International delegations head to D.C. to discuss religious freedom

UNITED STATES: More than 80 countries will send high-level participants to Washington next week for the Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom hosted by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. The event is a high-water mark for international religious liberty advocates, whose efforts are “much more bipartisan, though smaller” and draw less passion than domestic debates, writes The Washington Post’s Michelle Boorstein. Vice President Mike Pence will speak at the gathering.

ISRAEL: The Knesset passed a new law with support from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declaring Israel a Jewish nation-state with Hebrew its official language and Jerusalem its united capital. The language provisions appear to cut both Arabic as an official language—with more than 20 percent Israeli citizens Arab Israelis (1.7 million)—and the more recently designated Aramaic, the language of descendants of the country’s ancient Christian population. One joint Arab-Jewish Knesset leader denounced it as the “death of our democracy.”

RUSSIA: A federal magistrate judge in Washington ordered alleged Russian agent Maria Butina jailed until her trial to prevent her from fleeing the country. Federal prosecutors accuse Butina of communicating with Russian intelligence agents and using religious groups and events—including the National Prayer Breakfast—to influence U.S. officials. Butina is scheduled to appear in court Tuesday.

PAKISTAN: The latest polls show cricket star Imran Khan leading ahead of next Wednesday’s presidential election. Khan is a favorite of Pakistan’s military-dominated establishment, but his “knee-jerk anti-Americanism, record of pandering to fundamentalist clerics, and promise to create an ‘Islamic welfare state’ bode ill for Pakistan.” Khan is courting the new and extremist Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan party, which calls for tightening already stringent blasphemy laws authorities have used disproportionately against Christians.

TURKEY: The bizarre twists in the Andrew Brunson case show religious freedom has become a nominal right in Turkey, writes Kristina Arriaga, a commissioner with the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom.

NIGERIA: Aid groups and church communities are still scrambling to restore normalcy in predominantly Christian areas of Plateau state after the June 23 Fulani herdsmen attack that killed more than 200 people.

BELGIUM: The scars of World War I in Ypres Salient “are so dense they practically form a contiguous strata in the soil.” At Messines Ridge, a key German stronghold, a remarkable project by archaeologists from former warring sides worked together to recover the remains of 42 German soldiers this year, reports Ypres tour operator Lionel Roosemont.

SWEDEN: More than half of Swedish children—53 percent—live in two-parent households (in the United States, 69 percent do). Without immigrant families, less than 40 percent of Swedish households would comprise intact families.

The worst wildfires in 12 years prompted Sweden to request international help this week. Lack of rain and unusually hot temperatures as far north as the Arctic Circle are allowing more than 40 wildfires to spread.

I’M READING The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East by Sandy Tolan.

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