“Murder of Chaldean Archbishop in Iraq Provokes Outrage”: Open up Immigration, now!!
comment by Jerry Gordon
With the discovery of body of kidnapped Chaldean Bishop Paulos Faraj Rahh on Thursday near Mosul, this ancient Christian community is in peril. Rahh was kidnapped on February 29th by gunmen who killed his driver and body guard after serving mass at a church in Mosul. Pope Benedict XVI was to have requested, during an upcoming visit with President Bush and US officials, efforts to discover and release Archbishop Rahh during a visit to Washington, DC . Instead we have justified outrage from Members of Congress, the American Chaldean community and prominent members of the Religious Freedom NGOs as this patent act of Jihadist terrorism. I’m sorry to say that he US has done little to secure this most ancient Christian group in the Middle East against Jihad.
Note these comment from William Murray of the Religious Freedom Coalition:
“The murder of Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho is on the hands of President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice,” William J. Murray, the chairman of the Religious Freedom Coalition, told Newsmax.
“Their refusal to assist the persecuted Christians in Iraq has emboldened Islamists to pillage, rape, and murder them. Had the Bush administration been proactive, the archbishop’s life could have been sparred,” Murray said.
“The administration will not even allow Christians in Iraq to form a police force while giving Islamist extremists such as Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr the right to maintain small armies,” Murray added. “The blame here belongs to George W. Bush.”
More than 40 percent of this ancient Christian community that antedated the arrival of Islam by several hundred years in Mesopotamia has fled since the start of the Iraq war in 2003. There were over 1 million Assyrian Chaldean Christians prior to the start of the conflict. Many have fled to Syria and Jordan, trying desperately to obtain asylum in the west and America. We have written about their plight.
My friend, Dr. Keith Roderick of Christian Solidarity, International stated plainly that the Assyrian Chaldean Christian community in Iraq is headed for extinction.
“The president has yet to publicly acknowledge the scope of the crisis facing the remaining Iraqi Christian community,” Father Keith Roderick, the Washington representative of Christian Solidarity International, told Newsmax. Roderick said he worried that the Iraqi Christian community, close to 1 million strong before the U.S.-led liberation of Iraq in 2003, “is headed toward extinction.” He called on the president to respond with “a policy to ensure greater security and a plan to resettle the upwards of 40 percent of the Christians who have fled their homes because of violence and threats of violence.”
We have argued in posts to open up the legal humanitarian refugee program to take those huddled Chaldean Christians denied emigration to the US, because Muslim officials and local agents of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Syria and Jordan have prevented applicants from even entering US legations for processing. Many of these were loyal translators to US coalition Forces and our Embassy in Baghdad. They and their families live under constant death threats. They deserve admittance to the US fill up the Iraqi refugee quota of 12,000 for Fiscal Year 2008. The Chaldeans also need their own security forces in Iraq to defend themselves against Islamists.
While the State department puts out a statement “disavowing this dastardly act of Islamist terrorism”. It and the Bush Administration does nothing to help. Nothing. The time to act is now. Perhaps, Pope Benedict XVI can intercede with President Bush and Secretary Rice to undertake appropriate and long overdue actions. Congress and the Administration must take the lead to protect this ancient Christian community, before it is, as Dr. Roderick has said, “extinguished’ by unrelenting Jihad.
by Kenneth Timmerman, NewsMax.com, March 14, 2008
Another priest was found murdered in northern Iraq on Thursday, sparking U.S. lawmakers, human rights advocates, and the Vatican to demand that the Bush administration take more vigorous measures to protect Iraq’s beleaguered Christian community.
It has also provoked outrage among some of President Bush’s staunchest supporters.
“The murder of Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho is on the hands of President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice,” William J. Murray, the chairman of the Religious Freedom Coalition, told Newsmax.
“Their refusal to assist the persecuted Christians in Iraq has emboldened Islamists to pillage, rape, and murder them. Had the Bush administration been proactive, the archbishop’s life could have been sparred,” Murray said.
“The administration will not even allow Christians in Iraq to form a police force while giving Islamist extremists such as Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr the right to maintain small armies,” Murray added. “The blame here belongs to George W. Bush.”
The body of the Chaldean Catholic archbishop, who was 65, was discovered near Mosul yesterday. He was kidnapped on Feb. 29 after celebrating mass at the Church of the Holy Spirit near Mosul city.
During the ambush, gunmen shot and killed Rahho’s driver and a bodyguard. A second bodyguard died later of gunshot wounds at a hospital.
Police in Mosul received an anonymous phone call on Thursday telling them where the body of the archbishop was buried, according to the Assyrian International News Agency (AINA). Police said that the condition of the archbishop’s body indicated that he had been dead for around a week and that his body showed no bullet wounds.
“The president has yet to publicly acknowledge the scope of the crisis facing the remaining Iraqi Christian community,” Father Keith Roderick, the Washington representative of Christian Solidarity International, told Newsmax.
Roderick said he worried that the Iraqi Christian community, close to 1 million strong before the U.S.-led liberation of Iraq in 2003, “is headed toward extinction.” He called on the president to respond with “a policy to ensure greater security and a plan to resettle the upwards of 40 percent of the Christians who have fled their homes because of violence and threats of violence.”
Just one day before Rahho’s body was found, aides to Pope Benedict XVI told editors at the Washington Times that the Pope would plead with President Bush and U.S. officials during his upcoming Washington visit to intervene with the Iraqi government on behalf of the kidnapped archbishop.
On March 6, Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., and Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., wrote to Rice, asking her to “personally ask the Iraqi government to commit any and all necessary resources to ensure the archbishop’s safe return.”
Rep. Joe Knollenberg, R-Mich., wrote separately to Rice, asking her to “make a public statement regarding the kidnapping of Archbishop Rahho.” Rice remained silent.
A search of public statements by Rice on the State Department Web site yields a single, parenthetical mention of Chaldean Christians in Iraq dating from May 2005.
Yesterday, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack issued a statement of condolence to the Chaldean community after the archbishop’s body had been found, calling the murder “ a terrible and tragic act of terrorism.”
The Chaldean Assyrian Syriac Council of America (CASCA) called the archbishop’s murder “a sad day for the Chaldean Assyrian Syriacs of Iraq and for the entire world of Christianity,” and warned that it was “just one more example of the threat the Christian minority is living under in Iraq.”
In Detroit, the Chaldean Federation of America has launched a program to funnel aid to Iraqi Christians who have fled their homes to neighboring Jordan and Syria through its “Adopt a Refugee Family Program.”
In less than six months, the program has “adopted” 1,000 refugees, and hopes to adopt 5,000 refugees by the end of 2008, program Chairman Basil Bakal told Newsmax.
© 2008 Newsmax. All rights reserved.
March 15th, 2008 at 11:43 • news opinion • Kenneth Timmerman • Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho murder • Chadean Christians in Iraq • Islamist threat • immigration • sanctuaries • security • NewsMax • William Murray • Dr. Keith Roderick • 1 Comment •
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1 Comment
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March 15, 2008
Comment by
http://openid.aol.com/USorThemblog Pope Bendict went out of his way to ask Bush ONE simple thing last year, to wit: HELP Christians in Iraq.
What did Bush do in response? He basically flipped Benedict the bird.
The Iraq Refugee Act as originally proposed last June ‘07 had specific provisions for giving priorities to religious minorities. By the time the bill reached the President those special provisions had been stripped from the bill. Bush signed it anyway and the Iraq Refigee Bill became law in Jan. 08 with nary a word about what efforts would be made to protect Christian minorities.
The State Dept. has set a goal to admit at least 12,000 Iraq refugees this year at a minimum, they may try to admit more if all goes well. How many of those do you think will be muslim and how many will be Christians or Jews? Timmerman also writes and there have been posts on this blog on how muslims run the refugee referral busness in Iraq.
It is correct to lay Blame of this archbishop’s death directly with this administration.
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