Congressmen condemn Obama silence on Christian 'genocide'
'Unless we call this what it is, we will be judged poorly'
Published: 7 hours ago
President Obama has essentially remained mute on Christian genocide in the Middle East, so a bipartisan group of lawmakers has introduced a resolution to fill the leadership void.
“Last year, the world watched in horror as ISIS initiated a political and religious insurrection in the name of establishing a caliphate across Iraq and Syria,” said California Democrat Juan Vargas on Friday, the Washington Examiner reported. “We must not mince words, today a genocide is being committed against Christians and other religious minorities in their historic homelands throughout the greater Middle East. These crimes against humanity must be properly acknowledged in order for the global community to appropriately respond to these infringements on religious freedom.”
The resolution was introduced Thursday by Democratic Rep. Anna Eshoo of California along with Republican Jeff Fortenberry of Nebraska.
“I think that unless we call this and name this what it is, that we will be judged poorly and so it’s with sadness that I say that we have legislation to call this a genocide,” said Eshoo, CNS News reported.
“Christians are in trouble throughout the Middle East and northern Africa – I hope this administration dials up concern for Christians … I don’t know what the administration thought, that things couldn’t get worse or whatever,” said Texas Republican Ted Poe, the Examiner reported.
“Does this administration care? This is genocide,” said former Republican Rep. Frank Wolf of Virginia, the newspaper reported. Wolf noted February’s beheading of 21 Coptic Christians in Libya; those killed were only referred to by the White House as “21 Egyptians.”
Paul Marshall, Lela Gilbert and Nina Shea have collaborated to create “Persecuted: The Global Assault on Christians,” which confirms that groups like Pew Research, Newsweek and The Economist also identify Christians as “the world’s most widely persecuted religious group.”
Although the Obama administration ordered airstrikes in Iraq to help save Iraq’s Yezidi religious minority on Mount Sinjar, the president has come under consistent criticism for not being more vocal about the nation’s vanishing Christian population. Iraq’s Christians, once 1.5 million strong, have dwindled to 300,000, the Examiner reported.
“The head of the Maronite church got down on his knees [in front of me] and said, ‘Please help us get out, or otherwise they’re going to kill each one,’” Republican Rep. Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina said Thursday, the newspaper reported.
Obama also made headlines in February when he used the the annual National Prayer Breakfast to highlight the “terrible deeds” done in the name of Christianity.
Instead of calling ISIS “Islamic,” however, he referred to the terror group as a “brutal vicious death cult that in the name of religion carries out unspeakable acts of barbarism.”
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http://www.wnd.com/2015/09/congressmen-condemn-obama-silence-on-christian-genocide/#3Xq4kKL3yTIe1lMK.99
