MidnightWatcher – Prophecy in Motion

“Islamic militants in Nigeria gave Christians three days to leave the north following President Goodluck Jonathan’s declaration of a state of emergency in four northern states.

Boko Haram, a Taliban-inspired group that has carried out a series of raids and bombings in the north and the capital, Abuja, also said Muslims should leave the south of Africa’s top oil producer.

The group urged ‘our fellow Muslims to come back to the north because we have evidence that they would be attacked,’ Abu Qaqa, a spokesman for the group, said today in an e-mailed statement. ‘We are also giving three days ultimatum to the southerners living in northern Nigeria to move away.’

Boko Haram, which means ‘Western education is a sin,’ says it’s fighting to establish sharia law in the north. Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country of more than 160 million people, is roughly split between a mainly Muslim north and predominantly Christian south.

Qaqa said the state of emergency declared on Dec. 31 ‘was meant to attack Muslims and not to restore normalcy.’

Jonathan declared the emergency in parts of Borno, Yobe, Plateau and Niger states and set up a special counterterrorism unit within the armed forces after attacks left at least 43 people dead and 73 wounded in a Christmas day bombing of a church near Abuja.” Read more.

“(AINA) — Bishop Kyrillos, the Coptic Orthodox bishop of Nag Hammadi, received last week several threats of attacks to be carried out on churches in Nag Hammadi, either on New Year’s Eve or Christmas Eve on January 6. ‘I do not want another Nag Hammadi Massacre to happen again,’ he said in an interview on the Egyptian independent TV Channel Al Tahrir. On January 6, 2010 6 Copts were killed and more than 15 injured in a drive-by shooting of worshippers as they left church after celebrating the Coptic Orthodox Christmas Eve’s mass, which falls on January 6 according to the Julian Calender (AINA 1-7-2010).

The Nag Hammadi diocese will cancel all festivities for New Year’s Eve and Christmas Eve, and will end the midnight service early and not after midnight as is the norm.

‘I have reported to the police all the threats received and asked for protection. I told them that I am ready to ask our youth to organize committees to protect the churches,’ said Bishop Kyrillos. ‘Yesterday I sent an appeal to Field Marshall Tantawi, head of the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, the prime minister and the interior minister, asking them to secure Nag Hammadi, which has experienced repeated acts of violence.’

At the end of 2009, despite warnings by local church authorities in Nag Hammadi of possible violence during the Coptic festivities in January 2010, police had not bolstered security for Christmas.

Bishop Kyrillos believes that the reason behind these new threats is his unwavering support for the Copts of his diocese, who are plagued by an escalating series of kidnappings. The Bishop councils his parishioners not to give in to the kidnappers by paying the ransoms, but instead to report the crime to the police. ‘I cannot and will not stay inactive while I see the terrified Coptic families paying all what they have, and sometimes what they do not have, to get their children back.'” Read more.

Leader of Egyptian Al-Tagammu’ Party: The Christians in Egypt Have Every Right to Be Scared (Video)

By Ulma Haryanto – “The Wahid Institute, a Muslim organization that promotes tolerance, warned on Thursday that the worst was yet to come for religious freedom and tolerance if the country refused to take drastic measures.

‘We have been recording the state of religious freedom and tolerance since 2008, and I have to say that 2011 was the worst,’ said Rumadi Ahmad, program coordinator at the institute.

Aside from the increasing incidents of religious violence and intolerance — 276, up from 198 last year — the Wahid Institute also highlighted the steady growth of religious bylaws.

The institute reported that 36 regulations had been drafted or implemented that banned religious practices that were deemed as deviant from Islam, including the Ahmadiyah, required dress, respect toward holy days and obligation to pay alms.

In 2011, West Java and its districts issued 10 religious bylaws, more than any other region including Aceh, which partially adopts Shariah law.

West Java also ranked first in the number of religious violence and intolerance incidents with 160 recorded incidents this year, according to the institute.” Read more.

Flashback: Indonesia: Hundreds of Hard-Line Muslims Rally to Denounce the ‘Arrogance’ of Local Church Congregation for Continuing to Exist – “Hundreds of hard-line Muslims rallied outside the Bogor City Hall on Sunday to decry the ‘arrogance’ of a beleaguered church in the city that remains shuttered by authorities despite a Supreme Court order to open it. The protesters, from Hizbut Tahrir Indonesia and the Indonesian Muslim Communication Forum (Forkami), said they wanted to show that all Muslims were united in opposition to the presence of the GKI Yasmin Church in the city. ‘We’re here to refute the arrogance of the church, which continues to insist on setting up in the Taman Yasmin [housing complex],’ said Achmad Imam, the Forkami head in Bogor.” Read more.

Flashback: Massive Increase of Radical Islamism Spreads Throughout Indonesia, Including ‘Top-Quality’ Universities – “The suicide bombing of a church in Central Java on Sept. 25 pointed not only to a new level of attacks on religious minorities in the world’s largest Muslim-majority country but to a political bent that accommodates Islamist extremism. ‘Radicalization of Islamic teachings and understanding is a problem in Indonesia,’ admitted Dr. H. Nasaruddin Umar, director general of Islamic Community Guidance under the Ministry of Religious Affairs. ‘There’s a need to re-explain the concept of jihad.’ Pino Damayanto, aka Ahmad Yosepa Hayat, who blew himself up wounding over 20 members of the Sepenuh Injil Bethel Church (Bethel Full Gospel Church) in Solo on Sept. 25, apparently believed it was his religious duty to kill ‘the enemies of Islam,’ according to his understanding of ‘jihad.’” Read more.

Iranian Christian News Agency, Mohabat News – “These threats remind us of the bitter events of last Christmas. On 26 December, 2010 when churches all around the world were praying, worshipping and celebrating the birthday of Jesus Christ, agents of the Iranian intelligence ministry attacked a number of house churches and homes of Christians in an organized fashion. They arrested hundreds of Christian converts, some of whom are still being held in prisons of the Islamic regime.

Again this year, as Christians and churches in Iran are preparing for Christmas and New Year celebrations, it seems that the security authorities are planning to repeat their violent and inhuman acts of last year to intimidate Iranian Christians. Reports received by Mohabat News from different cities of Iran indicate that security authorities are expanding their anti-Christian projects to exercise tighter surveillance of churches in order to crack down on Christians and attempt to terrorize them.

According to news published on 23 December, 2011, Farhad Sabokroh, the pastor of the Assemblies of God church of Ahwaz, as well as his wife and the members who gathered to worship and celebrate Christmas were arrested in a pre-organized attack on the church building by security authorities of the Islamic regime of Iran. All the detainees were then transferred to an unknown location.

This time, the security agents showed no mercy even to the children of the church and raided their Sunday School class with their faces covered. The security agents were shouting on children as they cried out in fear as a result of the attack. They then transferred these children to an unknown location together with other members present at the church. A question should be asked regarding this attack and it’s this. Is attacking children, frightening and treating them like criminals another tactic of the regime to oppose the growth of Christianity? Such violent and inhuman acts will only have a negative impression on these children and form a dire and evil image of these agents of the regime on their minds.

Reports sent to Mohabat News from Tehran also say that the sale of Bibles and gospels in the AOG church of Markaz in Tehran was banned two weeks ago. This prohibition shocked visitors to the library of the church. This report also states that security authorities have ordered all books stores around Enghelab Street in Tehran to unconditionally forbid the sale of Gospels and Bibles to customers.” Read more.

“A Christian couple and their one-year-old son have been shot dead by Muslim gunmen in a ‘religious attack’ in Nigeria, police said today.

The family were in a village near the the city of Jos on Tuesday evening when the killers – believed to be Muslim herdsmen – opened fire.

Plateau state spokesman Pam Ayuba said today that assailants shot the Christian couple and their child near their home.

The attack just two days after Christmas is the latest in a spate of religious violence in the country.

In a separate attack, extremists threw a homemade bomb into an Arabic school in Nigeria’s Delta state.

Seven people were wounded in the attack, including six children who were younger than nine.

The attack at around 10 p.m. on Tuesday came two days after a series of Christmas Day bombings on churches and other targets by Islamist militant group Boko Haram claimed around 32 lives.

Boko Haram, which means ‘Western education is forbidden’, wants the imposition of strict Sharia law in Nigeria.

‘Some men driving in a Camri car threw a low capacity explosive into a building where an Arabic class was taking place,’ police spokesman for the state Charles Muka said by telephone.

‘Children aged between four and nine were taking a lesson. Six children were injured and one adult (was),’ he added.

Hundreds have died in recent years in communal attacks and reprisal attacks in the Jos area in the nation’s ‘middle belt,’ where the largely Muslim north meets the predominantly Christian south.

Around 90,000 people have so far been displaced during the clashes, according to the BBC.

Christians in northern Nigeria said yesterday they feared that a spate of Christmas Day bombings by Islamist militants could lead to a religious war in Africa’s most populous country.” Read more.