MidnightWatcher's Blogspot

Here’s an update on this story (that has absolutely nothing to do with Islam) …

• Flashback: ISIS: The Spread Of Islam Requires Body Parts And Chunks Of Flesh
• Flashback: ISIS Releases Video Of Mass Killings, Supporters Cheer As ‘Most Beautiful’
• Flashback: Islam: The Greatest Murder Machine In History, ‘The Enormity Of The Slaughters … Are So Far Beyond Comprehension That Even Honest Historians Overlook The Scale’

Qur’an Sura 48:29, “Mohammed is [Allah’s] apostle. Those who follow him are ruthless to the unbelievers but merciful to one another.”

By Paul McGeough, The Sydney Morning Herald – “It’s a ‘brief’ war, which is to say that media reports on the brutal, dehumanising violence as Boko Haram consolidates its hold on a nation-sized slice of Nigeria invariably are ‘briefs’ because it is being fought in a ‘too’ area – too dangerous, too remote, too far down any list of global priorities.

But satellite images released by London-based human rights group Amnesty International add weight to troubling speculation that Boko Haram, the African iteration of the so-called Islamic State which continues to run amok in Syria and Iraq, has just concluded its worst atrocity.

‘These detailed images show devastation of catastrophic proportions in two towns, one of which was almost wiped off the map in the space of four days,’ said Daniel Eyre, Nigeria researcher for Amnesty. ‘Of all Boko Haram’s assaults … this is the largest and most destructive yet. It represents a deliberate attack on civilians whose homes, clinics and schools are now burnt-out ruins.’

Nigerian authorities have played down an estimated death toll of as many as 2000 villagers, who are said to have been gunned down as they attempted to escape on foot or were incinerated while hiding in their homes, which were torched. But Amnesty describes the satellite imagery as ‘indisputable and shocking’ evidence of the scale of attacks, the extent of which previously had to be extrapolated from witness accounts given over the phone.

By Amnesty’s count, more than 3700 structures were damaged or destroyed. In Doron Baga, a town less than 4 square kilometres in size, about 3100 structures appear to be reduced to cinders or damaged; in nearby Baga, 2 square kilometres, the count is about 620.

Eyre explains another dramatic element in the images: ‘Many of the wooden fishing boats along the shoreline [of Lake Chad], visible in the image taken on January 2, are no longer present in the January 7 image, tallying with eyewitness testimony that desperate residents fled by boat.’

Tactically, Boko Haram doubled-down after these attacks in Baga district, introducing a horrific new weapon to the conflict – child suicide bombers, as young as 10 and 15.

‘I looked up and saw body parts everywhere, then the body of a little girl cut in two,’ a man who identified himself as Ibrahim Abu told reporters, in the wake of an explosion near an open-air cafe where he sat with friends in a market at Potiskum, south-west of Baga…

A man in his 50s told Amnesty: ‘They killed so many people – I saw maybe around 100 killed at that time in Baga. I ran into the bush – as we were running, they were shooting and killing …’

Another man described his own flight in fear: ‘For five kilometres, I kept standing on dead bodies …’

A woman said: ‘I don’t know how many, but there were bodies everywhere we looked.'” Read more.

Flashback: Nigeria: Boko Haram: Our Goal Is To Eliminate Followers Of Christ – “Terrorist organisation Boko Haram has issued a statement making clear that its goal is to eliminate followers of Christ from Nigeria and establish an Islamic state. ‘The Nigerian state and Christians are our enemies and we will be launching attacks on the Nigerian state and its security apparatus as well as churches until we achieve our goal of establishing an Islamic state in place of the secular state … We are responsible for the suicide attack on a church in Jos and also another attack on another church in Biu,’ a spokesman for the group, Abul Qaqa, is said to have told reporters in the northeastern city of Maiduguri over the phone.” Read more.

Flashback: Nigeria’s Christian President Warns That The Current Massacre Of Christians Means The End Times Is Upon Us – “In another deadly move portraying Nigeria’s Borno state as a killing field for Nigerian Christians, attackers have stormed a church service in Kiyak village in the outskirts of Chibok, killing another set of 15 worshippers. It was the second major killing of Christians in the Chibok area. Early in December, 10 Christians were also killed in the area… News of the killings emerged after President Goodluck Jonathan questioned whether deadly Islamist attacks on churches in his country and other violence worldwide could be signs of coming ‘end times’… The attack followed another gruesome killing Friday that saw attackers slit the throats of 15 Christians in a pre-dawn raid in Musari …” Read more.