Surge of religious persecution in North Africa in January 2024

 

01/24/2024 North Africa (International Christian Concern) – In the past several months, North Africa has seen a disturbing surge in persecution of its national Christians, with Mauritania, Algeria, and Libya at the forefront of escalating hostilities against Christians. This unsettling trend sheds light on the complex interplay of political, religious, and social factors that contribute to the challenges faced by Christian minorities in the region. 

Mauritania: The Arrest and Release of 15 Christians 

Mauritania is an Islamic Republic and while constitutionally does not outlaw Christianity, capital punishment for apostasy and blasphemy from Islam is outlined in the country’s legal code. Proselytizing or promoting any other religion other than Islam is also not allowed in Mauritania. In December 2023, a video went viral locally of a Mauritanian baptism, which led to a government crackdown with 15 Christians detained and then later released after several weeks of national debate concerning the nation’s tiny, but growing, Christian minority.  

Algeria: Church Closures and Crackdown on Pastors 

Neighboring Algeria has not been exempted from the wave of persecution. Reports over the past few years show a series of church closures and a crackdown on pastors, signalling a concerning violation of religious freedom. Both long-time registered protestant churches as well as house churches have been revealed, raided and Christians detain from practicing their faith in Algeria. The targeted nature of these actions raises questions about the motives behind such measures and denial of crackdowns on Christians.  

Libya: Government Searches for Christians Online and Through Connections 

In Libya, a divided nation grappling with post-conflict challenges, local governments and militia’s intensified efforts to find and detain Christians have added to the growing concerns. The use of online surveillance and connections to track down individuals based on their religious affiliation underscores the extent to which religious persecution has infiltrated even the digital realm. The breakdown in law and order in the fractured nation puts any Libyan even suspected of interested in Christianity in grave danger of being detained, tortured, or even killed.  

What Is Behind this Disturbing Trend? 

The surge in persecution against Christians in North Africa can be attributed to a confluence of factors: 

Political Factors in the Region 

The New Year as brought a sharper divide between the Muslim majority world and the Western world order. While a complex geopolitical factor that reaches far beyond North Africa, the ongoing conflict in Israel-Gaza is perceived by many in the Muslim majority world as a form of Western tyranny against Muslim lands. The United States is still seen by many around the world as a center of global Christian evangelicalism, and with most America’s evangelicals firmly putting their political support behind Israel in the latest Middle East conflict, North African protestant groups (which represent the majority of indigenous Christians in North African countries) are experiencing great backlash and persecution through assumed association. Hence in the deeply Islamic nations of North Africa, the tiny numbers of national Christians, particularly protestant groups that come from Muslim backgrounds, are sometimes unfairly perceived and suspected as siding with the “Christian West” and/or “Zionism.” 

Perceived Growth of Christians in a Deeply Islamic Cultures 

The perceived growth of Christian communities in predominantly Muslim nations in North Africa has heightened anxieties among certain segments of the population, especially extremist Islamic groups. In some cases, Christians are viewed as a threat to the prevailing religious and social order, leading to increased discrimination and persecution. 

In deeply Muslim-majority nations, there exists a longstanding hostility toward anyone who converts to Christianity. This stems from a deeply ingrained sense of religious identity, where any deviation from the majority community faith is met with suspicion and unfortunately sometimes extreme cases of persecution. The challenge lies in fostering greater religious tolerance within these societies and proving that despite being Christians, they are still good citizens and are a central part of the fabric of the cultures that they represent.  

For interviews, please contact:  press@persecution.org.  

Since 1995, ICC has served the global persecuted church through a three-pronged approach of assistance, advocacy, and awareness. ICC exists to bandage the wounds of persecuted Christians and to build the church in the toughest parts of the world.

Muslims kill almost 200 in Nigeria on Christmas Eve

 Suspected Nigerian Fulani militias attacked 21 Christian villages in the Bokkos,  Barkin Ladi, and Mangu counties of Plateau State on Christmas Eve, killing nearly 200 villagers according to government officials and humanitarian groups. The number of dead is expected to rise as families continue to search for missing loved ones. 

On Thursday, Plateau State Commissioner of Information and Communication Hon. Musa Ashoms reported 195 people killed during the Christmas Eve attacks, and villagers were still missing. He told communities to defend themselves and take up arms as needed.  

Amnesty International Nigeria reported 194 people killed in Plateau State including 148 in Bokkos, 27 in Barkin Ladi, and 19 in Mangu. The Nigerian Red Cross reported 161 deaths and 32,604 people affected. The attack touched 84 communities in Bokkos and Barkin Ladi and left 29,350 people displaced. In addition, 301 people were injured and 27 houses burned. 

Witnesses said that scant security was present to repel the attacks that lasted more than seven hours. 

“More dead bodies were found in the bush today,” said Timothy, a local from Mbar village in Bokkos County. “Yes, my village was attacked on Christmas Eve, and other villages close to my community. Many houses were burnt including my church. I can’t say how many people were killed but we found more dead bodies today and we are looking for missing ones.” 

Naomi, a resident of Mayong, lost four family members in the attack and fled to an IDP (Internally Displaced Persons) camp. “My house was burnt, and I mourned on Christmas day,” she said. 

Ezekiel Peter Bini Condole, president of the Irigwe Youth Development Association covering Bokkos, Barkin Ladi, and Mangu called on Nigeria President Bola Tinubu to do more to protect Christians. He said that Christians in Plateau State should be compensated by the government for their losses. Condole added that there are threats of more attacks to wipe out Christians, and he called on U.S. President Joe Biden to pressure Nigeria’s leaders to stop the killings. 

Nigeria is one of the most dangerous places for Christians, particularly in the Middle Belt region. International Christian Concern (ICC) listed Nigeria in its annual Persecutors of the Year report the last three years. More than 50,000 Christians have been killed in the Middle Belt region over the past 20 years, and millions have been displaced. 

For interviews, please contact:  press@persecution.org. 

Have you ever wondered why Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are crappy countries?

 In countries like Myanmar and Nigeria, acts of persecution against Christians are more likely to make news reports because of their extreme violence. But in many other locations, persecution typically takes on a more subtle form. It likely won’t make any media outlet and might not have any documentation at all. But it’s still an ever-present issue that diminishes the quality of life for many Christians.  

One place where such persecution occurs is Bangladesh, a South Asian nation with an overall population of 170 million, where over 90% of the people are Muslim and most of the remaining portion are Hindu.  

Thomas (real name withheld to protect identity), a Christian in Bangladesh, says that many people “express their desire for conversion” to Christianity, but they don’t follow through with it due to “threats of killing and persecution.” 

Many children in Bangladesh “grow up with a nasty mentality to hate other faiths,” says Thomas. In the villages, these children often target the Christian families “to steal and destroy farms and gardens.” He adds that when Christians protest such behavior, then things become more aggressive.  

In the cities, says Thomas, anti-Christian sentiment can surface through harassment from non-Christian employees or having non-Christian employees refuse to cooperate with the Christian employee. The Christian employee might also get stuck with job duties on a Sunday, so that they might have to choose between attending church or keeping their job.  

Thomas isn’t sure exactly what percent of Bangladeshi Muslims support acts of persecution against Christians. He says, though, that it doesn’t take much to spoil the “full bucket of milk.” 

He gives the example in which you might have “just one person doing anti-Christian activities in a large Muslim family.” Maybe the other family members “silently support it,” or maybe they themselves “are also afraid” of their hostile family member. It can be very difficult for an outsider to determine which case is the reality. But either way, nobody discourages the person from acting on his hostility.  

Thomas says that “anti-Christian mentality is present throughout” the country among Muslims who are either uneducated or who study in fundamentalist madrassas which teach that Bengali is not a Muslim language, and that Islam is the only legitimate religion. “It’s enough to make a soft brain child into a violent fanatic,” says Thomas. 

Rates of Christianity are much higher among indigenous ethnic minorities in Bangladesh. Thomas says these indigenous Christians are typically “very humble and hospitable,” especially to a wandering laborer “who comes very helplessly to work in the area.” 

Thomas shares a scenario in which a Muslim might come to a Christian household to do agricultural work. The Christian family might give the Muslim some land to live on. Then, the Muslim “calls other relatives and builds a mosque with bamboo.” 

At this point, the guest might start to act like he’s the owner. Thomas says then “they become a threat to local people … they take away crops, steal fruits and vegetables, make a chaos without any cause.” At this point, the host family will have “lost their inner silence,” he adds. 

As for legal recourse, Thomas says how “without a complaint, the police have no responsibilities. And if you go to complain, you have to pay an official fee with a big bundle.”  Then, the police want evidence. “How do you show bullying and tricking?” asks Thomas.  

People tend to view filing a criminal complaint as a major source of harassment. As Thomas explains, “If the police call you to the station, you lose your daily wage and maybe even your job.” And “if the police come to your home, you need to make them happy with some external hospitality, otherwise the report will be against you.” 

“Sometimes, the village chief or higher authority supports people against the Christians,” says Randall (real name withheld to protect identity), a pastor from northern Bangladesh. He adds that Christian converts from Muslim backgrounds have a slim chance at receiving fair treatment.  

Bangladesh’s secular federal government has expressed its concern about Islamic extremism, but Randall feels that the effort they make about persecution is “not fruitful action.”

In Randall’s view, “above 90 percent of Bangladeshi Muslims support acts of persecution against Christians.” He estimates that about half of Bangladeshi Hindus support such acts. 

Another South Asian nation, Sri Lanka, has an unusual degree of religious diversity, with four major religions forming considerable percentages of the population (about 70% Buddhist, a bit more than 10% Hindu, and Christians and Muslims each a bit under 10%). 

Aside from the catastrophic 2019 Easter bombings that struck multiple churches and luxury resorts, persecution of Sri Lanka’s Christians typically isn’t of the sort that makes headlines. And yet, it can be a constant issue. 

Elias (real name withheld to protect identity), a Catholic in northern Sri Lanka, says he doesn’t know of any cases of Sri Lankans having their land taken specifically because of their Christian faith.  

“But when it comes to the workplace, [Sri Lankan] Christians face a lot of challenges,” he says. “They need to work harder than the other laborers to survive in that workplace.” And in many cases, “They’re unable to reach the top positions even if they have talents to lead,” he adds.  

Persecution against Christians in Sri Lanka is often linked to Buddhist nationalism that is prominent among the majority ethnic group, known as the Sinhalese.  

But Elias says that Sri Lanka’s Muslims persecute against Christians in a way that is disproportionately stronger than the part of the overall population they form. This type of persecution, he says, is more pronounced on the country’s eastern coast, which has a higher Muslim population.  

Meanwhile, in Bangladesh, with its overwhelming Muslim majority, some Christians are compelled to “depend on Muslim lawyers to fight against [other] Muslims” who have taken their land by coercion or with fake documents, says Thomas. These lawyers “are very clever,” he adds. They “take away money from the Christians” and then work on behalf of the Muslims.  

Thomas feels that Christians are powerless to solve this problem either legally or illegally. “So, it stays as is.”  

Making their way to Christian households are the next round of itinerant laborers. As Thomas describes, “They come as a humble cat and then become a tiger.” 

For interviews, please contact:  press@persecution.org. 

IDF bombs Christian church in Gaza

 An explosion Thursday night at St. Porphyrius Greek Orthodox Church in Gaza City destroyed the church’s assembly hall, injuring and killing dozens of people inside.  

At least 500 people, including many of Gaza’s small Christian minority, have been sheltering in the church since the war began. The explosion killed at least 40 people, including 19 Christians, according to preliminary reports. 

Neither side of the conflict has released a statement claiming responsibility for the attack. Gaza authorities state that it was an Israeli airstrike, while Israel has not yet made a statement at the time of reporting. International Christian Concern continues to monitor the situation as more information becomes known and verified. 

St. Porphyrius is an ancient church, with the church’s original site dating to the 5th century AD. It is the largest of the three churches still open in the Gaza Strip and one of the main locations where Gaza’s Christian community have been sheltering during the war, believing it to be one of the last safe places in Gaza. 

The church is administered by the Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem, which issued an official statement after the strike on their church in Gaza:  

“Despite the evident targeting of the facilities and shelters of the Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem and other churches – including the Episcopal Church of Jerusalem Hospital, other schools, and social institutions – the Patriarchate, along with the other churches, remain committed to fulfilling its religious and moral duty in providing assistance, support, and refuge to those in need, amidst continuous Israeli demands to evacuate these institutions of civilians and the pressures exerted on the churches in this regard. The Patriarchate stresses that it will not abandon its religious and humanitarian duty, rooted in its Christian values, to provide all that is necessary in times of war and peace alike.” 

For interviews, please contact:  press@persecution.org. 

People sheltering in two churches in Gaza

 While the bombardment of Hamas continues in the Gaza Strip, the small contingent of Christians there is sheltering in two churches. They, like many citizens in Gaza, wonder if they will live through this crisis. 

The past ten days have been filled with horror for southern Israel and for Gaza – hundreds were reportedly killed on Tuesday when a missile struck a hospital in northern Gaza, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. The war began when Hamas executed the deadliest single terrorist attack in Israel’s 75-year history.

The initial Hamas attack has been retaliated by Israel through nonstop bombardment and a complete blockade on the more than 2 million populated Gaza Strip. Thousands of civilians have been killed in the war, and international negotiations to allow critical humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip through Egypt’s Rafah crossing have so far been unsuccessful.  

Gaza’s small Christian community has been sheltering in two churches in Gaza City during this week’s Israeli bombardment. Both churches lie within north Gaza, the area that the Israeli military has ordered civilians to leave in preparation for an expected ground invasion.

The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) has been made aware of the churches and Christians’ presence in the area. IDF leaders have told private sources that they will protect and ensure that the churches do not become targets in the war.  

Gaza’s civilian population must be protected in this latest escalation of the Hamas-Israel war. Gaza’s churches must not become targets of war, and people taking refuge inside the churches must be protected.  

Political challenges and conflict in recent decades have threatened the continued survival of the Gazan church and its estimated 1,000 Christians who face persecution. 

For interviews, please contact:  press@persecution.org. 

Myanmar military bomb refugee camps

The Burmese military, known as the Tatmadaw, bombed a refugee camp in the northern state of Kachin this week. The strike killed 29 and wounded 55, according to the Kachin rebel group as reported in the New York Times.

The military has killed 4,146 civilians, including 472 children, since it seized the country in a February 2021 coup and arrested 25,300, according to the rights group Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.

When the military took over the government in 2021, it promised that it would quickly conduct free and fair elections. It has broken that promise and self-imposed deadlines several times since, and analysts believe that the Tatmadaw could not conduct an election today given its tenuous control of the country.

Recent reports suggest that anti-junta militias have gained significant ground in recent months, reducing the area under solid Tatmadaw control to as little as 17%, according to the Special Advisory Council for Myanmar.

In September, ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations), a regional bloc, voted to remove Myanmar from its scheduled chairmanship in 2026, replacing the country with the Philippines. ASEAN has consistently voiced its disapproval of Tatmadaw’s usurpation of the government.

Myanmar is a patchwork mosaic of ethnic and religious groups. Though a strong majority of the population is ethnic Burman, and an even greater percentage is Buddhist. The communities that make up the rest are well-established, well-organized, and mostly predate the formation of the modern state by centuries.

The Tatmadaw has long persecuted Rohingya Muslims and ethnic minority Christians including with bombings of civilians, torture, and attempts to forcefully convert minorities to Buddhism.

In many cases, Myanmar’s ethnic minorities have taken on a distinct religious identity as well. About 20-30% of ethnic Karen are Christians, while other groups—such as the Chin—are more than 90% Christian. This overlap of ethnic and religious identity has created a volatile situation for believers. In Chin State, for example, most of the population is Christian, creating a target-rich area for the military.

Many refugees from Myanmar flee directly across the western border into India and Bangladesh or across the eastern border into Thailand. Some end up resettling as far away as the United States and Australia, while many others face decades of uncertainty in massive refugee camps closer to Myanmar.

For interviews, please contact:  press@persecution.org.  

Muslims burn down Catholic church and kills one in Kaduna state

Suspected Muslim terrorists attacked and burned a Catholic seminary in Kaduna State, Nigeria on Friday and killed a young seminarian who was trapped in the fire.

The attack occurred at the rectory and house of St. Rachael’s Parish in Fadan Kamantan. Two priests escaped the blaze, but seminarian Naam Ngofe Danladi perished. A Catholic church representative said they were warned before the attack, and they contacted authorities. The military, however, arrived after the assailants fled and the church was destroyed.

Kaduna State Gov. Uba Sani vowed to bring the assailants to justice.

Rev. John Joseph Hayab, chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) Kaduna State Chapter, issued a statement on Saturday, saying “our hearts are filled with pains” over the incident:

“It is no longer news that armed men invaded a Catholic Church Parish Headquarters located at Fadan Kamantan community and the criminals targeted the Parish Priest’s residence … the Parish Priest, Rev. Fr. Emmanuel Okolo who also doubles as the Chancellor of the Catholic Diocese of Kafanchan, and his assistant were able to escape out of the house before the criminals set the entire Rectory ablaze burning to death a Seminarian Bro. Naam Ngofe Danladi who is just about completing his training into the Catholic Priesthood.

"What is disheartening about this particular attack is the fact that the place of attack is just by the Kaduna – Kafanchan Major highway with a military checkpoint not far from the Parish. The Parish is located at the heart of Kamantan town, and the attack was carried out at about 8:00 p.m. This causes us to wonder some more, ‘Where is the hope, how much more terrible could the situation get?’

“We appreciate the willingness of the present administration to proffer practical, real and lasting solutions to the security challenge in Kaduna State as made visible by the ongoing recruitment process of over 7,000 men and women into the Kaduna State Vigilante Services (KADVIS).

“In the light of sharing in the faith of the perceived goodwill of the present administration in Kaduna State, we invite the Governor of Kaduna State and all relevant stakeholders to immediately swing into action and ensure that those responsible for the Kamantan evil night are apprehended and made to face the law.

“Security is everyone’s business; it is disappointing that this kind of unholy activity could be recorded at the heart of the Fadan Kamantan community, and the criminals will operate unchallenged. It is a slap to the security forces within that jurisdiction, it is a slap to the religious leaders, traditional and community leaders."

For interviews, please contact: press@persecution.org.