SUMMER 2007 D

GREEK MELKITE CHURCH BAGHDAD

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GREEK MELKITE CHURCH BAGHDAD

Christians in Irak 2007
Baghdad. Already during the year 2006 a district of Baghdad, called Daura, about 15 Km from the center of the city has been the scene of bombing and harassing the Christian population. Since the sixties Daura was a district populated by Christians, esp. Assyrians. The government had granted a plot to the Chaldean community, where a church and monastery were build, in expectation of the christians to come there. The Chaldean seminary, and afterwards, the Babel-faculty for Philosophy and Theology was erected there. With the time passing, the place was invaded by moslim people who lived in peace with their Christian neighbours. But after the invasion, things changed here like everywhere in the country. In 2006 the Assyrian church was completely ruined by explosives, and the Chaldean church (The two Apostles) was attacked. Several priests were kidnapped, and christians began to leave the unsafe place. In 2007 the Chaldean church (St.John the Baptist) was threaten, the pictures and the cross should be removed and the priest had to leave. Gradually, during the year, Christians were urged to leave their houses, without taking anything with them. Or they had to become moslim, or pay an great sum of money, or to give some of their daughters to the “Amir”. About 250 families were thus obliged to leave their houses. They live now somewhere with their relatives, or in very bad conditions. Some could go to their villages in the North, or others left for Syria. In the city of Baghdad itself, already several churches had been damaged by explosives, and other districts (seyidiya,Hay el'adel,beyya,neyriya, karada, mu'almin, hay eljami'a) underwent the same fate as Daura. Several hundreds had to leave their homes. 5 priests were kidnapped. Kerada, a Christian district, was announced in TV, as a place where Christians had to leave. Christian doctors and teachers were kidnapped. One morning, four months ago, 5 christian girls went to the university by taxi and never returned. No one can defend their lives or their rights. The radical leaders proclaim that one who kills a Christian will be blessed in heaven, and that all their houses and possessions will fall free in the hands of their adepts. Thousands left the city, as if it were the end of Christianity, in a country were they lived 630 years before the appearance of Islam. What concerns the Greek Catholic: several families had to leave the houses, and live now with difficulty in unhealthy conditions. Others remained, but they are afraid that they will be driven out or killed. A deacon with his family, and old sick mother, was threaten to death, and had to leave the house, after he was hurt and flagellated with deep wounds on his back.
In Mosul the harassing of the Christians is even more severe. Shops had to be closed down, some youngsters were shot in the streets, and others kidnapped. Last August, a young Chaldean priest, a teacher in the Babel college, was shot in the streets of Mosul when he left the church after the evening prayer, together with 3 deacons and a girl, who survived to relate the killing.

The villages in the plain between Mosul and the mountains, are relatively quite for the moment, but they have to protect themselves with guards and defences. In the Kurdish region, the situation is safe, and the Christian villages are rebuild with their churches, and construction of houses is going on in a fast tempo, but real work is lacking and no real future is ahead. Nobody knows what tomorrow will bring. But for the moment they enjoy there some peace and safety.

Actual situation of the Christians in Iraq