 Home abandoned after being destroyed by Muslims (Compass Direct photo) |
There’s more evidence being uncovered of a concerted campaign of violence by Muslims against Christians in Africa, as a new report from Compass Direct describes how Christians in two villages in Nigeria cannot return home because Islamic attackers have turned their entire villages into cattleyards.
The attacks have been documented by Obed Minchakpu for Compass Direct. They follows WND reports of Muslim-on-Christian violence in Ivory Coast, Kenya, Nigeria and Egypt, among others.
The report today said Christian farmers in Mdandi were busy in March harvesting crops when “scores of armed, hard-line Islamists – avoiding the surrounding Muslim villages – descended on Mdandi, destroyed the Christians’ homes and drove them out.”
Luka Zafi, a pastor of the Church of Christ in Nigeria, said there had been earlier attacks but none so brutal.
“They left and returned the second time with more of them, and all armed with guns. We could not fight back since we do not have arms to fight them. We ran out of the village, and they destroyed our two church buildings and our houses,” he said.
His church membership of about 50 was scattered, he reported.
“A Compass visit to the village found Muslim Fulani nomads had taken it over and were using it to graze their cattle,” the report said.
Authorities believe the attackers were Islamists from nearby parts of Bauchi state in Nigeria who were collaborating with local Muslims and Fulani herdsmen.
Zafi told Compass Direct that it is more important for the government to stop the attacks by Muslim militants than for the Christians’ property to be restored.
“Unless this is done, I am afraid, Christians in this part of the country may be on their way to extinction,” he told Compass.
Compass said Muslim extremists also attacked Gumel, another Christian village nearby, and two Christians were killed there.
There, a church with membership of about 160 was dispersed.
“We cannot return to the village – not only because our houses have been destroyed, but because the Muslims have taken over the village and are using the place as a grazing field for the Fulani Muslims in the area,” said Ishaya Magaji, 65, pastor of the displaced church members.
Magaji said the attacks were part of an extremist Islamic jihad being waged against Christians in Bauchi state.
International Christian Concern’s Nigeria specialist Jonathan Racho earlier documented other Muslim violence against Christians in Nigeria.
He said 17 Christians were killed in one attack. He said the death toll in Nigeria – since Muslims started a terror rampage on the election to a second term of Christian President Goodluck Jonathan – has topped 600.
WND recently has reported that Egyptian Christians also say they are under siege now, following the Muslim Brotherhood’s integration into power.
Reports document attacks by armed gangs on about 60 Coptic Christians during a protest at a national television headquarters and suggest that the Egyptian army has been part of the aggression.
Christians have been demanding without success that the government prosecute the perpetrators of the attack and the burning of the Mar Mina church in the Cairo neighborhood of Imbabba on May 8.
A dozen people were killed and more than 200 were injured there.
Egyptian human rights activist and journalist Wagih Yacoub was an eyewitness to the violence and describes the assault on Christians as an ambush.
“The army left. They were not there and they did nothing after the attacks. Other criminals came and attacked the Christians. We asked for the rescue and the army came after a few hours,” Yacoub related.
WND also has reported a surge of Muslim-on-Christian violence across other regions of Africa, including Kenya and Ivory Coast. The attacks in those countries developed following political elections that offered Muslim-Christian competition.
 Sen. Barack Obama with Raila Odinga |
In Kenya, President Obama campaigned for the Muslim challenger, Raila Odinga, while Obama was a U.S. senator.
Appearing with Odinga at campaign stops, Obama gave speeches accusing the sitting Kenyan president of being corrupt and oppressive.
But Odinga lost, despite attracting Muslim votes through a secret Memorandum of Understanding with Muslim Sheik Abdullah Abdi, the chief of the National Muslim Leaders Forum of Kenya. In the memo, Odinga promised to rewrite the Kenyan constitution to install Shariah as law in “Muslim declared regions,” elevate Islam as “the only true religion” and give Islamic leaders “oversight” over other religions, establish Shariah courts and ban Christian proselytism.
After his loss, Odinga accused the incumbent president of rigging the vote and allegedly incited his supporters to riot. Over the next month, some 1,500 Kenyans were killed and more than 500,000 displaced – with most of the violence led by Muslims, who set churches ablaze and hacked Christians to death with machetes.
Odinga eventually ended up as prime minister in Kenya through a power-sharing arrangement that was enacted in an effort to appease the rioters.
Similar attacks on Christians developed in Ivory Coast after a Christian candidate was elected president on the determination there was fraud in the voting in Muslim-dominated parts of the country. The United Nations and the U.S. then said that the Muslim challenger should be installed in office, which was done after the French army moved into the country.
