Dhimmi Watch: Mosul: "Climate of panic" among Christian community after month-long series of attacks, local media silent

October 6, 2008

Mosul: "Climate of panic" among Christian community after month-long series of attacks, local media silent

Islamic Tolerance Alert. "Mosul, the relentless slaughter of Iraqi Christians," from AsiaNews, October 5:

Mosul (AsiaNews) - A new attack against the Christians in Mosul: yesterday afternoon, an armed group assassinated Hazim Thomaso Youssif, age 40. The ambush took place in front of his clothing store in Bab Sarray; it is not yet known who ordered the killing, but it is suspected that it is the work of Islamic fundamentalists, in a city that has long been the theater of deadly attacks on the Christian community.

On the same day, 15-year-old Ivan Nuwya, also a Christian, was killed. The young man was shot to death in front of his home in the neighborhood of Tahrir, in front of the local mosque of Alzhara.

A source for AsiaNews in Mosul decries the "climate of panic" in which the Christian community lives, the slaughter of which continues "to the indifference" of the media, which "do not even report the crimes that are committed." Speaking of the situation in Mosul, the source emphasizes that the city "has become the holocaust of the Christians," and that there is no sign of improvement despite the efforts in the war on terror.

The diocese has been paying an increasingly large tribute of blood in recent years, beginning with the tragic kidnapping of Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho, whose lifeless body was found last March 13 in an abandoned area just outside of the city. During the ambush that preceded the archbishop's captivity, the three men acting as his bodyguard were massacred by the terrorists.

In 2007, the Iraqi Christian community suffered 47 deaths, 13 of them in Mosul: these include Fr Ragheed Gani, murdered on June 3, and two other priests.

Between January 6 and 17 of this year, there was also a series of attacks on Christian property. A wave of bombings struck the Chaldean church of the Immaculate Virgin, the Chaldean Church of St Paul, which was almost destroyed, the entrance to the orphanage run by the Chaldean sisters in al Nour, a Nestorian church, and the convent of the Dominican sisters in Mosul Jadida.

The last episode of violence dates back to September 2, when there was a tragic end to the kidnapping of a 65-year-old doctor, Tariq Qattan, who was killed in spite of the fact that his family had paid 250,000 dollars for his release. Two days before, another Christian, Nafi Haddad, had been kidnapped and killed.

Posted by Marisol at October 6, 2008 9:16 AM
Print this entry | Email this entry | Digg this | del.icio.us

Comments
(Note: The Comments section is provided in the interests of free speech only. It is mostly unmoderated, but comments that are off-topic, offensive, slanderous, or otherwise annoying stand a chance of being deleted. The fact that any comment remains on the site IN NO WAY constitutes an endorsement by Jihad Watch or Dhimmi Watch, or by Robert Spencer or any other Jihad Watch or Dhimmi Watch writer, of any view expressed, fact alleged, or link provided in that comment.)

Old Middle East (Muslim) saying:

"First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people."

Whatever could it mean?

Posted by: darcy

at October 6, 2008 10:07 AM

Killing Christians for fun and Prophet.

Brought to you by Mohammadans for Mohammad.

A fine upstanding public benefit corporation. serving humanity...That's the Ummah, and other Mohammad worshippers. Everyone outside the circle
is an invader or trespasser and must be killed or driven out.
A lot like the behavior of white blood cells, or ants and bee's attacking any invader.
You are either of the nest or you are of another.
If you are of another, you will be attacked.

It is difficult to just get up and move, and completely unjustified, but it may be the best thing for the Christian communities under attack to do. Possibly they could get aid from western Christian charities to help relocate to safer areas...

Posted by: duh_swami

at October 6, 2008 11:13 AM

This madness is truly deplorable.

Slightly O/T, but... in the interest of awareness of how similar atrocities can happen elsewhere, we should note the current and recent events in Orissa province, India, where the Hindu Fundamentalist VHP are rampaging against and slaughtering Christians. Important if only to qualify some common assumptions about Hindus often made at this site, and which I had accepted until now.
http://www.asianews.it/index.php?l=en&art=13138&geo=&theme=&size=A

This is not a good advertisement for fanatical faith. The recent posts wrangling about belief versus atheism should refine the argument in terms such as: any very deeply held faith, whether in a religion or in a (totalitarian) ideology, can lead to justification of evil actions which would not be countenanced by ordinary people in their right minds.

Posted by: StephenA55

at October 6, 2008 12:41 PM

Just to clarify that last comment; I do not mean to suggest that Hindus have suddenly become dangerous generally, but that there is something anomalous and uncharacteristic going on there.

Posted by: StephenA55

at October 6, 2008 12:57 PM

I read StephenA55's article above, concerning Hindus' massacre of Christians right now. Here's an excerpt:

"Even now thousands of Christians are still in flight, running from slaughter, living in forests, terrorised, without food or clothing.

Orissa, a state located in north-eastern India, has seen such waves of persecution before. Last December on Christmas Eve, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), a Hindu fundamentalist organisation, attacked and destroyed 13 churches and chapels, killed three people and wounded scores of Christians in Kadhamal district, leaving many people homeless.

One of those who drove Hindu mobs against Christians was Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati, a VHP leader."

Wow, sounds like Mohammedans, but, these are Hindu.

Read it all.

Posted by: darcy

at October 6, 2008 4:47 PM

In a story on CBS "60 Minutes", an Iraqi christian priest said that the Christian churches did not want to be guarded by US Soldiers. Any sign of complicity with the USA would make the church a target of "terrorism".

That's not a direct quote but that's what I recall from the TV news program.

Posted by: CTYankee

at October 6, 2008 9:12 PM

I have just sent off a letter to my parish priest with this story: two links, the link back here to jihadwatch and then the link to the original source.

Realistically, I don't think the Iraqi Assyrian Christians are in a defensible position - they don't occupy a mountain plateau, as the Maronites did in the middle ages, or as the Christian Ethiopians do, and therefore I doubt that even if armed to the teeth, they could successfully fend off the mohammedan hordes.

I think these Christians are going to have to be taken in by majority-Christian or secular kafir countries - as quickly as possible. I think we will have to be prepared to take them all (though, as a matter of prudence, it should be made very plain that any Muslim discovered to have posed, fraudulently, as a 'Christian refugee' in order to gain entry to the West, will be booted right back where s/he came from, as soon as the imposture is detected).

We would also have to make sure that our own NON-MUSLIM citizens were in charge of every step in the process of application and reception for these refugees, since we know for a fact that Muslim infiltrators would do everything they could to block that process, so as to keep the fleeing Christians inside the Predator Pit.

In my note to my parish priest I said it was high time that Australian church leaders began lobbying our government to fast-track the reception of Muslim-persecuted *Christian* refugees from places like Iraq - if we did not want to witness a classic jihad genocide, like that of the Armenians. (I also argued that we should STOP immigration by Muslims!).

Posted by: dumbledoresarmy

at October 6, 2008 10:48 PM

Before lobbying too hard for Assyrian refugees to join your country, just read this article: http://gatesofvienna.blogspot.com/2008/10/assyrians-of-sdertlje.html

Certain elements of extreme sexism, lack of integration and readiness for violence don't look very appealing.

I don't know how much credence people on this site give to Gates of Vienna (so rejected by LGF), but I still keep my finger on that pulse, abhorred though I am by some of the extremely sexist and other nonsense that sometimes gets posted there by commentators.

Posted by: Lili

at October 7, 2008 12:38 AM

Comments are turned off and archived for this entry.