Christians on the edge of extinction

It was the sunny morning of Aug. 6, 2014, in the Christian town of Qaraqosh, east of Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city. A big family sent its small, active boys out to the courtyard of their home after breakfast.

“Go play!” the bearded grandfather said, grinning and shaking his finger at them. They laughed and ran outside.

The mother, a striking, slender woman with green eyes and dark hair, stayed inside to take care of the baby. The boys were two brothers and a cousin. They were 6, 7, and 9 years old. They were full of energy, quick to tease each other and run away. Their wrinkled grandmother smiled as she watched them chase each other in the garden enclosure. As was her habit, she prayed as she sat on her plastic chair, pulling her rosary beads through her fingers. A young woman, a family friend, sat by her side. It was the young woman’s wedding day. They had talked of the celebration to come.

There was a sudden, white-hot blast from the sky. A deafening explosion. In a moment of horror and confusion, the grandmother could not hear. She looked up in terror. “It was raining meat,” she said later. Human flesh.

The young woman lay flayed on the pavement. She would never be a bride. The 9-year-old had been eviscerated. The other boy was in shock, his legs ripped wide open. The youngest was weeping and bleeding from wounds all over his legs and back.

The rest of the family erupted from the house. Screaming, chaos, and despair. The young woman and the 9-year-old were dead. The family made a frenzied trip to the hospital, their old car smeared with blood. The 7-year-old died as doctors worked on him. One hundred thirty stitches later, the littlest boy would later wish that he had died as well.

The family returned to their town, bloody and dazed. The grandmother wept to God: Why did You allow the young people to die, and me to live? The parents took their dead sons right to their church. The ancient sanctuary bells of Qaraqosh tolled, calling Christians to the funeral mass. The sobbing family held photos of those who had been killed. They were buried. And even then, in the distance, the townspeople could hear more mortars exploding.

ISIS was coming.

In a moment of horror and confusion, the grandmother could not hear. She looked up in terror. “It was raining meat,” she said later. Human flesh.

It was the sweltering summer of 2014. The Islamic State, or ISIS, had spilled out of the blood and chaos of Syria, advancing into Iraq. They destroyed human beings when it suited them. The terrorists took over homes, churches, and shops, wrecking anything they did not steal. Black flags flew from vehicles filled with jeering jihadists. Shouts of “Allahu Akbar!” echoed in the dusty streets.

Even so, many of those who lived in this part of northern Iraq, in the mostly Christian towns and villages of the ancient Ninevah Plain, said that what happened was an odd blend of fear and reassurance. “Don’t worry,” the ISIS troops told many of them, particularly the elderly women. “We will not hurt you. You are our mother. We are your sons.”

Perhaps this was like the Jews of 1930s Europe being told that the ghettos were for their own safety.

In the mid-summer of 2014, many Americans were not yet fully aware of ISIS. The simmering situation in the Middle East, with its bloody civil war in Syria, attacks in Egypt’s Sinai, and continuing unrest in Israel, Palestine, northern Africa, and Yemen were worrisome, yes, but far away.

The beheading of James Foley, the brave American journalist captured by ISIS terrorists in Syria, would not be posted on social media until late August. His execution would shock and awaken many in the West. Sadly, he would be the first of many journalists, aid workers, Coptic Christians, minority Muslims, and others beheaded and burned by ISIS.

But again, back in the summer of 2014, many in the West were not yet fully awakened to the dark intentions of the Islamic State.

Meanwhile, Christians and other Iraqi minorities lived in a different world. Like other places in the Middle East, religious and ethnic minorities were often routinely hassled or denied in everyday tasks like getting a job, a driver’s license, or an apartment, simply because of their religion or origin. Christian cab drivers, their allegiance known because of the cross dangling from their rear view mirror, found that some riders would not use their services. Such were the challenges of everyday life.

It’s slightly ironic that Christians would face such issues. Iraq is known as the cradle of Christianity. The Bible indicates that ancient Mesopotamia, with its conflux of rivers, was the site of the Garden of Eden. The great patriarch Abraham came from Ur. Many believe the Old Testament prophets Daniel, Jonah, and Ezekiel are buried in Iraq. The earliest followers of Jesus Christ brought His gospel to Iraq. The Good News flourished there.

Islam flooded most of Iraq in A.D. 633, gradually taking over the land so that Christians were a distinct, tiny minority by 2014.

Today, various people groups with many different beliefs, passions, and causes populate Iraq’s territory. The U.S.-led war that toppled Saddam Hussein left a vacuum of power now occupied by many different entities. Ancient tribal allegiances are strong. Some political players are sheiks; all have intricate lines of loyalty. No one, particularly a Westerner, can aptly identify all the players, agendas, militias, military designs, and ancient allegiances.

IT WAS STILL AUG. 6, the longest day in the world for those in Qaraqosh. The entire town knew what had happened to the little boys and the young woman. They had also heard news reports about ISIS: In the last few days, the terrorists had killed hundreds of native Yezidis, an Iraqi minority group. The fighters had surrounded the fleeing Yezidis on Mount Sinjar. The rocky mountain was dry, dusty, and oppressive. There was no food or water. ISIS troops raped young women, killed children, and obliterated entire families. Some Yezidis chose to throw their children off the mountain rather than have their young ones fall into ISIS hands. It was a scene of horror, eerily reminiscent of ancient words from the New Testament: “[In the end, those who flee] will say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us!’ and to the hills, ‘Cover us!’”

Many Yezidi girls were captured, their male family members killed. They were sorted by their eye color, blue or green eyes fetching a higher price in the marketplace. They were also separated into “pretty” and “ugly” groups. They were sold among ISIS fighters and to others. Many were sent to Syria or other locations. Some killed themselves. A few escaped.

As the nuns made their way, slowly, along the dark, clogged road, women would run toward their van and beat on the windows, screaming, “Please! Please! Take our children!”

On the afternoon of Aug. 6, the courageous sisters of the Dominican convent in Qaraqosh held meetings. This was their home; they had great ministries to many needy people in the area. Should they flee before ISIS arrived? Should they stay? Surely the military forces—Peshmerga fighters of Iraq’s Kurdish lands—would protect them.

Still, there had been ominous signs. Over the past few weeks, rough men—strangers in a town where most people knew one another’s extended families—had yelled crude insults to the Iraqi nuns and to other Christian women. They appeared to be shepherds from surrounding villages, but no one knew for sure.

During the afternoon, the nuns looked out the windows of their home to see Kurdish soldiers taking off their uniforms and putting on civilian clothes. Not a good sign.

After dinner they celebrated mass. Then they received phone calls telling them that the hour of danger had come.

Fourteen sisters were loaded into two minivans. They took only an extra habit, each, and their purses.

“I had 250 books in my room,” said Sister Diana (the names of the Iraqis in this article have been changed for security reasons), a passionate Iraqi nun who holds doctorates from universities in the United States and Europe. “There was also a picture of Jesus that I loved: Jesus, the Teacher. I can’t imagine what ISIS has done to my things.”

It was 11:30 p.m. The streets were full of panicking people. There was no electricity. It was 115 degrees Fahrenheit. As the nuns made their way, slowly, along the dark, clogged road, women would run toward their van and beat on the windows, screaming, “Please! Please! Take our children!”

The sisters took children and their mothers into their vehicles, everyone squishing together in the sweaty space. But soon they could not fit any more.

“Five minutes felt like five years,” said Sister Diana. It took 11 hours for their packed vans to make it to Erbil, capitol of Kurdish Iraq and a place of relative safety, a distance of about 45 miles.

Later, they would hear from friends who had stayed behind that ISIS arrived in Qaraqosh at 5 a.m. Gunfire and shouts of “Allahu Akbar” filled the streets.

The same was true in other towns throughout the region. In one night, ISIS emptied ancient Christian and Yezidi lands of their people. Fifty thousand displaced human beings staggered into Erbil and its surrounding areas. Elderly people collapsed on the road and begged to be left to die. Sunburned toddlers and their exhausted mothers begged anyone they could find for water.

John, an affable Christian who owned a prosperous farm and various businesses in Qaraqosh, escaped. Later he would find that ISIS had taken over all his holdings. But in that long night he saw much he would prefer to forget.

“In my whole life I had never cried,” he said. “It’s just not part of our culture for men to cry. But I could not stop weeping that terrible night, just seeing the helpless people in the streets, groaning and crying.”

A Christian cab driver named Amed drove down a dark street, unknowingly, straight into a nest of ISIS soldiers. They forced him from his taxi. One crashed his left temple with the butt of his AK-47, broke his teeth, and then shattered his wrist and elbow with the heavy gun. Amed tumbled to the ground. The terrorist shot him twice, shouted “Allahu Akbar,” and left him dying on the road.

Later, a compassionate Kurdish soldier picked up Amed. He was taken to a hospital, where he received three pints of blood. He lived. Today he lives in a camp of displaced Christians in Erbil.

ISIS fighters painted the Arabic letter “N,” standing for “Nazarene,” on houses owned by followers of Jesus of Nazareth. They started with the gracious home of a Christian doctor. He had to flee. Later, he would find that his house had become a haven and home for ISIS troops.

Crosses were removed from churches, relics smashed, and structures bulldozed. Monks were expelled from their ancient monasteries. ISIS troops destroyed what’s believed to be the grave of the prophet Jonah, revered among Christians, Muslims, and Yezidis alike, and the traditional burial place of Seth, the son of Adam.

ISIS converted an 800-year-old church in Mosul into a place for torture. Another priceless church was made into a prison for Christians and any others who might offend ISIS sensibilities, while another was used to stockpile weapons.

“We have your daughter. When she grows up she will be ashamed of you. We are raising her as a child of ISIS.”

TODAY, AN HOUR OR SO from ISIS’s front lines, tens of thousands of men, women, and children are living in “internally displaced people” camps. They are known as IDPs. Their presence has swollen and challenged the Kurdish population of Erbil. International aid groups and non-governmental organizations have helped, but the local churches have carried the weight of the crisis.

In the beginning of their diaspora, displaced people slept in parks, on church grounds, and in the streets of Erbil. Gradually tent cities emerged, then other solutions. Today—six months since ISIS came—people who have been displaced from their comfortable homes live in a variety of conditions. Many lack electricity, running water, and any kind of healthcare. The summer heat has given way to freezing temperatures. Some are living in chicken coops or reclaimed outbuildings. Four hundred families live in the concrete hull of a partially finished Ankawa Mall, a cold, gray den. It is damp, dank, dangerous, and dark.

In an 11-foot-by-11-foot “room” in the mall, a couple now make their “home.” The husband is blind. Because of his condition, the family did not flee with the initial wave of people leaving Qaraqosh. ISIS captured them. As the wife and mother was sitting on an ISIS minibus, she did not know where she might be taken. The bus windows were smeared, blanked out with mud. A man came and stood before her. She held her 3-year-old daughter in her arms. The ISIS fighter tore the child from her as she wept.

Later, the family found that the child had been given to a religious leader of the terrorist group. Though the woman was later released and made her way to a camp for displaced Christians, a taunting phone call followed: “We have your daughter. When she grows up she will be ashamed of you. We are raising her as a child of ISIS.”

If you visit this couple today, they weep as they tell you of their little girl’s loss. There is no electricity in the place where they now sleep, displaced from their home and bereft of their daughter. The stench is heavy. But by a flashlight’s beam you can see, on the flimsy wall, a photo of the 3-year-old, and a picture of Jesus.

In another camp for displaced people, you would meet a beautiful young woman, 9 months pregnant. She smiles as she rocks her toddler boy. It was her cousin who was killed on the morning of her wedding day, Aug. 6. The mother-to-be will tell you, proudly, that her husband has left for military training. He is hoping that Christians, displaced by ISIS, can reclaim their ancient lands on the Ninevah Plain.

Around the corner from this woman, you might be accosted by the friendliest 12-year-old on the planet. “Hello!” she called out in English. “My name is Rebecca! Thank you for coming!”

She has thick black pigtails and a huge smile. ISIS displaced her and her family, like everyone else in this camp. Rebecca has not been in school since last summer. She desperately wants to learn more English. “I love you,” she will scrawl in your notebook.

Rebecca’s mother is a patient woman, though simmering with exuberance, like her daughter. She has three sons and two daughters. She and her husband had a nursery business, raising vegetables and flowers. As they fled Qaraqosh, with seven extended families, their driver got lost. They prayed, she said, and he found the right road.

Two years earlier, this mother had been in a marketplace in Mosul. An IED exploded. The shrapnel shredded her right eye. She will pop out the prosthesis—an orb with a nice brown iris—and show it to anyone who visits.

Still, like her daughter, this mom has hope. This is what she said:

“I want people in the U.S. to pray for us to return home. We have been 6 months in camps. The psychology affects our kids. They have no schools. No education. Our children are in prison. We keep thinking, this month we will go home … this month we will go home. As we’ve built up this [temporary home], we will also rebuild what they destroyed.”

When asked if it’s hard to trust God after all that has happened, this cheery woman responded:

“To the contrary! These sufferings have increased our faith in God. Without God we can do nothing. Even when we were trying to come here to escape, God changed our direction on the road, away from ISIS. At 11 p.m. each night, we all pray here in the camp. We have confidence that God is with us and He will do what is good for us. He saved us from ISIS and He will get us home.”

Not far from this camp is a Christian secondary school. Its classes are conducted in Assyrian; its students are all Christians. These are residents of Erbil. They are not displaced people, though they, like everyone else in the area, have been affected by the diaspora. Their textbooks are written in Aramaic, the ancient language spoken by Jesus Christ. These students are taught Kurdish, Arabic, and English. It’s a tough regimen.

If you visit a ninth-grade class, you might find a group of students studying history. They are learning about the attacks of the Mongols upon their land, many centuries ago. The Mongols, led by the grandson of Genghis Khan, attacked Iraq in 1258. They looted homes, destroyed places of worship, and burned libraries. They raped women and killed children. They captured Iraq’s ruler, rolled him in a rug, and trampled him with their horses.

The school headmaster, when asked if ISIS is worse than the Mongol hordes, does not hesitate:

“Yes. At least there was not as much civilization back then. Now their destruction is worse because we have civilization. Radical Islam gives them power to kill, assault, be in authority—this is all in Islam itself. The West needs to understand this. Twenty years from now we will not be here if nothing is done.”

In a classroom full of 12th-grade students, an outspoken young woman speaks for her peers. Her words are a mixture of fatalism and hope:

“We have no future here. I believe Jesus Christ will help us. We all feel abandoned by Iraq’s government. Our dream is to be safe here and to live in peace. The displaced people have complicated our lives, but they are our people. Their situation is our situation. It is my country. I will stay.”

Iraq’s displaced and wounded people exhibit the same determination. If you sit with the grandfather, the one who lost his little grandsons to the ISIS mortar in the courtyard, you will hear it.

He is asked, “Did this terrible suffering cause you to lose your faith in God?”

The grandfather responded, “No! I believe in God.”

Then he pointed to the terrible photos taken on the day his grandsons died. If you look at the photos of the blood-smeared walls of his courtyard, the slaughter of the innocents, it’s overwhelming. “I believe,” the grandfather said. “And I know that it is the blood of Christ that cleanses us of all evil.”

“I believe,” the grandfather said. “And I know that it is the blood of Christ that cleanses us of all evil.”

One cannot help but wonder: If the Islamic State is not destroyed, and if ISIS achieves its goal to take broad sectors of the Middle East as its own caliphate, then full-scale liquidation—not just the evil displacement, suffering, and second-hand citizenship of its targets—is next. The obvious comparison is the situation in late 1930s Nazi Europe. First the Jews were harassed, forced from their homes, randomly killed, and put in ghettos and camps. When the civilized world did not respond, 6 million were then annihilated—their lives, families, ancient culture, and identity lost forever.

Do we in the West want another such genocide to take place on our watch?