By Jennifer Jensen http://www.10news.com - 22/7/14 SAN DIEGO -- The radical Islamic group ISIS is making good on its threats to kill Iraqi Christians who refuse to convert. The crisis is closely being followed by San Diego's Chaldean community, which is the second largest population of Iraqi Christians in the United States. Local Chaldean leader Mark Arabo says what is ...
By Bishop Edward J. Burns http://juneauempire.com July 2014 This past June 15 was the first time in at least 1,600 years the Sunday Mass (Divine Liturgy) was not celebrated anywhere in Mosul, the second-largest city in Iraq. Mosul's many churches were closed by Sunni Muslim rebels belonging to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, which overran the ...
17/6/14 ALQOSH, Iraq (AP) -- Over the past decade, Iraqi Christians have fled repeatedly to this ancient mountainside village, seeking refuge from violence, then returning home when the danger eased. Now they are doing it again as Islamic militants rampage across northern Iraq, but this time few say they ever want to go back to their ...
By Ava Thomas http://www.brnow.org 15/2/14 BAGHDAD -- When Don Alan* thinks of Iraq, he thinks of friends who sit trembling in their walled neighborhoods, afraid to take their kids to school. There's good reason for their fear, he said. January 2014 was Iraq's deadliest month in nearly six years. More than 1,000 people died at the hands of gunmen ...
Matteo Fagotto The Australian - 28/12/13 "THEY held me captive for five days, without food nor water, constantly beating me. One day I heard them coming down the basement where I was held. "Suddenly, I felt a cold blade under my neck and someone told me, 'If you become a Muslim, we will not kill you.' " Sitting on ...
21/1/13 Alan Wisdom www.theird.com Iraq's Christian population has been the target of violence for several years. The Christian community in Iraq has suffered great loss in the decade since the U.S. invasion of 2003. Is there a ray of hope now that Iraq's Assyrian, Chaldean, Armenian, and other Christians can find a secure future in the Kurdistan region? This ...
12/4/2012 ED WEST From: The Australian THE Arabs once had a saying about the British: "Better to be their enemy, for that way they will try to buy you; for if you are their friend, they will most certainly sell you." For Iraq's Christians, it has proved to be sage advice. It is a lesson learned by ...
By Dr Amer Al Sabaileh 3/4/2012 Although not a Christian myself, I feel that no one can doubt the important role of the “Christians of Levant” during the period of enlightenment in the Arab world. They played a significant part in creating a platform for an Arab socio-cultural and political consciousness. The Middle East is a rich ...
By Luiza Oleszczuk Christian Post 30/3/2012 The year 2011 did not bring respite for Christians and other religious minorities in Iraq as hundreds of thousands of migrants who fled the country are still unwilling to risk returning due to reports of continued discrimination, fear of renewed violence and the government's apparent inability to protect citizens. In addition to the ...
By Catholic News Service 16/12/2011 EDMONTON, Alberta – Iraqi Ziyad Matti and his wife, Dalia Hikmat, have not had a proper Christmas in years. They are looking forward to a quiet, peaceful celebration of Christmas as the settle in their new country and learn their way around. The couple and their 1-year-old daughter, Kristel, arrived in ...
6/12/2011 Contact: Jerry Dykstra, Open Doors USA, 616-915-4117, jerryd@odusa.org SANTA ANA, Calif., Dec. 6, 2011 /Christian Newswire/ -- While much of the world's attention is focused on the Egyptian elections and American troops withdrawing from Iraq, the situation inside Syria is getting worse, especially for Christians. There is unrest and chaos in Syria for various reasons. Some of ...
2/11/2011 The Anniversary: I scanned the congregation from my seat at the altar of the little church in Paris, Notre Dame de Chaldée. Their faces have become familiar to me: young women in black clutching small children, their long black hair and dark eyes blending into their widow's weeds. And the parents whose children were murdered: ...
15/8/2011 Kirkuk (AsiaNews) – A bomb exploded last night near the St Ephraim Syrian Orthodox Church in Kirkuk, which is just a few hundreds of metres from the Chaldean cathedral, in central part of the city. The device blew up at 1.30 am and there were no victims. The damages to the church were however huge ...
14/11/2010 Head of the Egyptian Coptic Church Pope Shenouda III leader will cancel his 39th ordination anniversary celebration in a move to demonstrate solidarity with the Baghdad church afflicted by terrorist attacks two weeks ago, sources said. On 1 November, Al-Qaeda’s offshoot, the Islamic State of Iraq, attacked the Our Lady of Salvation Cathedral, leaving 58 dead ...
7/11/2010 A senior Iraqi Christian is to call on believers to quit the country, after gunmen targeted a church in Baghdad. Archbishop Athanasios Dawood, who is based in the UK, will make his appeal during a service at the Syrian Orthodox Church in London. The archbishop has previously criticised the lack of protection for Iraqi Christians. At least 52 ...
2/11/2010 By: Khalil Murshadi, Agence France-Presse, with files from The Daily Telegraph BAGHDAD - Grieving Christians in Baghdad marked All Saints Day in mourning yesterday for 52 people killed during a hostage drama with al-Qaeda gunmen that ended in an assault by Iraqi forces backed by U.S. troops. Mourners carried coffins out of the Syriac Catholic church of Our ...