comment by Jerry Gordon

Perhpas Pope Benedict XVI- the ‘panzer Pope’, as our friend Bruce Tefft of the Grendel Report calls him, can raise the matter with President Bush of a cooordinated effort to open up legal humanitarian immigration of Iraqi Christians, now, when their fate lingers in the balance.

Deutsche Welle, April 4, 2008

Germany is debating whether to give visas to more Iraqi Christian refugees, given their widespread mistreatment at home. But some argue that singling out one minority is unfair.

Five years after Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was ousted, the Sunni and Shiite Muslim communities seem to be united on at least one front — their hatred of Christians.

Germany’s Catholic and Protestant churches are alarmed about rising sectarian violence being committed against Christians in Iraq. Bombed churches, beheaded clergymen, and massacres of women and children: According to observers, the very existence of this religious minority, which has been settled in Iraq for nearly 2,000 years, is threatened.

As a result, German churches are calling on the government to open the borders for persecuted Christians from Iraq.

Worsening situation for Christians

“The churches ask for a relevant number of Christians and other non-Muslim religious groups,” said Nele Allenberg, a legal expert from Germany’s Protestant Church.

“There are around 180,000 Christian refugees in Iraq’s neighboring countries — that is Syria, Jordan and also Turkey. Germany would have to take in a big part of these people, meaning 20,000 to 30,000 people,” Allenberg said.

She said the situation for Iraqi Christians today is significantly worse than before Saddam Hussein was ousted from power five years ago, when the country’s Christians lived peacefully side by side with Sunni and Shiite Muslims.

Now Christians tend to be associated with American and British invaders, who many Muslims believed would be waging a modern-day crusade against Islam.

Officials at the U.N. Higher Commissioner for Refugees speaks with Iraqi refugees in Syria during a tour by the U.N. Higher Commissioner for refugees Antonio Guterres on Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2008. Syria is home to some 1.5 million

The chairman of the Council of the Protestant Church in Germany, Bishop Wolfgang Huber, made a similar point in his Good Friday prayers. He named the atrocities that have been visited upon Iraqi Christians and noted: “The constitution allows all religious groups, so on paper the situation should be better. But actually the situation is worse.”