, has left behind hollowed-out Christian villages, reports the New York Times. Assyrian Christians, an indigenous Middle Eastern minority, once formed thriving farming communities along the Khabur River in Syria’s northeast. But when IS attacked the area in 2015, the militants demolished churches and kidnapped . . . Read More

Egypt: Suicide attack on Coptic church foiled

August 13, 2018 Egypt Alexandria, Cairo, Copts, Egypt, Islamic State, Tanta

Dome of the Church of the Holy Virgin in Cairo's Mostorod district where a suicide bomber tried to get inside. (Photo: STRINGER/AFP/Getty Images)

A suicide attack on a Coptic church in north Cairo, Egypt, was thwarted on Saturday, 12 August, reports Coptic news site Watani. A man wearing a suicide vest detonated the bomb about 250 metres from the Church of the Holy Virgin in the Mostorod district. He was killed instantly, as . . . Read More

Will new Muslim region in southern Philippines bring peace?

August 10, 2018 Philippines Bangsamoro, Cotabato, Islamic extremism, Islamic State, Marawi, Maute, Mindanao, Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte has called on all communities in the southern Mindanao region to support the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL) that is to facilitate the creation of an autonomous Muslim region. During a ceremony on Monday, 6 August, he urged the local population “to actively participate in constructive discussions . . . Read More

Nineveh Plains Christians ‘slowly returning to normal’

August 8, 2018 Iraq Assyrians, Baghdad, IDPs, Iraq, Islamic State, Karamles, Nineveh Plains, Qaraqosh

Four years since IS seized the town of Karamles in northern Iraq’s Nineveh Plains, the local Christian community are “returning, albeit slowly, to normal”, AsiaNews reports. Hundreds of Christians joined in a procession following a Mass at the weekend, holding candles and chanting psalms, to celebrate their return and the new life . . . Read More

‘When religious freedom is protected, women’s rights are strengthened’ – US ambassador

August 1, 2018 Global News -- No Particular Country Human rights, Islamic State, Minorities, Myanmar, Rape, Religious freedom, Rohingya, Women

There is a strong link between religious freedom and the facilitation of women’s rights, according to the US Ambassador to the Vatican, Callista Gingrich. In an article for Fox News, Gingrich argues that “when religious freedom is protected, women’s rights are strengthened and societies flourish”. “Female victims of religious discrimination . . . Read More

Freed Czech charity worker recalls finding hell and heaven in Sudan’s jails

July 13, 2018 Sudan Abdulmonem Abdumawla, Hassan Taour, Islamic State, Khartoum, Kuwa Shamal, Nuba Mountains, Petr Jašek, Prisons, Sudan, Sudanese Church of Christ

The Czech aid worker who spent 14 ½ months behind bars in Sudan has said he counted his experience a “privilege” because it enabled him to share his Christian faith with Sudanese prisoners, and praised the country’s “very courageous” Christian minority. Petr Jašek also told World Watch Monitor that two . . . Read More

Call for UN to establish International Day for victims of religious persecution

July 5, 2018 Global News -- No Particular Country Bashiqa, Genocide, Islamic State, Minorities, Religious freedom, Tariq Ahmad, UK, UN, Yazidis

The United Nations should establish an International Day Commemorating the Victims and Survivors of Religious Persecution, say parliamentarians in the United Kingdom. The proposed annual day should be on 3 August, “being the day when Daesh [the Arabic acronym for ISIS] unleashed its genocidal campaign against the Yazidis in Sinjar, . . . Read More

Iraqi archbishop tells USAID delegation to hurry up aid delivery

July 4, 2018 Iraq Bashar Warda, Donald Trump, Erbil, Iraq, Islamic State, Kurds, Louis Raphael I Sako, Middle East, Mosul, Nineveh Plains, Religious freedom, Sunni, USA, Yazidis

An Iraqi Catholic archbishop has said he and other bishops are “delighted” that the US aid arm is to make good on a pledge to send aid directly to non-Muslim communities recovering from ISIS’s occupation of their towns and villages, but warned “time is running [out]”. Archbishop Bashar Warda of . . . Read More

Indonesia appoints ‘incisive’ Muslim leader in attempt to combat extremism

July 2, 2018 Indonesia Indonesia, Islamic extremism, Islamic State, JAD, Java, Nahdlatul Ulama, Surabaya

The Surabaya Pentecostal Church's front yard and remainders of the gate's canopy after the bomb attack on 13 May in which five people died. (Photo: World Watch Monitor)

The appointment of one of the Muslim world’s “most incisive and outspoken reformers” to Indonesia’s Presidential Advisory Council signals a shift in how Indonesia is trying to combat extremism, according to religious freedom professor Paul Marshall. In May Indonesia was rocked by a number of suicide bombings orchestrated by Jamaah . . . Read More

UN chief ‘personally concerned’ about return of Christians to Iraq and Syria

June 21, 2018 Afghanistan, Al-Shabaab, Antonio Guterres, Asylum seekers, Bashiqa, Human rights, IDPs, Iraq, Islamic State, Kachin, London, Migrants, Myanmar, Patriarch Kirill, Refugees, Somalia, South Sudan, Southeast Asia, Syria, UN

Tree and Arabic painting on the wall in Bashiqa, a town near Mosul in Iraq where Christians are slowly returning, saying: "Tomorrow will be more beautiful." (will be better) (Photo: World Watch Monitor)

The UN’s Secretary General has stressed the importance of Christians returning to the areas from which they fled in Iraq and Syria. “I am fully convinced that after the stability of the situation in Iraq and Syria and the adoption of a certain political decision, it is very important to . . . Read More

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