Come Out Of Her My People – 3,000 Christians Reportedly Flee Iraq City Amid Persecution
Some 3,000 Christians have fled (Mosul) over the past week alone in a “major displacement,” said Duraid Mohammed Kashmoula, the governor of northern Iraq’s Ninevah province. He said most have left for churches, monasteries and the homes of relatives in nearby Christian villages and towns. “The Christians were subjected to abduction attempts and paid ransom, but now they are subjected to a killing campaign,” Kashmoula said, adding he believed “al-Qaida” elements were to blame and called for a renewed drive to root them out. Political and religious leaders interviewed said the change in tactics may reflect a desire on the part of extremists to forcibly evict all Christians from Iraq’s third largest city. (Source)
According other reports, it isn’t only so-called extremists who are to blame for the forced, violent ousting of Christians… it appears Iraq security forces are also taking part for political reasons. Here are some sources:
- Assyrian Christians – members of a Church so ancient that it still speaks Aramaic, the language of Jesus Christ – will demonstrate outside the Iraqi embassy in London tomorrow (Sunday) against a sneaky change to the law of Iraq that will hasten their extinction. (UK Telegraph)
- “I can’t accuse anyone (in particular), but of course they are forces with badges in their pockets, walking the streets — no one stops them — knocking on the doors of Christians.” (Reuters)
- Now some estimate that more than half of Iraq’s Christians have fled. White believes that the Christian community is about a quarter of the estimated 800,000. “It isn’t easy for these people to leave,” he said. “They have no representation…. We need the Christian world to do something about it.” (Kansas City Star)
- [Background/History] Christians have inhabited what is modern day Iraq for about 2,000 years, tracing their ancestry to ancient Mesopotamia and surrounding lands. Theirs is a long and complex history. (BBC News)
I am by no means claiming any kind of revelation, but a passage came to me when I read this news:
Rev. 18:1 After these things I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority, and the earth was illuminated with his glory.
2 And he cried mightily with a loud voice, saying, “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and has become a dwelling place of demons, a prison for every foul spirit, and a cage for every unclean and hated bird!
3 “For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich through the abundance of her luxury.”
4 And I heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues. 5 “For her sins have reached to heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities.
Photo caption: Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert (R) and opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu attend a memorial ceremony in Jerusalem July 31, 2008. (REUTERS/David Furst/Pool)