ICC's January E-Newsletter, Persecution

your bridge to the persecuted church

PERSECU ION .org

INTERNATIONAL CHRIS TIAN CONCERN

PERSECUTIONJ A N UA R Y 2012

International Christian Concern

Interview with a “Son of Hamas”A unique perspective from the son of a Hamas founder

Is a disaster on the horizon for Christians in Egypt?

inside this issue:

Caught in Between: Post-Election Egypt

Caught in Between: A Preview of Christianity in Post-Election EgyptAt the time of writing, Egypt had just completed its first round of parliamentary elections in major cities. The results may indicate a coming disaster for Coptic Christians.

Afghan Christians in Danger at Home and AbroadAidan Clay, ICC’s Regional Manager for the Middle East, details an urgent plea for prayer he received from one of our contacts in Afghanistan. What is the future for Christians in a country where a man was beheaded for his faith in 2011?

Interview with the Son of Hamas, Part IVLast January, we gave you the third part of an interview ICC’s President conducted with the son of a Hamas founder in his new book, “Islam Uncensored.” In this fourth installment, Mosab discusses the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Your Donations at WorkThree Christians imprisoned in Ethiopia for sharing their faith were released in November thanks to a phone call from of our staff members!

INSIDE THIS ISSUEJanuary 2012

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From the President’s Desk

Michael’s final words to his fiancé, Viviane, were, “Don’t let me go, stay with me. Don’t be scared.”

They were among thousands of Christian marchers on the streets of Cairo, Egypt protesting the destruction of a church by Islamists. Seconds later, a military truck that had purposefully plowed into the crowd to crush the Christian protestors drove over Michael, crushing his skull and killing him. Later, holding his lifeless hand in the hospital, Viviane sobbed, “I will not leave you!”

The future for Egypt’s Christians is bleak. Just this week, we found out that Islamists had captured over 60% of the vote in the first round of parliamentary elections. Early in 2011, I told you that many Egyptian Christians felt they had heard the Lord telling them to prepare for a time of intense crushing. It seems that season is upon us.

Christians have lived under terrible oppression in Egypt (you know, one of the “moderate” Islamic countries), but the future may prove unbearable.

There is something in Michael’s last words that seem so foundational. His words resonate in my heart with the gentle insistence of a message the Lord wants me to hear: “Don’t let me go, stay with me. Don’t be scared.”

You see, his last words embody the nature of our ministry to the persecuted. The persecuted suffer greatly. They know that we can’t solve their problem, but they receive tremendous comfort in knowing that we pray for them and we care. Reminding us to “weep with those who weep,” they urge us, “Don’t let me go, stay with me.”

Still, they minister to us by the example of their lives. They live under constant threat and suffer all kinds of crushing blows, but they look to us and say, “Don’t be afraid.”

If you are like me, you desperately need their message and example. Please join me in serving them. They are completely worthy of your investment and sacrifice.

Jeff King President, ICC

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caught in between: a preview of christianity in post-election egypt

After a long march from Shubra, Viviane Magdi and her fiancé Michael Mosad finally reached their destination at the State TV building in Maspero near Tahrir Square in Cairo. It was October 9th, and a mass crowd of demonstrators had gathered to protest the destruction of a church by an Islamist mob in Aswan a week earlier. Upon arrival, however, the protest took an unexpected turn. Above the chants for freedom and an end to military rule, the couple could hear screams and the crackle of gunfire rising from among the demonstrators.

Although nervous about the apparent violence that had broken out in what started as a peaceful demonstration, Michael refused to return home. “There are people who fell; we have to stand with them,” Viviane remembers Michael saying.




A moment later, a military vehicle veered into the crowded street. Demonstrators scrambled and tripped over one another, uncertain where the vehicle would turn next. “He held my hand and said, ‘Don’t let me go, stay with me, don’t be scared.’ Then suddenly, I felt myself pushed away,” Viviane recalled.

Looking behind her, she saw Michael swept under the truck and crushed beneath its tires. His skull was fractured and his legs were left dangling from his body as the truck sped off. Soldiers following behind the vehicle began beating Michael’s unconscious body. One soldier turned on Viviane, who was begging them to stop hitting her fiancé.

Finally, a lone soldier intervened, loaded Michael’s lifeless body on a truck, and drove him and Viviane to a Coptic hospital. Kneeling beside three other corpses on the hospital floor, Viviane held her fiancé’s hand and cried in despair, “I will not leave you!”

A photo taken of her clasping Michael’s hand (left) and the testimony she would later give to the Egyptian press circulated throughout the

country and Viviane soon emerged as the unforgettable face of the October 9 massacre that protestors later dubbed ‘Bloody Sunday.’

The Christians’ Dilemma

Michael was one of 26 Christians killed that evening. The initially peaceful demonstration was met with the worst violence Egyptians had seen since President Hosni Mubarak’s ouster in February.

As Michael and Viviane were marching with fellow countrymen, state-run television broadcasts were simultaneously calling on “honest Egyptians to defend the soldiers” against “armed Coptic [Christians].” While Muslims who had joined the Christian protest saw through the façade, understanding that it was the military, not Christians, who were responsible, radical Islamists responded by descending on the scene with sticks, firebombs and guns, chanting, “The people want to bring down the Christians. Islamic! Islamic!”

Viviane weeps beside the body of her murdered fiancé in Egypt.




The Christians’ Dilemma

In post-revolution Egypt, the greatest fear among Christians has been the increasing influence of the Muslim Brotherhood and the unparalleled brutality of the Salafis, whose interpretation of Islam derives from Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia. Salafis have been responsible for killing numerous Christians in 2011, including twelve on May 7th when a church was burned to the ground and numerous Christian-owned apartments and shops were vandalized and looted in the poor Imbaba district of Cairo.

But Christians face pressure from both government fronts. An elected Islamist government will institute Islamic-based laws that even further repress the Christian minority. On the other hand, it was the military – not Islamists – that was responsible for the most violent attack committed against them in post-revolution Egypt.

October 9th was not the first time the military killed unarmed Christians in 2011. On March 8th, nine Coptic Christian protestors were killed in the poor Mokattam suburb of Cairo. When ICC spoke with all nine of the victims’ families, every relative, including some who were eyewitnesses, told us that it was the military that was responsible for the deaths of their loved ones.

“The government and military are killing Christians. It’s that simple,” said Coptic activist Wagih Yacoub, who was shot with rubber bullets during the protest on October 9th and, like Viviane, had a friend who was killed by the military (left). “It was a peaceful march, so why did they shoot real bullets on a peaceful people? We want to worship in peace, that’s all we want.”

On the evening that the first stage of elections was complete and demonstrators declared it time for the military to surrender power to civilian rule, the military reacted by beating protestors with batons, injuring 80. The savior of Egypt’s revolution, initially praised last January by protestors who chanted ‘the people and army are one hand,’ is now seen as Egypt’s final roadblock to freedom.

25-year-old Christian activist killed by the military on Oct. 9




Having no one to run to, thousands of Christians have already fled the country. Like what is occurring in Iraq, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories and much of the Middle East, many anticipate that Christianity will considerably decline in Egypt. Though some have resolved to stay no matter the cost, others have told ICC that they will flee if Islamists take over.

Election Day and Beyond

On election day, a significant number of Christians – around 70 percent – turned out to cast their votes. “We are voting for liberal parties as a means of survival,” Farid George, a Christian in the southern city of Assiut, told The Associated Press. A counter vote against Islamists may be the Christians’ final hope.

However, even the large Christian turnout may not be enough. In the first of three phases to elect the lower house of parliament, Islamists took 65 percent of the overall vote. Most disconcerting for Coptic Christians is that one in four Egyptians opted for the ultraconservative Salafis (Wahhabis), who believe non-Muslims should not be treated as citizens with equal rights. Since the revolution, Salafis have called the

One of hundreds of protestors injured by the military in the week leading up to the first round of voting in Egypt.




appointment of a Christian governor “anti-Islamic,” protested Osama bin Laden’s killing, and demanded that Christians pay a religious tax called jizya like they were forced to do in the 7th century. Many Christians fear that laws instituted by Salafis would be similar to those enforced under the Taliban in Afghanistan.

“If Salafis take over power, it would turn Egypt into the Taliban,” Wagih Yacoub told ICC. “Salafis are one of the largest threats to Christians in Egypt. The Muslim Brotherhood is also very dangerous, but the difference is that Salafis don’t negotiate. They are straightforward. They want to kill.”

Egypt’s elected parliament will be given the authority to select a 100-member panel to draft a new constitution. The Muslim Brotherhood, which won the most seats – nearly 40 percent – in phase one of the elections, together with Salafis and other Islamists, will likely be the key participants (depending on the results of phase two and three of the election). Having already announced their intention to establish Egypt as an Islamic state, it is only a matter of time before Christians face even greater persecution than they do now.

“All Coptic [Christians] are very worried. We didn’t expect this,” Girgi Szaki, a 42-year-old engineer with two children, told Agence France-Presse. “A lot of Christians are now saying that the Mubarak era was better than now,” said Eman Seif, a 53-year-old doctor.

Some church leaders, however, refuse to lose hope. “We are passing through a dark tunnel of violence, feeling grief of death and injustice...” Bishop Thomas of the Coptic Church told World Magazine. “Trying to bring forgiveness and justice together is a big struggle, but we are committed to the love that never fails.”

We are passing through a dark tunnel of violence... trying to bring forgiveness and justice together is a big struggle, but we are committed to the love that never fails.”

Christian girl holds a cross in a protest following ‘Bloody Sunday’



Afghan Christians in Danger at Home and AbroadWritten by Aidan Clay, ICC’s Regional Manager for the Middle East

In the beginning of November, the following urgent message from Obaid, an Afghan Christian living in New Delhi, arrived in my inbox:

“I just received a warning call from a person who introduced himself as an [official at the Afghan embassy]… If I don’t go to the embassy in two hours to meet him, he will arrest [me] and present me to the embassy through the Indian police… Please pray and be in contact, and if in case something happens, my wife will contact you. He was claiming that I convert people from Islam to Christianity.”

The calls continued throughout the day. “They were very angry and saying that they will hit me by knife and kill me,” the exile, who changed his name after fleeing Afghanistan in 2007 when an Islamic court issued an arrest warrant for his conversion, told me in reference to the third call he received late that night.

A video still of an Afghan Christian man who was beheaded for his faith last year.



Threats against Afghan converts to Christianity should not be taken lightly. Conversion is viewed as a serious crime in Afghanistan, and Christians are frequently targeted by the government as well as extremists. Last year, a video was released of the beheading of an Afghan man, Abdul Latif, by four Islamist militants near Herat. The militants, who claim to be the Taliban, read a passage from the Hadiths before executing the victim: “Mohammad (peace be upon him) says, ‘Whoever changes his religion should be executed.’”

Tragically, even escape from Afghanistan does not necessarily mean an escape from persecution. In September, an Afghan convert was scalded with boiling water and acid at a refugee processing center in Norway. His attackers reportedly told him that if he did not return to Islam, they would kill him.

For Obaid, the menacing calls were not the first time he felt threatened since arriving in India. “Our community is a persecuted and rejected community,” he told me last April.

“We left behind all our belongings in Afghanistan just to save our lives by leaving Afghanistan. Here in India, we are receiving no legal and physical protection from the UNHCR Office or Indian government. We are harassed, attacked, insulted and persecuted by Indian Muslims and Afghan Muslim refugees in this city.”

United Nations High Commission of Refugees Fails to Protect Afghan Christians

The persecution of Afghan Christian refugees is sometimes ignored by the very agencies that are mandated to protect them. Aman Ali and his family fled Afghanistan in June 2010 following a television broadcast showing footage of Afghans being baptized. Though Aman’s conversion was already known in his community, the broadcast stirred animosity towards Christians and led to nationwide protests and the arrests of several converts.

Afghan convert burned with boiling water and acid.



“Someone had reported my activities to the secret police of Afghanistan and they were looking for evidence to arrest me, but I was so careful and had to stop my work,” Aman told ICC. “After the television showed pictures from a baptism ceremony, the Afghan government started arresting believers from different parts of Kabul… Most Afghan believers were scared… and left the country. So did me and my family.”

Aman immediately applied for refugee status with the United Nations High Commission of Refugees (UNHCR) upon arrival in New Delhi, but was rejected and told that he failed to meet the criteria set forth in Article 6B of the UNHCR Statute which states that in order to receive refugee status, one must have a “well-founded fear of persecution by reason of his race, religion, nationality or political opinion.” It was clear to Aman that the UNHCR did not consider his conversion a legitimate threat to his life.

Ratimullah, another Afghan convert, fled his home in Mazar-i-Sharif at the same time that Aman was fleeing the country. Like Aman, Ratimullah’s application for refugee status was also rejected, along with seven other applicants. The applicants have spent months in hiding, fearful that if caught by the Indian police they will be deported back to Afghanistan. “I cannot return to my country because I will be arrested and

Ahmad Faizi, an Afghan Christian asylum seeker, went on a hunger strike here at the Harmondsworth Immigration Removal Center before he was deported in April of 2011.



executed by the Afghan government,” Ratimullah wrote in an appeal to the UNHCR. “A definite death is waiting for me in my homeland.”

Afghan Christian refugees in India are not alone. Similar requests have been denied by the UNHCR in Britain as well as in other countries. The Guardian reported an Afghan Christian asylum seeker, Ahmed Faizi, as saying, “If the Taliban don’t execute me for being a Christian, my family will,” just before his deportation last April.

Taliban Website Threatens to Destroy All Christian Centers One by One

Their predictions are ringing true amidst renewed threats by the Taliban to purge Christians – both foreign and national – from the country. A statement posted on a Taliban website (left) on October 18 warned that “special plans” have been made to “destroy all [Christian] centers one by one.” A translation of the notice declares:

“Under the name of this shameful and corrupt democracy, there are all kinds of pagans entering into our country. Thousands of Christian missionaries have also entered our country under the name and cover of aid societies and NGOs. They are busy with their activities (evangelizing) and have the support of foreign and Afghan forces, claiming that they are giving humanitarian and social help to people…

“According to our reports, these Christian evangelists and social organizations are directly inviting Afghans to Christianity… These infidels, enemies of Islam under the name of corrupt democracy and their lords, need to know that the Afghan Islamic Emirate is seriously taking your activities into consideration… The Afghan Islamic Emirate will take practical measures and has already made special plans to destroy all [their] centers one by one; the centers where plans are made that destroy the holy religion of Islam and Afghan culture.”

Taliban website threatens Afghan Christians.



Obaid told me the warning should not be ignored, saying, “The centers’ activities are being observed, Afghan converts are identified, and it is planned to destroy the centers. This is serious!” Some foreign aid workers in the country, however, have heard similar declarations in the past and view the threat as merely Taliban propaganda.

Hundreds of Afghan Christians, like Obaid, remain on the run from religious-based persecution that targets them at home and abroad. “In the modern world, where we have NATO, the UN, human rights commissions, and governments which claim they fight for democracy and give protection for those who are persecuted, I cannot find a place in this world where I am protected,” Obaid lamented.

“In this modern world, where we have NATO, the UN, human rights commissions, and governments which claim they fight for democracy and give protection for those who are persecuted ... I cannot find a place in this world where I am protected.”

Afghan refugees wait at UNHCR registration center.

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THE SON OF A HAMAS FOUNDER DISCUSSES THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN CONFLICTLast January, we gave you the third part of an interview ICC’s President, Jeff King, had with the son of one of the founders of Hamas in his new book, Islam Uncensored. The book is now available on Amazon.

ICC: What can you tell us about how Hamas was founded? What was your father’s role in starting the organization?

Mosab: It was born to destroy Israel and establish an Islamic state in the Palestinian territories in order to establish a global Islamic state, ruling the entire world. Hamas’ other purpose is resistance—to defend themselves against the occupation. The Geneva treaty and the international community give them the right to defend themselves. But they believe that they have the right to defend themselves by blowing people up. Because of that, Hamas has been responsible for the deaths of many Jewish people and many Israelis.

Hamas is an organization that wants to defend its people, but I don’t believe they know how. They have made the situation worse. They need to stop for a second and think where they’re going with their so-called resistance.


ICC: Was Hamas founded as an outgrowth of the Brotherhood?

Mosab: Hamas and the Brotherhood are the same. The Muslim Brotherhood is the mother of Hamas. They have the same ideology; they are the same. They call it Hamas in order to take the Muslim Brotherhood out of the picture so Israel does not attack the entire Muslim Brotherhood. This is how they survive. It was a strategic and smart thing to do, but they are absolutely the same.

ICC: How about funding? Are the Saudis the main funders?

Mosab: This is a tricky thing. Hamas initially funded the movement from their own pockets, with members’ donations. Let me tell you, funding is not what keeps Hamas going. What keeps Hamas going is their motivation—their Quran and their Islam. In fact, funding can sometimes be destructive for Hamas because when they have more money, they become more corrupt. They get busy with money. There have been times when they didn’t have money, and they were more dangerous.

Their motivation is their enemy and our enemy. Say, for example, you’re dealing with a mafia. Usually, their motive is a personal motive. You can scare them, put them in prison and punish them, and they will stop on some level or be very limited. But when you’re fighting a group like Hamas that’s highly motivated by their beliefs, by their Quran, by the promise of their god, the more you put pressure on them, the more they believe in their idea. Hamas is an idea. You simply can’t kill an idea with a tank or Apache.


This is why everyone has failed to stop Hamas so far. There’s no way to stop them if you don’t stop their ideology, not even if you cut off all their funding.

Hamas has been under sanctions for the last four years now in Gaza. They are responsible for feeding 1.5 million Palestinians and themselves … and they’re still surviving. How? No gas, no electricity, no food, lack of everything, and they can still survive. You know why? Because their motivation is still there, and their motivation is actually surviving.

ICC: If Hamas and Fatah were to get land for peace, what would they do?

Mosab: The best-case scenario is that they will fight for that. It’s finally their decision to have self-determination and do whatever they want in their land. But I cannot guarantee that they will ever get peace. I want them to have that, but I want them to understand and gain freedom and liberty in their hearts first. If you give them land now, and they don’t understand what liberty means, what freedom means, they will abuse it and they will be victims.

I’m not saying that they don’t deserve to have a Palestinian state, but this is their challenge. It’s their right to have a state, but will a Palestinian state give the Palestinians peace? I doubt it. Will a Palestinian state build a future for Palestinians? Good education, good health care? A solid government that will make them a better nation? I doubt that also. This is the real challenge.

ICC: You described in the book a time when you were watching an explosion that was being blamed on Israel. While your father is being interviewed by Al-Jazeera, you’re looking at the video, and you realize that the explosion came from the ground up, not vice versa. And despite proving this, Al-Jazeera ran it as a false story. I just remembered in the last war, there were a lot of staged things from Hezbollah and they largely got a pass. How reliable is the news coming out of the region? How easily is it manipulated?

“Hamas is an idea. You simply can’t kill an idea with a tank or Apache. This is why everyone has failed to stop Hamas.”


Mosab: It’s not only manipulated. Everybody there creates his own version of this conflict, and there are victims on both sides. Many people are taking advantage: religious leaders, politicians, everybody’s trying to take advantage of the situation to climb on the shoulders of those victims. You can use anything for any agenda. Take one picture; Palestinians will use the picture for their goals and the Israelis will use the same picture for theirs.

We’re dealing with corrupt human beings. Everybody has a percentage of corruption. Especially when it comes to politics in the Middle East — how honest are people? This is a matter of individuals. Because of that, I have to keep my focus on individuals, not just on nations. We have to start to change people’s hearts.

It’s not just a matter of establishing a Palestinian state if it’s based on a lie or based on hate and revenge. It would explode again and it wouldn’t survive. But if you start working with individuals, teaching them the principles of forgiveness and unconditional love, this is how everybody starts to move on instead of being enemies. They can work together, be productive, and be a great example for everybody. Those are the main things that I am focused on, regardless of whether there is a Palestinian state or not.

Visit islamuncensoredbook.com to buy the book for the full interview.

“Take one picture; Palestinians will use the picture for their goals and the Israelis will use the same picture for theirs. We’re dealing with corrupt human beings.”

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A Phone Call Saves Christian Prisoners Advocacy

We are very excited to inform you that on October 25, three Christian prisoners were released from prison in

Ethiopia after ICC’s Regional Manager for Africa called the Muslim police officials and reminded them that they were violating the law by arresting the Christians for preaching the Gospel.

The three Christians (one of whom is a former Muslim leader) were arrested on October 15 for preaching the Gospel to Muslims. Even while they were in prison, the Christians continued to share their faith. As a result of their testimony in prison, two people came to Christ and others were healed from sickness after the Christians prayed for them.

The police panicked and released them after receiving the call from ICC. The freed Christians told us later that a Muslim police official confronted them after receiving the phone call and asked them, “How do you have people in the US who asked us to release you?”

Though the three are now free, Muslim authorities are threatening to bring criminal charges against the former Muslim leader.

ICC is closely monitoring the situation. Please keep these three Christians in your prayers.

Ethiopian Christians released from prison after ICC intervention.



Helping Somali Converts to Christ Hand of Hope: Africa

Somali converts to Christianity can be killed by family members, al Shabaab militants, or even a next door neighbor if their faith is discovered. Recently, ICC met with two families (neither are pictured) who are on the run or in hiding after facing severe persecution and threats.

One young man fled Somalia with his family four years ago after his father was brutally murdered for preaching the Gospel. Now living as refugees in a neighboring East African country, they are scarcely able to make enough money to pay rent or put food on the table.

In November, the young man was followed home and beaten unconscious by six Somali Muslims who had heard that he was a Christian. Believing that he would soon die, his attackers left his body outside a church’s front gate as ‘a warning’ to other Christians.

Though he survived, his spleen needs constant medication and he has nearly lost the ability to control his bladder. One tooth was knocked out and his right eye is black and nearly blind. He and his family have also received threats since the Muslims learned that he survived the attack.

ICC is funding the young man’s surgery and medication, and helping his family find a safe place to move. This family is only one among many persecuted Somali converts to Christianity that ICC is helping.

ICC is working in Somalia, one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a Christian.

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“Vindicate the weak and fatherless; do justice to the afflicted and destitute. Rescue the weak and needy; deliver them out of the hand of the wicked.” Psalm 82:3-4

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ICC's January E-Newsletter, Persecution