MidnightWatcher – Prophecy in Motion

Pakistani Muslims Beat and Burn Christian Pastor For Preaching ... To Christians

By JRS Gill, Pakistan Christian Post – “No one really knows the size of Pakistan’s Christian minority, nor of the entire population. The most recent census — conducted in 1981 — gave a rough count of 84 million people of whom not quite a million were Christian. The unofficial 1990 estimate is 108 million, with an explosive birth-rate of nearly 4 percent. That could soon mean up to 2 million Christians in this land of Islam.

The data published by the Pakistani government this January shows that the number of Christians in the country is approximately 3, 8 million. Their condition today can be described as catastrophic. In 1986, a law on blasphemy was adopted in Pakistan to become a tool for persecuting religious minorities. This law is often used to squaring personal accounts and to seize other people’s property. This law has become a tool for the tough persecution of religious minorities, especially Christians. Last year, at least 161 people were sentenced under the law of ‘blasphemy’ in Pakistan. Nine people accused of ‘blasphemy’ and ‘outrage against Islam’ were executed extra judicially. Even Muslim legal scholars admit that 95% of all the accusations of ‘blasphemy’ are false.

Christians are deprived of their rights under this law because a Muslim can report an outrage against Islam without providing witnesses or proof. The law on ‘blasphemy’ demands that the accused should be immediately sentenced. Recently the death sentence for Asia Bibi – who, asked about her faith, replied that she was a Christian and was accused of ‘blasphemy’ – was reconfirmed. As of February 1, 2012, over 580 000 people in 100 countries signed an appeal to the Pakistani government to release Asia Bibi. At present, her health is in critical condition.

A young mother has been falsely accused of ‘blaspheming’ Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, because she rebuffed attempts by relatives who had converted to Islam to force her to renounce her Christian faith, family members said.” Read more.

Your Jewish News – “A Muslim mob has set ablaze a Catholic church frequented by Southern Sudanese in the capital Khartoum, witnesses and media reports said on Sunday.

The church in Khartoum’s Al-Jiraif district was built on a disputed plot of land but the Saturday night incident appeared to be part of the fallout from ongoing hostilities between Sudan and South Sudan over control of an oil town on their ill-defined border.

Sudan and South Sudan have been drawing closer to a full scale war in recent months over the unresolved issues of sharing oil revenues and a disputed border.

Last week, South Sudanese troops seized Heglig, which the southerners call Panthou, sending Sudanese troops fleeing. The Khartoum government later claimed to have regained the town.

The witnesses and several newspapers said a mob of several hundreds shouting insults at southerners torched the church. Fire engines could not put out the fire, they added.

One newspaper, Al-Sahafah, said the church was part of a complex that included a school and dormitories. Ethiopian refugees living in the Sudanese capital also used the church.” Read more.

Daniel 11:43, “He will gain control of the treasures of gold and silver and all the riches of Egypt, with the Libyans and Nubians in submission.”

Compass Direct News – “JUBA, South Sudan, April 19 (CDN) — As tensions between Sudan and South Sudan turn into military combat on the border, predominantly Christian citizens of southern origin trapped in Sudan fear the Islamic government and Muslims in general will turn on them, sources told Compass.

Officially foreigners though many of the half million southern Sudanese in Sudan have never lived anywhere else, the ethnic southerners have been granted another 30 days as of April 8 to register or leave the country. But the government has forbidden hundreds of ethnic southerners from boarding planes for Juba, saying they require documents from the southern capital in order to leave.

‘They closed all ways in front of us in order to prevent us from travel to our country,’ said one church leader.

South Sudanese Christians were surprised to learn that all flights and land routes to South Sudan were closed to them on April 9, with no information forthcoming on when they would be allowed to leave, sources said. The Sudanese government last week declared it was in a state of war with South Sudan, adding to the fears of the trapped southern Sudanese.

Church leaders who wish to remain in the north said they have not been provided enough information on how to register for legal status. And many South Sudanese fear that registering will only help officials to monitor their movements.” Read more.

“Jordan (MNN) ― Refugees who have fled to Jordan from Syria are telling mission leaders supported by Christian Aid Mission about deliberate, new persecution from the ‘Arab Spring’ insurgents who are seeking to overthrow the brutal Assad regime in Damascus.

Nearly 100,000 Christians so far have fled from Homs and other cities being targeted by government forces, but it is no longer just to escape the crossfire. Now, more reports are revealing that a new wave of persecution is deliberate and growing. As a result, Virginia-based Christian Aid Mission is sending additional aid to help the growing numbers of refugees which have fled to Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey.

‘It is over; we can’t get back what we lost,’ said one discouraged Christian refugee here in Jordan. ‘It will never be the same anymore for me or my family. We’ve lost hope.’ He said he had to flee with his family at night, because anti-Christian persecution in Syria is becoming a steadily growing reality.

‘I had my own business. I ran a supermarket, and we were financially stable. Unfortunately, that’s not the case anymore. Our dreams vanished when a group of terrorists threatened to kill my family, burn our house, and set fire to the supermarket if I didn’t pay them $7,000.

‘I paid the amount, hoping that they would leave us alone, but they did not. Instead, they kidnapped me for a whole week. They only let me go on one condition: that each month I would pay them the same amount.

‘What do you think I could do? I fled. I packed our stuff, taking only the basics. I took my family and came to Jordan. My son, Omar, has one year left to finish his bachelor’s degree, but now his dreams have vanished as well. I used to be a business owner…but now I am a laborer who can hardly provide the day-to-day basics for my family.’

Meanwhile, indigenous missionaries supported by Christian Aid are standing in the gap to help by visiting Syrian refugees in northern Jordan, sometimes every day. Like the grocer, they also have left everything. Many have lost sons and other family members since the fighting began.

Another older woman told native missionaries how close death is for Syrian Christians, ‘I was talking with friends next to our building when suddenly, from every direction, we heard gun shots. At the same moment, I watched my friends fall dead in front of me. I lost my friends in one second. I was also hit by a bullet. It fragmented my knee, and now I can’t walk normally.’

‘Only three weeks ago, two car bombs detonated in the middle of a Christian neighborhood in Syria, close to the Syrian Air Intelligence building. The explosions caused massive damage, turning walls to rubble.'” Read more.

“The Jammu and Kashmir Police has arrested a Christian couple on charges of ‘promoting enmity’ while they were allegedly distributing pamphlets about Christianity in the border township of Bandipora in north Kashmir.

The police said the couple from Delhi, along with a local girl, was distributing pamphlets in the Bandipora market when people raised a hue and cry and called the police. Sensing trouble, the police seized the pamphlets and immediately whisked them away for sustained questioning.

The police later registered a case under section 153A Ranbir Penal Code (promoting enmity between groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, etc) at the Bandipora police station. Under this section, the law prescribes imprisonment of up to three years, or with fine, or with both. In case of an offence relating to religion, the punishment could extend to five years.

‘We have arrested the duo. The woman was seen distributing pamphlets in the market place where she had gone shopping,’ said Bashir Ahmad Khan, superintendent of police, Bandipora district.

The couple and the girl have been detained and questioned in the police station. Police sources said during questioning, they said they were not doing anything unconstitutional or illegal in the town.

The police said they were arrested to avoid any law and order breakdown in the area. ‘There was lot of hue and cry which could have created law and order problem in the area. Therefore we took them into custody as a preventive measure to avoid any crisis in the district,’ said a police official.

The arrest comes six months after the police arrested a Christian priest in Srinagar in November last year.” Read more.

Compass Direct News – “After a memorial service for three Christians who were murdered in Malatya, Turkey five years ago today, an Istanbul pastor who was attacked over Easter weekend said he’s experienced hostility from Muslims nearly all his life.

Semir Serkek, 58, pastor of Grace Church in Istanbul’s Bahcelievler district, said he personally knew Turkish converts to Christianity Necati Aydin and Ugur Yuksel and German Christian Tilmann Geske, who were brutally murdered by five young men in the southeastern city of Malatya on April 18, 2007.

‘I looked at their fate with some envy, because they were young and I am old, but they left – I have gone through many things,’ he said. ‘But they were so young, so young.’

On a day when memorial services were held for the three slain Christians in Malatya, Izmir and Elazig as well as the ones Serkek attended at both the Kozyatag Cultural Center and Gedikpasha Church in Istanbul, the pastor said the physical violence on him the evening (April 7) before Easter Sunday surprised him.

‘I’ve been verbally abused for being a Christian many times, but this was the first time I was hit, so this was surprising and made me sad,’ Serkek said.

Serkek was alone at Grace Church finishing preparations for the next day’s Easter celebration when at around 9 p.m. he heard frantic pounding at the door, he said. Opening it, he found four young men in their late teens who claimed they had questions and demanded to enter.

The men, whom Serkek said appeared to be about 18 years old, were agitated, and when he refused to let them in they used insulting language, he said. They threatened to kill him if he didn’t recite the Islamic testimony of faith.

‘This made me uneasy, and I told them that this was a church and they should come back in the morning,’ Serkek told Compass. ‘‘This is a Muslim neighborhood, what business does a church have here?’ they asked me, and told me again and again that if I didn’t accept the final religion I would die.'” Read more.

“The United States has warned its citizens in Nigeria that the radical Islamist sect Boko Haram may be planning attacks in the capital, Abuja.

The U.S. embassy issued an emergency message saying attacks could target hotels used by Westerners, but that the timing was unknown.

The alert said the Nigerian government was aware of the threat and ‘actively implementing security measures.’

The embassy cautioned citizens to be especially aware of their security near Nigerian government facilities, diplomatic missions, large gathering places, markets and places of worship.” Read more.

Viewer Discretion Advised

By Gary Lane, CBN – “ISTANBUL, Turkey — On April 18, 2007, three Christians were bound to their chairs, tortured, and stabbed repeatedly at a Bible print shop in Malatya — their throats slit.

Five years have now passed since the Malatya murders, an incident that was perhaps the most tragic and brutal murder of Christians in modern-day Turkey.

Today, believers are facing increased persecution and the country is gradually moving away from secularism.

‘You see everyday is April 18. Everyday I have to live without him,’ widow Susanne Geske told CBN News on the one year anniversary of her husband’s murder.

Five suspects went on trial for killing the men, but there is still no conviction…

Church attendance dropped immediately after the Malatya incident. And although attendance is now growing again, so are the number of attacks against Christians.

The Protestant churches of Turkey documented 12 attacks in 2011. This included the beating of Christians for sharing their faith with Muslims.

No one has been prosecuted for any of these crimes, putting Turkey on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom’s list of ‘countries of particular concern’ (CPC) for the first time.

Nina Shea, one of the commissioners supporting that move, said the Turkish government is suppressing Christian worship, and as a result Christian numbers are dwindling.

‘They comprise 0.15 percent of the entire population of Turkey,’ Shea said. ‘They are very frail, and we’re going to see them vanish in our lifetime if Turkey doesn’t lift its dense web of regulations and give them religious freedom.’

Turkey’s ambassador in Washington called the CPC designation ‘politically motivated.’

Middle East analyst Walid Phares is not surprised by the persecution of Christians in Turkey. He said Prime Minister Erdogan has been shifting away from a pro-NATO, pro-Western position to a ‘pro-Islamists, more anti-Israel and slightly anti-Western attitude.'” Read more.