More than Mercenaries: Russians Martyred by Muslims for refusing to deny Christ and embrace Islam

The Quran's commands in action: Islam's fourteen centuries of using the sword to try to force Christians to commit apostasy and deny Jesus Christ continues with the execution of two Russian soldiers.

The Quran explicitly commands Muslims to fight against and terrorize the unbelievers till they embrace Islam or “feel themselves subdued” as is seen in these verses:

Fight against those who believe not in Allah, nor in the Last Day, nor forbid that which has been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger and those who acknowledge not the religion of truth [i.e. Islam] among the people of the Book [Jews and Christians], until they pay the jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued. (Sura 9:29) 

So, when you meet those who disbelieve, smite at their necks till when you have killed and wounded many of them, then bind a bond firmly on them... Thus you are ordered by Allah to continue in carrying out jihad against the disbelievers till they embrace Islam. (Sura 47:4)

This of course brings to mind the powerful witness of New Martyr Evgeny Rodionov of Chechnya, who, after being captured by Muslims, refused to remove his baptismal cross and deny Christ. He was faithful to the end, and is now widely venerated as a martyr and saint by Orthodox Christians all around the globe. I saw icons of him at a recent visit to a ROCOR parish in Atlanta.

As of now, we know very little about Roman Zabolotny and Grigory Surkanov, except that they refused to deny Jesus Christ, and chose to die as Orthodox Christians. In many lives of the Holy Neo-Martyrs under the Turkish Muslim yoke, we saw sometimes deeply flawed people who came to life in Christ when confronted with the choice of death or denying Him to live as a Muslim. Many were offered riches, comfort and women in addition to being threatened with death, and still confessed Jesus Christ. The reality of one's immanent death helps sharply reveal some depths of the mystery of the soul. 

May Roman's and Grigory's sins be consigned to oblivion, may their memory be eternal, and may they receive the crown of martyrdom for witnessing to their faith with their very lives. May we be inspired by these ordinary, yet valiant and extraordinary believers, who were faithful unto death. 

Still from ISIS video, showing Roman Vasilievich Zabolotny and Grigory Mikhailovich Surkanov

Russian mercenaries captured by ISIS ‘are executed after refusing to reject Christianity and become Muslim' 

by Will Stewart, MailOnline, October 6, 2017 

(thanks to Jihad Watch and Blazing Cat Fur):

Two Russian mercenaries reportedly captured by ISIS jihadists are feared to have been executed because they refused to read out a statement saying they rejected their Christian faith and had become Muslim.

Fr. John Whiteford: 'The Immoral Policy of the United States Government in Syria'

A fearless and righteous statement from an Orthodox Christian priest in the United States; Fr. John Whiteford is speaking truth to power here, and rightly condemns the immoral, hypocritical and deceptive policies of the U.S. government in Syria. 

The same condemnation can be (and has been) made of U.S. policy towards Egypt, which resulted in the overthrow of the stable and lawful Mubarak government and the institution of a Muslim Brotherhood sharia regime so vile and repugnant that the military had to topple it to protect its citizens from Islam. In the Egyptian protests which led to Morsi's ouster, Obama was condemned as a supporter of Islamic terrorism, and Putin was seen as the defender of Christians. (Christians in Egypt continue to be persecuted by Muslim mobs and officials, and discriminated against by Egyptian law, but at least it is not the all-out jihad which existed under the Morsi reign of Islamic terror.)

The same condemnation can be (and has been) made of U.S. policy towards Iraq and Libya. Time after time, United States policy in the Middle East and North & Sub-Sahara Africa has been a primary causal agent of the rise of the Islamic State (ISIS) and other Islamic jihad groups, and the spread of Muslim persecution and genocide against Christians.

The government of the United States of America has the blood of tens of thousands if not millions of Christians on its hands. Electing the chosen successor to the current administration in Washington would be to perpetuate a U.S. foreign policy which is just as evil in its intent and blood-soaked in its effect as is the Democrats' pro-abortion position, which was cheered by thousands at the 2016 Democratic National Convention.

"I saw the woman, drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. And when I saw her, I marveled with great amazement." (Rev. 17:6)

The Immoral Policy of the United States Government in Syria

by Fr. John Whiteford, October 6, 2016

I feel compelled, as a Christian and as an American citizen speaking only for myself, to condemn the policy of the United States government which has been to overthrow the Syrian government by arming and funding a radical jihadist insurgency. This has fueled and exacerbated a conflict which has witnessed the deaths of nearly half of a million Syrians, produced five million refugees, seven and a half-million internally displaced people, and has brought untold misery upon many millions more who have suffered either directly or indirectly as a result of this shameful policy. [1]

I cannot turn a blind eye to the fact that our government continues, with our tax-payer dollars,  to fund and arm those who are raping, murdering, and displacing Christians (who represent about ten percent of the overall population) and other religious minorities in Syria. [2]

Christians in Aleppo Offer Meals to Poor Muslims During Ramadan

Fate of abducted Archbishops Paul and John uncertain.

According to this news story, there is still no official word on the fate of the abducted Archbishops, though it is known that the deacon traveling with them was killed during the April 2013 attack. (See the Antiochian Archdiocese news page for the two Archbishops here.)

Christians in Aleppo Offer Meals to Poor Muslims During Ramadan

by Elise Harris, Catholic News Agency, June 17, 2016

Aleppo, Syria, Jun 17, 2016 / 12:08 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Despite the war raging around them, Syriac Orthodox Christians in Aleppo have decided to provide food to poor Muslim families throughout the Islamic month of Ramadan. 

According to Agenzia Fides, the information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies, faithful of the Syriac Orthodox Archdiocese of Aleppo are offering breakfast and evening meals to “the poorest Muslim families” living in the predominantly Christian and Armenian Sulaimaniyah neighborhood of the city. 

The distribution center for the food, which is prepared by the Christian families themselves, is located at the archdiocese’s Cathedral of St. Ephrem the Syrian. 

“What is happening in the Middle East will happen in Europe” - Syrian Orthodox bishop in Switzerland

“'What is happening to us today began 1,300 years ago.' In the 7th century, the genocide of Christians began, then in the darkness, now in the media spotlight. The agenda of Islam has remained always the same, namely to expel the Christians from the Middle East."

A brave, faithful and honest Orthodox bishop fearlessly speaks the truth about Islam. May we heed his warnings and reject the "Same God Heresy."

“What is happening in the Middle East will happen in Europe,” 

(translated from «Was im Nahen Osten geschieht, wird auch in Europa passieren»), Tages Anzeiger, April 14, 2016 (thanks to Jihad Watch):

Isa Gürbüz, the Syrian Orthodox Church leader in Switzerland, calls Christians to be vigilant. The agenda of Islam is to take power.

“In 20 or 30 years there will be a Muslim majority in Europe. Half of European women will then wear a hijab.” This prediction doesn’t come from Michel Houellebecq or Thilo Sarrazin, but from Dionysos Isa Gürbüz, the Syrian Orthodox bishop in Switzerland. He resides in the idyllic Lake Zug Arth Capuchin monastery, with two monks and two nuns. From the monastery Mor Avgin, as it is called today, he oversees the 10,000 Syrian Orthodox faithful in Switzerland and 4,000 in Austria.

Isa Gürbüz is busy preparing for the Easter services, which are celebrated in his church in late April. Then his coreligionists will flock in the hundreds to Arth. Together they will pray, sing and debate – in the Aramaic native language, the sacred language that Jesus spoke. The Syrian Orthodox Church is the oldest of all. In her home in the former Mesopotamia, today Syria and Iraq, they are persecuted. “Arth has therefore become a center for the preservation of our endangered religion and culture,” says Gürbüz.

The fate of the Christians preoccupies the bishop.

Easter joy may not come easily for the bishop. He is too busy with the fate of Christians in the Middle East: “What today has caused thousands to join the terrorist groups of IS, Taliban or al-Qaida, is the extension of the genocide of 1915.” At that time nearly two million Christians – Aramean, Syrian and Greek Orthodox – perished, and millions converted to Islam. The Bishop continues: “What is happening to us today began 1,300 years ago.” In the 7th century, the genocide of Christians began, then in the darkness, now in the media spotlight. The agenda of Islam has remained always the same to him, namely to expel the Christians from the Middle East. Also in the coming years, the spirit of terror will reign there.

Russia – a Game Changer for Global Christianity

"Russia derives its spiritual strength after the Cold War from a mighty revival of the Orthodox Christian faith while the West is abandoning its Christian identity. The East and the West have switched roles as Christian superpower and defender of the Christian faith."

by Iben Thranholm, RT, November 10, 2015

Syrian Christians, father and daughter, visiting their house abandoned during the military action in the center of Homs. © RIA Novosti

At no time in history has the persecution of Christians been as intense and widespread as it is at the moment. There is a global war on Christians, which has escalated in scale and intensity since the US invasion of Iraq.

After the deliberate destruction of nation states and government structures all over the Middle East, Islamist groups have seized the opportunity to wage war on and persecute Christians.

American journalist and poet Eliza Griswold has written extensively in the New York Times about how the US invasion has caused hundreds of thousands to flee in Iraq. “Since 2003, we’ve lost priests, bishops and more than 60 churches were bombed,” Bashar Warda, the Chaldean Catholic Archbishop of Erbil said.

...the USA, supposedly ‘God’s Own Country’, created hell on earth for Christians all over the Middle East and then turned a blind eye to beheadings, rape of children and unspeakable atrocities.

With the fall of Saddam Hussein, Christians began to leave Iraq in large numbers, and the population shrank to less than 500,000 today from as many as 1.5 million in 2003.

With the Arab Spring things only went from bad to worse. ISIS’ success in Iraq has inspired similar groups in other continents, most notably Africa, where the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood commit numerous atrocities against Christians, as do Boko Haram in Nigeria and Al-Shabaab in Somalia.

Not only has the USA, supposedly ‘God’s Own Country’, created hell on earth for Christians all over the Middle East and then turned a blind eye to beheadings, rape of children and unspeakable atrocities. America appears to be deaf, dumb and blind to the problem, and that is obviously bad enough. But in addition to this, Western foreign policy has failed miserably. It has failed by underestimating the significance of religious faith in the countries subjected to Western intervention. The West’s most egregious foreign policy error is the assumption that the Western secular model, which demands clear separation between organized religion and politics, may be imposed on the rest of the world, irrespective of cultural or religious background.

Holy New Hieromartyrs Youhanna and Boulos: May we have their blessing!

This seems to be the most reliable information released since the abduction of Metropolitan of Aleppo Paul (Boulos) and Syriac Metropolitan of Aleppo John (Yohanna ) Ibrahim in 2013. If true, then we lament and cry "Lord have mercy!", and "May their memory be eternal!"

But we also believe and proclaim that these two shepherds are True Confessors and Faithful Witnesses, and have received their crowns as Holy Hieromartyrs for Christ!

Metropolitan Paul (Yazigi)

Indirect info suggests two metropolitans kidnapped in Syria executed

Moscow, Interfax, December 2, 2015 (Many Thanks to Emanuel): 

According to some reports, two Syrian hierarchs, namely Orthodox Church of Antioch Metropolitan of Aleppo Paul and Syro-Jacobite Metropolitan of Aleppo John-Ibrahim, kidnapped in 2013, were executed.

"Leader of the only Middle Eastern Orthodox Party Mashriq Roderick Khoury spoke of this at a meeting with coordinator of the inter-faction State Duma deputy group for the protection of Christian values Sergey Gavrilov on Wednesday," executive secretary of the deputy group Oleg Yefimov told Interfax-Religion.

The leader of the Mashriq party told Gavrilov with reference to sources in Turkey that representatives of radical North Caucasian groupings jointly with Al-Qaeda participated in the kidnapping of Syrian hierarchs, he said.

The inter-faction deputy group intended to urgently turn to the Turkish authorities for confirmation of the detention of Abdurakhmanov and the information he produced about the assassination of the Christian leaders kidnapped in 2013.

Metropolitan John (Ibrahim)

"The source said that Abdurakhmanov showed a video in which the kidnapped metropolitans were filmed and also reaffirmed that they were executed," the source said.

Meanwhile, a source referred to a statement made by Dagestani native and participant of the terrorist grouping Magomed Abdurakhmanov, who personally confirmed his participation in the kidnapping of the hierarchs.

Maronite Patriarch of Antioch: Muslims want to conquer Europe with 'faith and the birthrate'

The cardinal said that "Muslims look on Christians as weak and believe that since they have no children and barely practice their faith, Islam will easily conquer them. Sadly, Muslims take their faith more seriously than most Christians, and they are gaining ground because of it."

From the heart of the Islamic world comes a Christian hierarch willing to speak the truth. We are only at the beginning of this new age of mass martyrdom of Christians.

Patriarch of Antioch: Muslims want to conquer Europe with 'faith and the birthrate'
by Thomas D. Williams, PhD, Breitbart News, November 6, 2015

In a stunning interview, the Maronite patriarch of Antioch, Cardinal Bechara Boutros al-Rahi, has contended that Islam has a clear, two-pronged strategy to take over Europe: religion and procreation.

The cardinal said that Muslims look on Christians as weak and believe that since they have no children and barely practice their faith, Islam will easily conquer them. Sadly, he said, Muslims take their faith more seriously than most Christians, and they are gaining ground because of it.

“I have often heard from Muslims that their goal is to conquer Europe with two weapons: their faith and their birthrate,” al-Rahi said in a recent interview with Famiglia Cristiana, an Italian Catholic weekly magazine.

For the Muslims, the Cardinal said, “the practice of the faith is essential and fundamental. In Saudi Arabia they go to Friday prayers even if they need a walking stick. They know the Koran by heart, and when they talk they often cite it. The same is not true for Christians who do not refer either to the Bible or the teachings of the Church.”

Syrian Christians cry 'JESUS!' before being beheaded by Islamic State

Another report on the 12 New Martyrs of Aleppo, Syria.

See also, 12 New Martyrs: Tortured, Crucified by Islamic State for refusing to renounce Christ.

REPORT: SYRIAN CHRISTIANS CRY ‘JESUS!’ BEFORE ISIS MASS BEHEADING

by Mary Chastain, Breitbart News, October 5, 2015

The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) executed 12 Christians, including a 12-year-old boy, after they refused to abandon their faith and convert to Islam. The murders occurred on August 28 outside of Aleppo.

“In front of the team leader and relatives in the crowd, the Islamic extremists cut off the fingertips of the boy and severely beat him, telling his father they would stop the torture only if he, the father, returned to Islam,” revealed Christian Aid Mission.  “When the team leader refused, relatives said, the ISIS militants also tortured and beat him and the two other ministry workers. The three men and the boy then met their deaths in crucifixion.”

The boy’s father was a “ministry team leader who planted nine churches.” One woman allegedly yelled “Jesus!” right before the terrorists beheaded her. Militants took eight aid workers, two of them females, to another village. They proceeded to rape the two females before they executed them.

“Villagers said some were praying in the name of Jesus, others said some were praying the Lord’s Prayer, and others said some of them lifted their heads to commend their spirits to Jesus,” described one source. “One of the women looked up and seemed to be almost smiling as she said, ‘Jesus!'”

Russia Declares ‘Holy War’ on Islamic State

"What the United States and its Western allies have wrought in the Middle East—culminating with the rise of a bloodthirsty caliphate and the worst atrocities of the 21st century—is as unholy as Russia’s resolve to fight it is holy." — Raymond Ibrahim

Related:

• Resurgent Russia: The Hope of Persecuted Christians
• The West's Blind Spot towards Russia
• Russia fears the eastward spread of 'jihadist cancer'
• Only Russia Defends Eastern Christians

Russia Declares ‘Holy War’ on Islamic State
by Raymond Ibrahim, FrontPage Magazine, October 6, 2015

The Orthodox Christian Church, which is reclaiming its traditional role in post-Soviet Russia, has just described its government’s fight against the Islamic State and other jihadi groups in Syria as a “holy war.”

According to Vsevolod Chaplin, head of the Church’s Public Affairs Department,

The fight with terrorism is a holy battle and today our country is perhaps the most active force in the world fighting it.  The Russian Federation has made a responsible decision on the use of armed forces to defend the People of Syria from the sorrows caused by the arbitrariness of terrorists. Christians are suffering in the region with the kidnapping of clerics and the destruction of churches. Muslims are suffering no less.

This is not a pretext to justify intervention in Syria.  For years, Russia’s Orthodox leaders have been voicing their concern for persecuted Christians.  Back in February 2012, the Russian church described to Vladimir Putin the horrific treatment Christians are experiencing around the world, especially under Islam:

The head of External Church Relations, Metropolitan Illarion, said that every five minutes one Christian was dying for his or her faith in some part of the world, specifying that he was talking about such countries as Iraq, Egypt, Pakistan and India. The cleric asked Putin to make the protection of Christians one of the foreign policy directions in future. 

“This is how it will be, have no doubt,” Putin answered.

Compare and contrast Putin’s terse response with U.S. President Obama, who denies the connection between Islamic teachings and violence; whose policies habitually empower Christian-persecuting Islamists; who prevents Christian representatives from testifying against their tormentors; and who even throws escaped Christian refugees back to the lions, while accepting tens of thousands of Muslim migrants.

“We must protect Russia from that which has destroyed American society.” 

— Russian President Vladimir Putin

Russian Patriarch Kirill once even wrote an impassioned letter to Obama, imploring him to stop empowering the murderers of Christians.  That the patriarch said “I am deeply convinced that the countries which belong to the Christian civilization bear a special responsibility for the fate of Christians in the Middle East” must have only ensured that the letter ended up in the Oval Office’s trash can.  After all, didn’t Obama make clear that America is “no longer a Christian nation“?

12 New Martyrs: Tortured, Crucified by Islamic State for refusing to renounce Christ

“In front of the team leader and relatives in the crowd, the Islamic extremists cut off the fingertips of the boy and severely beat him, telling his father they would stop the torture only if he, the father, returned to Islam,” Christian Aid revealed, according to a report from Morning Star News. 

“When the team leader refused, relatives said, the ISIS militants also tortured and beat him and the two other ministry workers. The three men and the boy then met their deaths in crucifixion.”

Why cut off the boy's fingertips? It's commanded in the Qur'an:—
“When your Lord inspired to the angels, ‘I am with you, so strengthen those who have believed. I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieved, so strike [them] upon the necks and strike from them every fingertip.'” (Qur’an 8:12)

They would stop the torture only if he, the father, returned to Islam: “They wish you would disbelieve as they disbelieved so you would be alike. So do not take from among them allies until they emigrate for the cause of Allah. But if they turn away, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them and take not from among them any ally or helper.” (Qur’an 4:89)

Why Crucifixion? It's commanded in the Qur'an: —
“Indeed, the penalty for those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger and strive upon earth corruption is none but that they be killed or crucified or that their hands and feet be cut off from opposite sides or that they be exiled from the land. That is for them a disgrace in this world; and for them in the Hereafter is a great punishment.” (Qur’an 5:33)

12 Christians Brutally Executed by ISIS Refused to Renounce Name of Christ, Died Praying, Reciting Lord’s Prayer 

by Leah Marieann Klett, Gospel Herald, via Jihad Watch — October 2, 2015:

Thousands of Christians in Iraq and Syria are displaced thanks to ISIS terror.

Twelve Christians have been brutally executed by the Islamic State, including the 12-year-old son of a Syrian ministry team leader who had planted nine churches, because they refused to renounce the name of Jesus Christ and embrace Islam. The martyrs were faithful to the very end; right before one woman was beheaded by the terror group, she appeared to be smiling slightly as she said, “Jesus!”

Putin Bests Obama in UN Showdown on Syria

Obama triples down on his politically correct Mideast fantasies, while Putin correctly analyzes ISIS and Assad.

by Robert Spencer, PJ Media — September 29, 2015

Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin both spoke at the United Nations on Monday, with Putin reiterating a call he made in September for an international coalition against jihad terror and the Islamic State in particular. Obama again rebuffed that call, although this time he left the door slightly open to some kind of cooperation with Russia.

The sticking point is Bashar Assad — and the differences that Obama and Putin have over Assad’s regime demonstrate yet again that when it comes to the jihad threat, Putin is assessing the situation realistically while Obama is operating in the realm of politically correct fantasy.

Putin skewered those fantasies in his UN speech Monday when he noted the failure of the Arab Spring to do what Barack Obama and the entire political and media elites insisted it would do: bring to the Middle East a flowering of democracy and freedom:

Instead of the triumph of democracy and progress, we got violence, poverty and social disaster — and nobody cares a bit about human rights, including the right to life. I cannot help asking those who have forced that situation: Do you realize what you have done?

No, they don’t realize what they have done, and they’re poised to do more of it.

Archbishops From Middle East Charge Discrimination Against Christians

"Since October 2014, 906 Muslim refugees from Syria were granted U.S. visas, while only 28 of Syria’s estimated 700,000 Christian refugees were provided with visas."

This further supports Raymond Ibrahim's important article, Obama Throws Christian Refugees to Lions.

by Warren Mass, The New American — September 16, 2015

Two archbishops from the Middle East have complained that the United States unfairly discriminates against Christians from their region when they apply for U.S. visas.

Chaldean Archbishop Bashar Warda of Erbil, Iraq, and Melkite Archbishop Jean-Clément Jeanbart of Aleppo, Syria, aired their grievances at an August 4 press conference at the 2015 Knights of Columbus Convention in Philadelphia.

The archbishops cited federal data indicating that, since October 2014, 906 Muslim refugees from Syria were granted U.S. visas, while only 28 of Syria’s estimated 700,000 Christian refugees were provided with visas. They said that even considering that Christians account for just 10 percent of the population of Syria, the number of visas granted to Christians seems widely disproportional.

Although the U.S. government does not track the religious affiliation of immigrants, Christianity Today nevertheless reported that the bishops gathered their information “from official U.S. government sources.” 

Obama Throws Christian Refugees to Lions

The anti-Constantine's support for Muslim genocide against Christians is undeniable. 

by Raymond Ibrahim, Gatestone Institute — September 25, 2015

Members of California’s Iraqi Christian community and their supporters protest the months-long detention of Iraqi Christian asylum-seekers at the Otay Mesa detention center.

The fate of those Iraqi Christians who had fled from the Islamic State only to be incarcerated in the United States has finally been decided by the Obama administration: they are to be thrown back to the lions, where they will likely be persecuted if not slaughtered like so many Iraqi Christians before them.

Fifteen of the 27 Iraqi Christians that have been held at a detention center in Otay Mesa, California, for approximately six months, are set to be deported in the coming weeks. Some have already been deported and others are being charged with immigration fraud.

Many of the Iraqi Christian community in San Diego—including U.S. citizen family members vouching for the refugees—had hopes that they would eventually be released.  Mark Arabo, a spokesman for the Chaldean community, had argued that “They’ve escaped hell [IS]. Let’s allow them to reunite with their families.”  One of the detained women had begged to see her ailing mother before she died.  The mother died before they could reunite, and now the daughter is to be deported, possibly back to the hell of the Islamic State.

Why are Christian minorities, who are the most to suffer from the chaos engulfing the Middle East, the least wanted in the United States?

The answer is that the Obama administration defines refugees as people “persecuted by their government.”  In other words, the only “real” refugees are those made so due to the actions of Bashar Assad.  As for those who are being raped, slaughtered, and enslaved based on their religious identity by so-called “rebel” forces fighting Assad—including the Islamic State—their status as refugees is evidently considered dubious at best.

Pressure Grows to Declare War Against Christians a Genocide

"Christianity in the Middle East is shattered," Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, Nebraska Republican, told the IDC [In Defense of Christians] conference on Sept. 9. "The ancient faith tradition lies beaten, broken and dying. Yet Christians in Iraq and Syria are hanging on in the face of the Islamic State's barbarous onslaught. This is genocide."

As I repeatedly strive to emphasize, "genocide" is a secular term, and while it is accurate in a forensic way, for us, as Orthodox Christians, we must school ourselves to speak of this as a "New Age of Martyrdom." 

Our brothers and sisters in Iraq, Syria and the Middle East — as well as in Egypt and throughout North and Central Africa, as well as in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia, Southeast Asia, the Philippines, Indonesia and throughout the entire Islamic world — are ascending a real Golgotha. Christianity is being crucified anew, and the evil is increasing in vast waves of persecution. Europe and North America are next. 

We must wake up, stand with our suffering brothers and sisters, pray for them, honor them as confessors and martyrs, and prepare ourselves for the trials to come through diligently living and practicing our most holy faith.

And, we must clearly state that this "New Age of Martyrdom," this "genocide," is the direct result of devout Muslims following the commands in the Qur'an, imitating Muhammad's example as extolled in the ahadith and the Sira, and applying the doctrines of Islamic jurisprudence. It is not just the Islamic State waging war against and persecuting Christians. It is also ordinary Muslims — neighbors of Christians — who are taking their religion more seriously and acting according to its commands. 

Islam itself is the direct cause of the first genocide of the 21st century, this "New Age of Martyrdom."

Pressure Grows to Declare War Against Christians a Genocide

by Douglas Burton, Washington Times via AINA, September 23, 2015:

Memorial to martyrs killed in 2010 church bombing; Baghdad, Iraq.

Human rights activists see it. Foreign leaders see it. And more than 80 members of the U.S. Congress see it. Together, they are pressuring the leader of the free world to declare there is a Christian genocide going on in the Middle East.

Their campaign -- which was discussed at a Capitol Hill conference earlier this month hosted by the two-year-old In Defense of Christians nonprofit -- has an influential ally on its side.

Pope Francis, making his first visit to the United States on Wednesday, has noted the number of Christians being martyred today exceeds the number martyred during the days of the Roman Empire.

In fact, the sheer numbers of Christians murdered and tortured every year in a dozen countries in the developing world is only getting worse, thanks to the relentless campaign of the ISIS and al-Qaeda terror groups.

For example, in 2014, 2,000 Christians were murdered in Iraq alone, which is the number cited by historian Edward Gibbon as the total number of Christian martyrs in the first three centuries of Christianity.

In Iraq, where Christian churches were planted 1,800 years ago, Christianity has been wiped out except for 200,000 refugees sheltering in Kurdistan and a few in Baghdad. Their language, Aramaic; their homeland, the Nineveh Plain; and their calamity are Biblical in scale. Hundreds have been publicly tortured and executed in Mosul while women and children have suffered severe levels of sexual violence since the Islamic State took control in 2014.

"Christianity in the Middle East is shattered," Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, Nebraska Republican, told the IDC conference on Sept. 9. "The ancient faith tradition lies beaten, broken and dying. Yet Christians in Iraq and Syria are hanging on in the face of the Islamic State's barbarous onslaught. This is genocide."

Former Archbishop of Canterbury warns against 'Muslim mass immigration to Europe'

"The frustration for those of us who have been calling for compassion for Syrian victims for many months is that the Christian community is yet again left at the bottom of the heap... Britain should make Syrian Christians a priority... We are a Christian nation with an established Church so Syrian Christians will find no challenge to integration...

"There has been too much Muslim mass immigration to Europe. Isn't it high-time instead for the oil-rich Gulf States to open their doors to the many Muslims who are fleeing conflict? Surely if they are concerned for fellow Muslims who prefer to live in Muslim-majority countries, then they have a moral responsibility to intervene...

"It is, of course, quite right that Europe has woken to the sheer scale of human suffering in Syria. It is equally right that our compassionate instincts will drive us to fund-raise and campaign for the innocent victims of the conflict. But that compassion must be realistic and clear-headed." 

— Lord George Carey, Former Archbishop of Canterbury

It is reassuring to hear a Christian leader speak so forthrightly abut the dangers of Muslim Mass Immigration, and the need for the Christian West to care for the Christian victims.


Britain Has a Duty to Rescue Syria's Christians 
by George Carey, the Telegraph via AINA, September 6, 2015:

The dramatic and disturbing developments of the past few days have introduced a new, heart-rending dimension to this refugee crisis. Undoubtedly, the most disturbing aspect is just how impotent Europe is proving itself to be. If the EU is not resilient in the face of this disaster, it could be torn apart.

I can't help thinking of Corporal Jones's catchphrase -- "Don't panic!" But even the Germans are panicking as Angela Merkel, in a desperate attempt to cajole her fellow European leaders into accepting binding quotas, has declared open season for up to 800,000 Syrians to come to Germany.

Isn't it a bit rich for the Germans to criticise other nations, including Britain, for failing to accept refugees? For years, our warm-hearted land has consistently accepted more asylum-seekers than Germany.

Besides, it would be a mistake to give way to bullying calls to immediately open our doors to tens of thousands of refugees. We are a small island and recent immigration figures are highly disturbing. Last year, a net figure of 330,000 people settled among us -- more than the population of Sunderland. Imagine this continuing, year after year.

Alas, the signal that Germany is opening its doors to this influx will make Europe into an even more attractive magnet for those who are genuine refugees -- but also to floods of economic migrants, most of whom are young men travelling alone. We don't even know how many of these have been combatants in the civil war.

If some of what I say sounds harsh or, heaven forbid, a touch unchristian, let me make it clear that I welcome David Cameron's announcement to allow thousands more to enter Britain through refugee camps in Syria's neighbouring countries. In the long term, this strategy will cut out the traffickers and reduce the risk of the sea and land journeys.

But the frustration for those of us who have been calling for compassion for Syrian victims for many months is that the Christian community is yet again left at the bottom of the heap.

Syriac Bishop Flavien-Michel Malké Beatified on 100th Anniversary of His Martyrdom at the hands of the Muslim Turks

Glory be to God for this holy hierarch who laid down his life for his flock and earned his crown as a true witness for Christ. May we learn from him and all the martyrs to stand firm in our faith in Jesus Christ, preferring to die rather than to deny Him who laid down his life for us.

When his friends and acquaintances urged him to withdraw from Gazireh to a safer location, he replied, “Even my blood I will shed for my sheep.” 

One of the bishop’s most striking phrases comes from when he was pressured to renounce the faith and to convert to Islam. Rather than giving in, the bishop replied, “I will defend my faith to the blood.”

Syriac Bishop Will Be Beatified on the 100th Anniversary of His Martyrdom

In 1915, Flavien-Michel Malké said, “I will defend my faith to the blood.”

National Catholic Register, August 11, 2015

Bishop Flavien-Michel Malké of the Syriac Diocese

of Gazireh, who was martyred Aug. 29, 1915,

and will be beatified Aug. 29, 2015.

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey — On Saturday, Pope Francis approved a decree recognizing the martyrdom of Flavien-Michel Malké, a Syriac Catholic bishop who was killed in 1915, amid the Ottoman Empire's genocide against its Christian minorities.

The decision was made during an Aug. 8 meeting between Pope Francis and Cardinal Angelo Amato, prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.

Bishop Malké will be beatified Aug. 29, the 100th anniversary of his martyrdom, during a liturgy celebrated by Ignatius Youssef III Younan, the Syriac patriarch of Antioch, at the convent of Our Lady of Deliverance in Lebanon. It is expected that thousands of Syrians and Iraqis displaced by the Islamic State will attend the beatification.

“In these painful times experienced by Christians, especially the Syriac communities in Iraq and Syria, the news of the beatification of one of their martyrs, will surely bring encouragement and consolation to face today's trials of appalling dimension,” read an Aug. 9 statement of the Syriac Patriarchate of Antioch.

“Blessed Martyr Michael, intercede for us, and protect especially the Christians in the Orient and all the world in these hard and painful days.”

Islamic State bulldozes 1,500-year-old Syrian monastery, captures over 200 Syriac Christians

Islam's war against Christianity continues to advance. In this report you see it all: Muslims conquering, destroying Christian sites, taking of captives, offering the "three choices" — convert to Islam, pay the jizya, or death." And tens of thousands of Muslims from all over the world are flocking to the Middle East to join the Islamic State because they see it adhering to pure Islam.

Islamic State bulldozes 1,500-year-old Syrian monastery

by Robert Spencer, Jihad Watch — August 21, 2015

Besides removing supposed temptations to idolatry, Islamic jihadists want to destroy the artifacts of non-Muslim civilizations because doing so testifies to the truth of Islam, as the Qur’an suggests that the destroyed remnants of ancient non-Muslim civilizations are a sign of Allah’s punishment of those who rejected his truth:

Many were the Ways of Life that have passed away before you: travel through the earth, and see what was the end of those who rejected Truth. (Qur’an 3:137)

This is one of the foundations of the Islamic idea that pre-Islamic civilizations, and non-Islamic civilizations, are all jahiliyya — the society of unbelievers, which is worthless. Obviously this cuts against the idea of tourism of ancient sites and non-Muslim religious installations. V. S. Naipaul encountered this attitude in his travels through Muslim countries. For many Muslims, he observed in Among the Believers, “The time before Islam is a time of blackness: that is part of Muslim theology. History has to serve theology.” Naipaul recounted that some Pakistani Muslims, far from valuing the nation’s renowned archaeological site at Mohenjo Daro, saw its ruins as a teaching opportunity for Islam, recommending that Qur’an 3:137 be posted there as a teaching tool.

“Isis in Syria: 1,500-year-old Mar Elian monastery bulldozed by Islamic State in Qaryatain,” by Gianluca Mezzofiore, International Business Times, August 21, 2015 (thanks to David):

Islamic State (Isis) militants have bulldozed parts of the ancient monastery of Mar Elian in Qaryatain, a strategic town located in the central Syrian province of Homs which has been seized from forces loyal to president Bashar al-Assad earlier this month. IS-linked Twitter accounts posted pictures of the destruction of the monastery, which was founded in 432 on the claimed spot of St. Elian’s death, for “worshipping a God other than Allah”.

According to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), IS also transferred dozens of Assyrian Christians, who were kidnapped after the capture of Qaryatain, near its northern Syria de facto capital of Raqqa.

Slovakia refuses EU plan to resettle Muslim refugees, ‘will only accept Christians’

Wisdom and prudence from the sovereign state of Slovakia. They (and all Christian countries) should be free to flatly refuse to accept forced Muslim immigration.

Keep Slovakia jihad free!

As of 2011, Slovakia was approximately 62% Roman Catholic, 8.9% Protestant, 3.8% Greek Catholic, and .9% Orthodox Christian, a very small Jewish remnant, the rest Atheist and other; no Muslim population even registered in the survey. No doubt they would like to keep it that way, given the historic problems their neighbors have had from Muslim incursions dating back a millennium (Slovakia herself was attacked by Muslim armies centuries ago), and the current woes suffered by every European country which has Muslim populations (sharia "no-go" zones, crime, etc).

More disturbing, the Islamic State has publicly targeted Slovakia in its 5-year plan to spread the caliphate from Spain to China, no doubt relying on mass Muslim immigration as a key component of their jihad.

The EU's demands amount to civilizational jihad, and would only result in the desolation of Slovakia.

Migrants crisis: Slovakia ‘will only accept Christians’
Slovakia says it will only accept Christians when it takes in Syrian refugees under a EU relocation scheme
BBC News via Pravmir, August 20, 2015

The country is due to receive 200 people from camps in Turkey, Italy and Greece under the EU plan to resettle 40,000 new arrivals.

Interior ministry spokesman Ivan Netik said Muslims would not be accepted because they would not feel at home.

The UN’s refugee agency (UNHCR) called on countries to take an “inclusive approach” to relocation.

But Mr Netik denied the move was discriminatory and said it was intended to ensure community cohesion.

‘Not going to like it’

The number of migrants at the EU’s borders has surged in recent months, reaching a record high of 107,500 in July. Most are Syrians, Afghans, and sub-Saharan Africans, fleeing instability or poverty.

Last month, EU member states agreed to take in 32,000 asylum seekers arriving in Italy and Greece over the next two years – fewer than the 40,000 target.

The scheme was made voluntary after some nations – including Slovakia – refused to accept set quotas.

Islamic State Militants Destroy Assyrian Churches Northern Syria

"The group has reportedly destroyed most of the churches in the area before withdrawal, military sources reported."

By Zozan Shekho

ARA News via AINA — May 26, 2015

The Assyrian Virgin Mary Church in Tel Nasri, Syria,

was destroyed by ISIS on April 15.

Hasakah, Syria -- Radicals of the Islamic State's (IS/ISIL) withdrew from several Assyrian villages in Tel Temir countryside in northeastern Syria, after battles with Kurdish and Assyrian forces.

The group has reportedly destroyed most of the churches in the area before withdrawal, military sources reported on Monday.

Speaking to ARA News, Fayez Korko, member of Haras al-Khabur force, said that a huge devastation hit the Assyrian areas in the vicinity of Tel Temir at the hands of IS terrorists, especially the worship places and civilians' property.

"They dropped the church's crosses and crashed them all. They also damaged all contents of the churches and painted anti-Christian slogans on the walls," he added.

63 Christian churches have been destroyed during the years of war in Syria

Although "churches were destroyed both by the opposition forces and the government army of President Bashar al-Assad... the report accuses only ISIS militants of desecration of Christian crosses... it is impossible to describe all the cases of attacks on Christian churches."

Pravoslavie — May 26, 2015

63 Christian churches have been destroyed during the years of war in Syria. The human rights organization, “Syrian Network for Human Rights” (SNHR), has published a report, entitled “Targeting Christian Places of Work in Syria”, reports Sedmitza.ru.

Authors of the report state that during the four years of war, churches were destroyed both by the opposition forces and the government army of President Bashar al-Assad. According to the 21-page report, directed against the legitimate regime, 14 churches were burned down by the opposition, 7 churches – by extremist groups (ISIS, Al-Nusra Front), while another 40 fell victims of the “ruthless” regime of B. al-Assad.

The report mentions one incident of deliberate desecration of a church in Kasab by the government troops. However, according to “World Watch Monitor”, islamists from “Al-Nusra” are responsible for that crime.

In spite of the consistent criticism of the Syrian government, SNHR admits that the majority of the churches “destroyed by the government forces” were situated on the territories controlled by the opposition.