Are Christians Safe in Muslim Lands? Honestly?

[TruthSeeker]

10 people hurt in Xmas blast inside Sulu chapel
12/25/2010 (Update 3 - 6:30 p.m.) The casualty toll in the Christmas Day explosion inside a Roman Catholic chapel in Jolo, Sulu climbed to ten late Saturday as investigators continued to trace the assailants responsible for the attack. Among the wounded was nine-year-old Anna Marie Girasul.

Senior Superintendent Agrimero Cruz, spokesman of the Philippine National Police (PNP), said three more wounded individuals were identified. They were newly ordained Catholic priest Rev. Ricky Bacoldol, Dr. Marian Lao, and Joshua Quibang, 16.

Earlier in the day, six other injured church-goers were identified as Emma Tan, 29, of Katanyagan Village; Antonette Quiñones, 30; Noel Indana, 33, of Camp Asturias; Johnny Chang, 50; Trishalan Carlos, 22; and Rochelle Ann Carlos, 21.

The explosion happened at about 7 a.m. inside the Asturias Evangelical Chapel in a police camp in Barangay Asturias. The chapel is located some 500 meters from the Sulu Provincial Police Headquarters.

Rev. Romeo Villanueva, 72, was in the middle of reading his Christmas message during the Mass when the explosion ripped through the right side of the chapel's roof.

“I was reading the Gospel. I was not yet finished when there was a loud explosion," Villanueva told The Associated Press by telephone.

He said the younger priest who was assisting him, Rev. Bacoldol, was thrown off his feet by the blast and suffered a slight leg injury.

Improvised explosive device

There were around 100 people inside the chapel when the incident happened, authorities said.

Four of the ten injured people were rushed to the Sulu Provincial Hospital, while the rest were brought to other hospitals.

Investigators said the blast, which damaged the chapel's ceiling and altar, was caused by an improvised explosive device (IED) although they have not identified possible suspects as of posting time.

Authorities said they are trying to figure out how the bomber managed to sneak in the IED despite the security personnel inside the church, who were deployed since Thursday upon the request of Fr. Ramin Hankin.

Cruz said members of the PNP Special Action Forces were already manning the gate of the chapel.

Recovered from the crime site were materials believed to have been used for the attack, including parts of a cell phone that could have detonated the device and a black plastic bag that served as a container of the ingredients used to make the IED.

The recovered items had already been brought to the PNP's Western Mindanao Regional Crime Laboratory in Zamboanga City.

‘Insensitive, barbaric act’

The PNP has already condemned the incident, calling it “insensitive and barbaric."

“It came like a thief in the night, sowing terror and grief to the worshipers who were celebrating the birth of Jesus," Cruz said.

The police spokesman said PNP investigators would “leave no stones unturned" to determine who were behind the holiday attack.

“Let this incident be a cue to all the faithful, whether Christians or Muslims, or other religions to condemn this and similar dastardly attacks on helpless citizens," he said. — Mark Merueñas with AP reports, MRT/LBG/JV, GMANews.TV

 

[silent hill]

^^ brother please also go to the threads where the topic is regarding the safety of muslims in the western christian lands

 

[TruthSeeker]

^^ brother please also go to the threads where the topic is regarding the safety of muslims in the western christian lands

Muslims are, today in the 21st century (of the Christian era) an order of magnitude safer in "Christian" lands than the reverse. In fact, as many have pointed out here, Muslims are even safer in "Christian" lands than they are in Muslim lands!

 

[silent hill]

Muslims are, today in the 21st century (of the Christian era) an order of magnitude safer in "Christian" lands than the reverse. In fact, as many have pointed out here, Muslims are even safer in "Christian" lands than they are in Muslim lands!

how can you say muslims are more safer in christian lands, they are not even safer in their own lands from the crusaders, dont u agree???

i just noticed the news of racist attacks on indian minority in australia, but you dont notice racist attack of muslims on hindus or western tourists in their lands like dubai, turkey, pakistan etc

 

[TruthSeeker]

they are not even safer in their own lands from the crusaders, dont u agree???

When you use words like "crusaders" you show that you are either ignorant or are purposefully making outlandish and unfair comparisons. There haven't been any "crusaders" in Muslim lands for 700 years.

 

[TechLahore]

Please jump to 1:40

YouTube - Bush Talks about Crusade on Sep 16-2001

I know Bush was a complete idiot and didn't know what he was saying (hopefully) but when the US Pres uses words like these you can understand how there might be a "misperception", shall we say....

 

[TruthSeeker]

Please jump to 1:40

YouTube - Bush Talks about Crusade on Sep 16-2001

More anti-Bush, anti-Western propaganda. He was not using the word as Jihadi apologists use it. And it doesn't change the facts of the situation of Christian minorities in Muslim lands. No amount of your misdirection can paper over that reality.

 

[TechLahore]

Wow you are getting so defensive... if it is "anti west" propaganda, then it is your own President who is engaged in it. This is an unedited speech given by Mr. Bush himself.

As for the treatment of muslims or christians etc. christians were doing great in Iraq until Mr. Bush invaded. Wasn't Tariq Aziz, the Prime Minister, a Christian himself? What do you think about the US role in destabilizing Iraq and making it unsafe for all its citizens, including Shias, Sunnis, Christians and whoever lives in that unfortunate country.

 

[Kambojaric]

Are Muslims Safe in Christian Lands????

Sebrenica?

Whats the point in generalising? Yes it may be unsafe in some muslim countries to be christian as it may be unsafe in some christian countries to be muslim. Since Iraq has been mentioned i might add before the US fucked up the country, christians were relatively safe there. There are examples of Iraqi Christians going far e.g. Tariq Aziz, Iraqi Foreign Minister for 8 years from 83 to 91.

 

[BATMAN]

Two pastors were tortured and arrested by Hindu radicals

YouTube - India: Woman Paraded Naked in Streets

 

[Airboss]

The # 2 in Saddam Regime, namely Tariq Aziz was a coptic christian actually..........
In passing I would like to mention that the catholic Skool my olders cousins went to in pakistan; if during assembly they did not recite the christian prayer that said"our lord J..C"
they used to get lashes on our hand at 07:30 am in cold winters! LOL....Thats was in lahore, pakistan BTW.

You might want to get your facts right before you start writing BS.

Tariq Azis is a Chaldean Christian & Not a Coptic Christian.

Coptic Christians are in Egypt.

Also I don't buy your story about your cousins school making them recite a Christian prayer.

 

[BATMAN]

I studied at catholic school and for 11 years every morning we recited traditional Christian prayers and jingles every day in morning assembly before starting studies.
In every break a suzuki van full of short stories from bible use to distribute it to us and we use to take those books as a free story but what is wrong in praying in English or reading Bible?

 

[Developereo]

Let's focus on one Muslim land, Pakistan.

There are crimes against Christians, but they are no more significant than crimes in the wider community. It's a reflection on lax law enforcement, not a nationwide hate campaign.

- Do we have laws banning construction of church towers? No!
- Do we have laws banning Christian nuns from wearing their habit in public? No!
- Do we restrict Christians from wearing a cross pendant in school? No!
- Does the mainstream media highlight every crime by any Christian? No!
- Does the mainstream media whip up a hate campaign when a new church is proposed? No!
- Do the President and all major politicans personally get involved and vow maximum punishment when Christians commit crimes against Muslims? No!
- Do random Christians get whisked off to jail in the name of 'national security' so authorities can pat themselves on the back for protecting the nation? No!

So, in conclusion, I would say that most Christians are doing quite well in Pakistan.

 

[TruthSeeker]

Egypt: 7 Die in Coptic Church Explosion

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS, December 31, 2010

An explosion went off in front of a Coptic Christian church as worshipers emerged from a New Year’s Mass in the northern port city of Alexandria early Saturday, killing at least 7 people and wounding 24, officials said. After the blast, enraged Christians emerging from the church clashed with police officers and stormed a nearby mosque, prompting fights and volleys of stone throwing with Muslims, the police and witnesses said — a sign of the sectarian anger that has been arising with greater frequency in Egypt. Nearly 1,000 Christians were at the Mass at the Saints Church, said Father Mena Adel. The service had just ended, and worshipers were leaving the building when the blast went off, about a half hour after midnight.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/01/world/middleeast/01briefs-EGYPT.html

 

[TruthSeeker]

A doorbell rings, a new attack on Iraqi Christians

(AP) – 9 hours ago

BAGHDAD (AP) — The latest bloody attack on Iraq's Christians was brutal in its simplicity. Militants left a bomb on the doorstep of the home of an elderly Christian couple and rang the doorbell.

When Fawzi Rahim, 76, and his 78-year-old wife Janet Mekha answered the doorbell Thursday night, the bomb exploded, killing them, Mekha's brother told The Associated Press on Friday. Three other people, apparently passers-by, were wounded.

"When I went there, I found both of them cut to pieces near the gate of their house," said the brother, Falah al-Tabbakh, 47, who had been at a funeral nearby in the eastern Baghdad district of Ghadir. He rushed to his sister's house after neighbors called him, and they told him what happened, he said.

The bombing was among a string of seemingly coordinated attacks Thursday evening that targeted at least seven Christian homes in various parts of Baghdad that wounded at least 13 other people, a week after al-Qaida-linked militants renewed their threats to attack Iraq's Christians.

The attacks are the latest since an Oct. 31 siege of a Baghdad church by al-Qaida killed 68 worshippers, terrifying the minority community, whose numbers have already fallen dramatically in the past seven years of violence in Iraq.

The repeated attacks have infuriated many Christians who question why the government seems unable to protect them despite its repeated promises since the church siege to do so.

"The Christians in Iraq are always targeted because they do not have militias and they do not believe in the power of weapons," said Father Nadhir Dakko, a priest at St. George Chaldean Church, who performed the funeral service for the slain couple.

Speaking to reporters after the service, Dakko railed against what he called the government's inability to "establish peace and security" for all Iraqis, Muslim and Christian. All Iraqis are suffering, he said, but the situation is harder for Christians because they are a minority.

"Iraq is bleeding every day," he said.

The government, while calling on Christians not to flee Iraq, has beefed up security around churches and dispatched extra police patrols in Christian neighborhoods. They've placed concrete blast walls around the Our Lady of Salvation church where the siege occurred.

Still, authorities and Christian leaders have acknowledged that security forces cannot protect every single house, and asked Christians to be vigilant. Violence has gone down across the country the past two years, but the government still struggles to protect even its own police forces.

Iraq's violence has struck all its various religious groups, and hundreds of thousands have fled the country since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion. But the ranks of Christians have been particularly depleted, in part because their numbers were not large to begin with — estimated at 1.4 million before the war. Now an estimated 400,000 to 600,000 Christians are left, according to a recent U.S. State Department report.

The Ghadir district where the elderly couple were killed shows the signs of the flight. In the past its population was predominantly Christian, with some Sunni Muslims. Both communities have fled in large numbers since 2003, and many houses have since been bought by Shiites from the nearby Shiite stronghold of Sadr City.

Al-Tabbakh said his sister's children had left Iraq even before 2003, but that his sister and her husbands were holdouts, determined to stay in their homes.

"Today, we stand next to two martyrs whose crime was that they preferred to stay in their country," Dakko, the priest, told the congregation in the funeral service.

Christians have been targeted in the past. But the October church siege was the deadliest ever, and it was followed by several dire warnings from al-Qaida's branch in Iraq that it intends to directly target the community. That prompted several thousand Christians to flee Baghdad for the relative safety of the Kurdish-run north in the past two months.

Father Mukhlis, a priest at Our Lady of Salvation church, the target of the October siege, said as many as 12 violent incidents occurred against Christian homes across the capital Thursday night.

Police officials confirmed seven attacks against Christian homes. They and hospital officials confirmed the deaths of Rahim and Mekha and 13 wounded in the various attacks. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

In the other attacks Thursday night, four bombings targeting Christians wounded six people. A stun grenade landed inside a Christian house in the Dora district in southern Baghdad, injuring three others, and a rocket hit a Christian home in downtown Baghdad, wounding one person.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but such attacks have generally been the work of Sunni militants linked to al-Qaida.

Deputy interior minister, Maj. Gen. Ahmed Abu Ragif, blamed Thursday's attacks on "terrorists who expressed hatred of Iraq in general and of the Christians in particular," Ragif said. The assailants' aim was to "prevent our Christian brothers to celebrate the New Year," he added.

At the Our Lady of Salvation church, both Christians and Muslims gathered Friday morning in a show of solidarity and to see a play performed by Iraqi actors about a woman whose son is killed in the church siege.

One Muslim woman said she wanted to demonstrate to the Christian community that they are not alone.

"What has happened in this church was so painful to all of us. We wish that we died instead of them. Those who plan to steal Iraq won't succeed because we all share joy and sadness together," said Hiba Shihab.

The Associated Press: A doorbell rings, a new attack on Iraqi Christians