Over the past few days, a literal genocide has taken place in Syria. You may not have heard about it in the mainstream media, but Islamic jihadists have slaughtered over 1,000 people—including hundreds of Christians.
These terrorists, who are an offshoot of Al Qaeda and now control the Syrian government, have rounded up and slaughtered entire families in northwestern Syria. They are specifically targeting religious minorities, and Syria’s ancient Christian community is among those in their crosshairs.
These jihadis overthrew Bashar al-Assad and seized power in Syria back in December. Their leader, Mohammad al-Julani, has made quite a show of wearing a suit and tie and declaring that he’s now “moderate.” He’s even using a new name, Ahmed al-Sharaa.
European governments have been all too willing to go along with the charade, and now, al-Julani has revealed his true face. His shock troops have spent the past few days gleefully murdering and maiming civilians.
Folks, once again, our brothers and sisters in Christ are being violently persecuted in the birthplace of the faith: the Middle East. Pray for them, and pray that the world puts the same pressure on the jihadis that it shamefully does on the nation of Israel.
Speaking of the Jewish State, the world should be thanking Israel right now for destroying Assad’s military arsenal so that it would not fall into the hands of this new jihadi regime in Syria. The massacres we’ve seen these past few days would have been much, much worse if Israel had not taken preventive action. Could you imagine the jihadis with advanced weaponry?
Between the Middle East and major events here at home, we are living in momentous times.
Erick Stakelbeck is an author, analyst, host of “The Watchman” program, and the Director of Christians United for Israel’s CUFI Watchman Project.
Editor’s Note: ‘We’re coming for the Christians’
Erick Stakelbeck, in Tuesday’s episode of the Watchman Newscast, highlighted the extreme situation faced by Christians under the new Jihadist regime in Syria.
“Christian persecution right now is at levels higher than we’ve seen probably since the early Church, the time during the Acts of the Apostles and afterward under the Roman Empire; that’s how bad it is now globally,” Stakelbeck underscored.
The violent footage emerging from Syria is almost beyond words, he noted.
“It’s too disturbing to even describe,” Stakelbeck lamented. “This is happening before our very eyes. That old radical Islamist slogan, I guess you could call it, ‘First the Saturday people—the Jews, then the Sunday people—the Christians,’ is playing out right now in real-time. It’s happening in Syria.”
“We’ve seen open statements of these jihadis marching through the streets of Northwestern Syria saying, ‘We’re coming for the Christians, and we’re going to kill them,’” he stressed. We also have videos of Christians in Syria who have masks on because they don’t want to reveal their identity, saying, ‘Please help us.’ It is a genocide. They know exactly what they’re doing.”
