RUTHFULLY YOURS

On Sunday, a bloodbath took place at the Our Lady of Salvation Church in Karrada, in central Baghdad. At least 52 people have been killed and many more were injured after Muslim terrorists held members of the congregation as hostages. Pope Benedict XVI has condemned the attack. In an address from the Vatican, he said after the Angelus prayer:

“Last night  in a very serious attack on the Syrian Catholic Cathedral in Baghdad, dozens of people were killed and wounded, including two priests and a group of faithful gathered for Sunday Mass . I pray – he continued – for the victims of this senseless violence, all the more ferocious as it has affected unarmed citizens, gathered in the house of God, which is the home of love and reconciliation.”

The church had been one of six churches that had been bombed in August 2004, but the circumstances of the attack appeared to be designed to inspire terror beyond Baghdad.

During evening Mass at the church, around 120 worshippers had been taken hostage by Muslim terrorists carrying guns and wearing suicide vests. Just before the church was attacked, the terrorists had attacked the Iraqi stock exchange, which was not far from the church. According to Marzina Matti Yalda, a member of the congregation who survived the ordeal:

“As we went outside the hall to see what was happening, gunmen stormed the main gate and they started to shoot at us. Many people fell down, including a priest, while some of us ran inside and took shelter in a locked room. We were packed together as we waited for the security forces to arrive.”

The attackers claimed that the hostages would only be released if Al Qaeda prisoners held in Arabic countries were to be released. Additionally, there were demands for Egyptian women to be “released.” The two women are wives of Coptic priests who have reputedly converted to Islam.

The SITE monitoring group reported that a website run by the Iraqi al-Qaeda group called the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) had reported that an

“angry group of mujahedeen from among the supporters of Allah raided one of the filthy dens of idolatry that was used by the Christians of Iraq as a headquarters to fight the religion of Islam.”

The hostage-takers had apparently launched the attack “to help our weak captive Muslim sisters in the Muslim country of Egypt” and gave a deadline of 48 hours for the release of these women who were “imprisoned in… the monasteries of disbelief and the churches of idolatry in Egypt.”

The women were named in an audiotape which appeared on the ISI website as Camellia Shehata and Wafa Constantine. The Islamic State of Iraq website audio included a statement from one of its suicide terrorists, who said:

“The end will not stop at killing the hostages only. Not only in Iraq, but in Egypt and the Levant and the rest of the countries in the area; there are hundreds of thousands of your people amongst us and hundreds of churches, and all of them will be targets for us if you do not comply.”

The Iraqi authorities had decided that they had to use force to enter the building. Whether people had been killed before that decision was made is unknown. At some stage, either before or during the attempt to rescue the Christian hostages, the assailants set off bombs.

According to a website statement from the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), the raid had led the hostage-takers to detonate their explosive vests, killing both hostages and police officers.

According to a police officer, quoted in the New York Times:

“It’s a horrible scene. More than 50 people were killed. The suicide vests were filled with ball bearings to kill as many people as possible. Many people went to the hospitals without legs and hands.”

Abdul-Kader Jassem al-Obeidi, Iraq’s  defense minister, was quoted as saying that the mission to rescue the hostages was a “successful operation.”

Saddam Hussein was undoubtedly a vicious tyrant who mercilessly persecuted groups whom he considered to be “enemies” or “threats.” However, it should not be forgotten that under his secular Baathist regime there were two things that made Iraqi society more civilized than neighboring Iran. Firstly, women were encouraged to be educated and many held positions of influence, with no obligations to shroud their heads. Secondly, Christians were allowed to practice their religion without persecution. Tariq Aziz, who became Saddam’s right hand man, was brought up as a Christian.

The invasion of March 20, 2003 opened the door for insurgents to impose their own backward Islamism upon the populace. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian-born criminal, arrived in Iraq and began to impose an intolerant and repressive Islamism upon regions of the country.  Zarqawi personally supervised the barbaric practice of sawing off the heads of live victims, videotaping these displays of “Islamic” atrocity and distributing copies. In the narrow mindset of the Islamist insurgents, Iraqi Christians were seen as belonging to the same “tribe” as the invading “Crusaders,” and they became victims and scapegoats. As a result of these persecutions, half of Iraq’s Christians fled to neighboring Syria. There were around 800,000 Christians at the time of the invasion, yet now there are less than 500,000.

In 2007 as Christmas Eve approached Father Butrus, the leader of the Our Lady of Salvation Church, Karrada, spoke of the diminished size of his congregation. In previous years, the church would have a congregation of 700, but he only expected half that number for the Christmas Mass that year:

“The church used to be full. We used to put loudspeakers near the gate because the main hall couldn’t hold all of them. This year, we decided not even to bring a Christmas tree because of the security situation.”

On Christmas Day, there were still enough people attending Mass at the church for the doors to be open, allowing latecomers to take part in the service. Some of the younger women had uncovered heads as they lit candles following the Mass. Others wore lace head coverings.

At the Easter Mass of 2009, a congregation of only 200 people attended the service at Our Lady of Salvation Church (also called the Church Sayidat al-Najat or the Virgin Mary Church) in Karrada, celebrated on April 12. One congregant, a retired teacher called Faiza Bunni, spoke to McClatchy News. She said:

“Easter this year is much better than in previous years. But the situation is not as it used to be before 2003. It will be like the old situation when I can leave my house without a head scarf.”

A woman studying dentistry added her opinions:

“This Easter is really better than the Easters of the last three years. I can’t say it’s like the old days before the collapse of the former regime, but it’s much better than the previous years. We are the only family who stayed in Iraq. My uncles, aunts and most of my friends are abroad.”

On August 1, 2004, the Virgin Mary Church in Kassada was one of six churches that were attacked in bombings that were timed to coincide with evening prayers.  At least three people were killed and many more were wounded. According to the BBC, the series of bomb attacks against Christians were regarded as the first in Iraq’s history. On the right is the scene outside the Virgin Mary Church on August 1, 2004.