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{"id":18669,"date":"2017-02-03T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-02-03T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leithart.level2d.com\/?p=392"},"modified":"2017-02-03T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2017-02-03T00:00:00","slug":"persecution-in-nigeria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/leithart\/2017\/02\/persecution-in-nigeria\/","title":{"rendered":"Persecution in Nigeria"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

D<\/span>ouglas Murray reports at The Spectator<\/em><\/a> on the ongoing and largely ignored persecution of Christian villages in Nigeria:<\/p>\n

\u201cThese tribal-led villages, each with their own \u2018paramount ruler,\u2019 were converted by missionaries in the 19th and 20th centuries. But now these Christians \u2014 from the bishop down \u2014 sense that they have become unsympathetic figures, perhaps even an embarrassment, to the West. The international community pretends that this situation is a tit-for-tat problem, rather than a one-sided slaughter. Meanwhile, in Nigeria, the press fails to report or actively obscures the situation. Christians in the south of the country feel little solidarity with their co-religionists suffering from this Islamic revivalism and territorial conquest in the north.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thousands have been killed, hundreds of thousands forced from their homes.<\/p>\n

Murray cites evidence that the persecution is being encouraged by the government, or at least elements within the Nigerian government: \u201cEvery village has a similar story. A few days before any attack, a military helicopter is spotted dropping arms and other supplies into the areas inhabited by the Fulani tribes. Then the attack comes.\u201d<\/p>\n

One woman was captured by Boko Haram, forced to marry, and held captive for eighteen months before escaping. She told Murray: \u201cAt night . . . a military plane would sometimes appear over Boko Haram\u2019s camp and drop off supplies. \u2018Look what powerful friends we have,\u2019 her husband would boast as he pointed to the lights in the sky above. Even if the Nigerian army does not support Boko Haram, elements of it certainly do. Whenever an actual operation against the group is planned, they are always tipped off by forces within the country\u2019s security apparatus.<\/span><\/p>\n

Sometimes the army follows a pattern of murderous passivity: \u201cA villager takes me to the bridge where the village leader and 13 others were recently gunned down in a Fulani ambush. Nigerian army troops watched the whole thing from their base a couple of hundred yards away\u2014just as they did the destruction of another Christian village, the remains of which sit, burned out and silent, right opposite them. The army seems to have no interest in protecting the Christians, while the government in Abuja appears to care more about passing new laws on cattle-rustling than on protecting human lives. When challenged after a massacre, soldiers often claim that they didn\u2019t receive any orders\u2014or had been commanded not to intervene.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"