In the midst of the civil war, churches and Christian-owned businesses have been targets of bombings by the Islamic State and other extremist groups, and there have been many reports of Christians being abducted, harmed and killed. Even so, many of Syria’s remaining Christians are committed to staying and rebuilding their country. Others are now returning home following IS’s military defeat.
Syrian villages ‘liberated’ from Islamic State
All the villages along the Khabour River invaded by Islamic State miilitants three months ago have been liberated, according to reports given to the Catholic News Service (CNS). “This is very happy news,” Father Emanuel Youkhana, of Christian Aid Program Northern Iraq, told CNS. But he cautioned Christian villagers from […]
‘We are going through a terrible moment’
Archimandrite Emanuel Youkhana leads prayers for the Hassaka, Syria Christians at a mass in the Assyrian Church of the East in Beirut on March 22, 2015.World Watch Monitor Danger levels rose sharply in late April for northeast Syria’s isolated Assyrian Christians, caught for nearly three months now between Kurdish […]
Historic church destroyed in Syria
An historic Armenian church has been destroyed in Aleppo, Syria. The Armenian Church of Forty Martyrs dates back to the 15th Century. The Armenian Weekly says it is unclear whether the church was destroyed by shelling or explosives. “The church was at the centre of Armenian community life in Aleppo, […]
Assyrian Christians flee jihadists to southeast Turkey
A harsh Islamic State offensive begun in late February against Syria’s dwindling Assyrian Christian population is accelerating a steady trickle of Christian refugees trying desperately to reach safety in Turkey, northern Iraq and Lebanon. But their future is far from guaranteed as refugees in Muslim-majority Turkey, where according to Turkish […]
UN Security Council is ‘failing Syria’
Leading humanitarian groups, including Oxfam and Save the Children, in a report to mark four years of the Syrian war, accuse UN Security Council members of lacking the will to stop the fighting. The Failing Syria report says the 15-member Security Council, which includes the US and UK, has not […]
Four years since teenage graffiti sparks Syrian civil war
Four years ago this week a group of young teenagers with a can full of paint sprayed messages on a wall in the Syrian city of Daraa. They couldn’t have known it but, over the next nine days, their graffiti would escalate into the Syrian civil war, which reaches its […]
Reports of ‘blanket’ release of Assyrians dashed
Most Assyrian Christian families taken hostage in northeast Syria more than two weeks ago remain in Islamic State hands, despite initial reports indicating all, or nearly all, had been released. Initial news that IS forces had released all the Christian detainees after Friday prayers March 6 was reported to the […]
23 Assyrian Christians released in Syria
Assyrians from Tel Goran village, abducted by Islamic State kidnappers in late February, were released and returned safely in Hassaka on March 2.Photo provided by CAPNI Ten days after the self-proclaimed Islamic State’s harsh offensive emptied out a cluster of Assyrian Christian villages in northeast Syria, the extremists’ intentions […]
Abandoned Syrian Christian leaders urge air strike
A Syrian Christian leader is urging the US to strike IS held positions following the news earlier this week that up to 220 Syrian Christians were kidnapped from Hassaka province. “There is a need for immediate action similar to what took place in Kobani,” Bassam Ishak, president of the Syriac […]
‘Turkey failed’ 100+ Christians abducted by IS
The Syrian Catholic Archbishop of Hassaka-Nisibi has accused Turkey of preventing Christians from fleeing Syria to safety across the Turkish border, two days after Islamic State militants abducted at least 96 people. They lived in a cluster of villages in northeast Syria which had been under the control of Syrian […]