Stop killing Christians
- Sep 15, 2014
- 5 min read
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A group representing Syrian Christians told congressional members on Tuesday that the United States ought to stop funding the very same extremists who are trying to kill all the Christians. Christian Solidarity International CEO John Eibner said Christians who are fleeing the violence in Syria have asked him, “Why is the U.S. at war against us?”
US President Barack Obama surprised his visitors, the delegation of Eastern Christians patriarchs, on Thursday when he told them that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad “protected the Christians in Syria.”
Obama met with the delegation in the White House for 35 minutes, during which the patriarchs presented a paper in which they exposed the situation of Christians in the Middle East and the threats and challenges they are facing, due in part to the expansion of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militant group.
Sources told that the highlight of the meeting was when Obama said the following phrase: “We know that President Bashar al-Assad protected Christians in Syria.” Obama then used the term “the Syrian government” instead of “regime,” which is usually used by the US to describe the government in Syria.
The confused attendees could not believe what they heard. However, one of the guests addressed Obama and said: “Then you should stop talking about a moderate Syrian opposition.” Obama spoke about the planned US airstrikes in Syria, claiming that they will help “facilitate the (Syrian) political process.”
Meanwhile, Republican Texas senator Ted Cruz was booed off stage Wednesday night in Washington when he defended Israel at a gala sponsored by In Defense of Christians, a group whose objective is to focus public attention on the plight of persecuted Middle East Christian groups.
“Christians have no greater ally than Israel,” Cruz said, drawing a sharp response from the audience who started booing. “Those who hate Israel hate America. Those who hate Jews hate Christians,” he continued. At that point, the booing got louder.
In addition to asserting that “Christians have no greater ally than Israel” (even as the Jewish state’s illegal settlements and apartheid policies have negatively impacted Palestinian Christians), Cruz further underscored his simplicity and callowness by lumping ISIS, Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Syrian and Iranian governments all into the same category, asserting that all are “engaged in a vicious, genocidal campaign to destroy religious minorities in the Middle East.”
Finding himself increasingly heckled, and for good reason, Cruz abruptly left the stage, announcing, “If you will not stand with Israel and the Jews, then I will not stand with you.” In a statement issued after the event, the Texas senator offered further insights into his reasoning on the matter:
I told the attendees that those who hate Israel also hate America, that those who hate Jews also hate Christians, and that anyone who hates Israel and the Jewish people is not following the teachings of Christ. These statements were met with angry boos. I went on to tell the crowd that Christians in the Middle East have no better friend than Israel. That Christians can practice their faith free of persecution in Israel. And that ISIS, al Qaeda, Hamas, and Hezbollah, along with their state sponsors in Syria and Iran, are all part of the same cancer, murdering Christians and Jews alike.
The reality, of course, is quite different. Not only does the Syrian government and Hezbollah not persecute Christians, the two allies in the war against ISIS have been the most steadfast and consistent defenders of Middle East Christians.
While ISIS has murdered Christians, the Syrian government under Bashar Assad has afforded protection to Christians, and back in April the Syrian Arab Army fought a major battle in the Christian town of Maaloula to liberate it from the control of militants who had taken it over.
The Syrian government also was instrumental in freeing a group of 13 nuns who had been kidnapped, the abduction of the nuns, too, having taken place in Maaloula. The town, by the way, located 40 miles northeast of Damascus, is one of the few places in the world where Aramaic, the native language of Jesus, is still used.
In the video at the top of this page, we see Julia Boutros, a very famous singer in the Middle East, denouncing the recent Israeli crimes in Gaza while also expressing solidarity with resistance fighters–both those of Gaza as well as the resistance in her own native Lebanon.
In other words, she is expressing support for Hezbollah, the very organization Ted Cruz accuses of being “engaged in a vicious, genocidal campaign to destroy religious minorities in the Middle East.” Boutros, by the way, not only is a Lebanese Christian, she was educated at the Catholic Rosary Sisters School in Jbeil, Lebanon.
Of course the enlightened statesman from Texas need not solely take my word on Assad’s treatment of Christians. He could also consider the words of Obama. The president’s remarks before a group of Eastern Christians probably won’t get much play in the Western media as they run contrary to the MSM narrative of the Syrian president as an evil, mass-murdering dictator, but certainly they provide a rather arresting perspective on the whole affair, and perhaps as much as anything else it speaks to the Obama administration’s rather incoherent foreign policy.
Maronite Patriarch Cardinal Bechara Rai asked the attendees “not to to respond to Cruz and to focus on the conference and its objectives instead of individual statements.”
The Patriarch of Antioch and All the East and the spiritual leader of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, Gregory III Lahham, and Lebanon’s ambassador to Washington Antoine Shadid both withdrew from the dinner after Cruz attacked Hezbollah. Lahham also refused to participate in a session about the situation of Christians in the Middle East because of its dubious objectives and problematic speakers.
Lahham found out that US state representative Chris Smith, who was scheduled to give a speech in the session, was planning on condemning Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, something that Lahham regarded as a departure from the conference’s objectives.
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This evening, the US began bombing near Baghdad and announced plans to bomb Syria. President Obama’s order to bomb is without Constitutional authority. His announced plans to attack inside Iraq and Syria are illegal acts of war against sovereign nations that have no intention nor capability of attacking the US.
President Obama’s motives are not superior to the United States Constitution or International law. He and members of his Administration involved in the planning and execution of these wars must be held accountable under the law.
Congress must do its job and cannot stand by idly while this President shreds the Constitution. This is not a question of the IS and what it stands for. This is a question of the US and what we stand for.
The way to deal with ISIS isn’t to bomb, it is to dry up their funding and weapons sources which have been coming from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and weapons from the US distributed through or captured from rebel/mercenary channels.
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