Persecution of Christians in Syria: President Trump recently pledged $50 million in emergency aid for Syrian Christians, and shortly after that, several world leaders met to begin working toward an international alliance of governments to support persecuted Christians, specifically in Syria. The situation there is urgent. The Order of Saint Andrew the Apostle, Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, hopes that the international community will quickly begin to act in order to provide genuine, tangible help for the Christians of Syria and the entire Middle East.
For more ChristianPersecution.com coverage of the persecution of Christians in Syria, see here.
ISIS kills 9, injures 71 in Syrian Christian attacks,” by Diana Chandler, Baptist Press, November 12, 2019:
SYRIA, (BP) — The Islamic State (ISIS) is claiming responsibility for two attacks on Christians in northeast Syria that killed nine and wounded 71, as Christians continue to flee villages just outside a proposed safe zone at the Syria-Turkey border.
An Armenian priest and his father were killed and a deacon was wounded in a car bomb attack as they drove from Qamishli in northeast Syria Monday (Nov. 11), persecution watchdog International Christian Concern (ICC) and others reported. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights confirmed the attack and obtained video footage, ICC said.
“Two Christian priests were killed today; ISIS shot them down,” ICC quoted a headline in the ISIS official Amaq news outlet.
Seven died and 70 were wounded in three car bomb explosions Monday near the Chaldean church in Qamishli, with ISIS also claiming responsibility, according to ICC and Asia News.
“Today’s violence in northern Syria and the targeting of Armenian leadership is a tragedy that deeply wounds the region’s entire Christian community,” Claire Evans, ICC regional manager for the Middle East, said Monday in a press release.
“Christians have long warned that ISIS will seek every opportunity to continue its genocide against religious minorities,” Evans said. “Meanwhile, Turkey’s actions in the area have generated an environment of instability. Armenian Christians, whose ancestors were killed in Turkey’s genocide, find themselves caught between violent actors across all of Syria.”
Hovsep Petoyan, pastor of the Armenian Catholic Community of Qamishli, Syria, was among nine killed when the Islamic State marked its first attacks against Christians in northeast Syria after the terrorists were declared officially defeated in March.
Monday’s car bombs are considered a clear signal that ISIS again is targeting Christians after the U.S. declared in March that ISIS was defeated in the region. The attacks are also considered retaliation for the October killing of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi….
