CSI Highlights Plight of Persecuted Christians in Syria, Other Mideast Nations

Agape Press ^ | January 3, 2007 | Allie Martin

[Alex Murphy]

AgapePress) - An official with Christian Solidarity International (CSI) says the once thriving Christian majority in Syria has now been transformed into a small, frightened community. According to published reports, thousands of believers are fleeing from war-torn Iraq into Syria, but the Islamic nation provides no safe refuge for Christians.

Keith Roderick is the Washington representative for CSI. He says most Christians in the United States do not realize that oppression and discrimination against followers of Christ is rampant in Syria, where "Christians are not equal and assume a second-class position within society." In Syria and elsewhere in the Middle East, he says, Christians are not only being kidnapped, raped, tortured, and killed, but many are being subjected to economic oppression and religious persecution as well.

For instance, Roderick notes, in Syria Christians suffer job discrimination, even in the religious schools, including Christian schools, where the principals have to be Muslim. "The president of the country has to be Muslim," he points out, for "Islam is the guiding religion of the constitution."

In other words, in Syria, "in all cases, things are not equal for Christians," the CSI official explains. And the U.S., he says, needs to stop turning a blind eye to the persecution of Christian people that goes on throughout that Muslim-dominated society.

American Christian author and pastor Rick Warren recently met with Syrian officials and was quoted by national media as describing the country as a "moderate" nation. However, Roderick says Syria is by no means moderate when it comes to religious freedom.

"When religious leaders go to Damascus and meet with the leadership and are used politically, as happened recently," Roderick comments, "I think it's a great disservice to the Christians who are there in Syria as well as to the other Christians in the Middle East." He calls believers living in Islamist societies throughout the region "the inconvenient minority" and says they are "a vulnerable minority who are being targeted for violence."

According to CSI, Christians now comprise less than five percent of the population of Iraq; and recent United Nations statistics revealed that 36 percent of those fleeing Iraq for Syria were Christians. Also, Roderick notes, untold numbers are now exiled in Jordan and Turkey, where they "live on the edge," most not permitted to work or to receive social assistance.