1 00:00:00,390 --> 00:00:03,970 Which is the most persecuted religious group in the world today? 2 00:00:03,970 --> 00:00:08,170 The answer in terms of sheer numbers and sheer horror might surprise you. 3 00:00:08,170 --> 00:00:12,220 It’s Christians, specifically Christians living in Muslim-majority countries, 4 00:00:12,230 --> 00:00:15,700 countries where Christians often preceded Muslims by centuries. 5 00:00:15,700 --> 00:00:18,980 I’m not talking about “War on Christmas” type harassment; I’m talking 6 00:00:18,990 --> 00:00:22,270 about “know your place or we’re going to kill you” persecution. 7 00:00:22,270 --> 00:00:26,560 Astonishingly, the Western mainstream media barely acknowledge what is happening. 8 00:00:26,560 --> 00:00:30,840 Let’s look closer at this issue. It tells us a lot about the world we’re living in. 9 00:00:30,849 --> 00:00:35,420 One hundred years ago, 20% of North Africa and the Middle East, the birthplace of Christianity, 10 00:00:35,420 --> 00:00:39,400 was Christian. Today, Christians make up 4% of the population. 11 00:00:39,400 --> 00:00:42,100 Much of that decline has occurred in the last decade. 12 00:00:42,100 --> 00:00:46,460 In essence Muslims are rendering North Africa and the Middle East free of Christians. 13 00:00:46,460 --> 00:00:49,399 Take Egypt, for example, my ancestral homeland. 14 00:00:49,399 --> 00:00:53,559 In just the past two years, tens of thousands of Christian Copts have left Egypt. 15 00:00:53,560 --> 00:00:56,900 And many others want to leave, but they simply cannot afford to. 16 00:00:56,900 --> 00:00:59,140 Why they want to leave is no mystery. 17 00:00:59,140 --> 00:01:05,140 On New Year’s Day 2011, the Two Saints Church in Alexandria was bombed, leaving 23 Copts dead 18 00:01:05,140 --> 00:01:09,600 and 97 injured. In recent years dozens of Coptic churches have been attacked, 19 00:01:09,600 --> 00:01:14,439 many burned to the ground. In August 2013 alone, the Muslim Brotherhood and its supporters 20 00:01:14,439 --> 00:01:20,139 attacked and destroyed some 80 churches. Unfortunately, Egypt is more the rule than the exception. 21 00:01:20,140 --> 00:01:23,320 Hundreds of Nigerian churches have been destroyed in recent years, 22 00:01:23,320 --> 00:01:27,500 with especially deadly attacks reserved for Christmas and Easter church services, 23 00:01:27,500 --> 00:01:32,680 leaving dozens dead or mutilated. Churches have been bombed or burned in Iraq, Syria, 24 00:01:32,680 --> 00:01:37,620 and just about every place in the Middle East where churches still exist except Israel. 25 00:01:37,620 --> 00:01:41,860 Christian businesses have been torched, Christian girls have been kidnapped, sold as child brides 26 00:01:41,860 --> 00:01:45,680 or slaves, and had acid thrown in their faces for not being veiled. 27 00:01:45,680 --> 00:01:51,380 Anyone born a Muslim who converts to Christianity faces jail and possibly execution. 28 00:01:51,380 --> 00:01:56,460 The list of fresh atrocities by Muslims against Christians grows longer almost every day. 29 00:01:56,460 --> 00:02:00,440 Even in Muslim countries often portrayed as “moderate” -- Morocco, Indonesia, 30 00:02:00,440 --> 00:02:03,560 Malaysia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan -- 31 00:02:03,560 --> 00:02:07,840 Christian minorities are under legal pressure not to build churches or evangelize. 32 00:02:07,840 --> 00:02:11,780 The Christians in these Muslim countries are often identical to their co-citizens in race, 33 00:02:11,780 --> 00:02:16,420 ethnicity, national identity, culture, and language; there is no political dispute between 34 00:02:16,420 --> 00:02:21,300 the Christians and Muslims, no land dispute. Vastly outnumbered and politically marginalized, 35 00:02:21,300 --> 00:02:25,810 these Christians simply wish to worship in peace. Instead they are hounded and attacked. 36 00:02:25,810 --> 00:02:30,980 So, then, why is this happening? And why is the media making so little mention of it? 37 00:02:30,980 --> 00:02:35,670 The first question is easy to answer. Christians are being persecuted in Muslim countries because 38 00:02:35,670 --> 00:02:39,849 they’re Christians, or as the Quran puts it, “infidels,” that is, non-Muslims, 39 00:02:39,849 --> 00:02:45,170 who are regarded by many fundamentalist Muslims as inferior. As a fundamentalist interpretation 40 00:02:45,170 --> 00:02:49,840 of the holy books of Islam has grown in the last fifty or so years, Christians have suffered. 41 00:02:49,840 --> 00:02:54,620 And in recent years, they have suffered terribly. I document this in my book, Crucified Again: 42 00:02:54,620 --> 00:02:58,590 Exposing Islam's New War on Christians. If this were happening to any other group 43 00:02:58,590 --> 00:03:02,010 besides Christians, it would be the human rights tragedy of our time. 44 00:03:02,010 --> 00:03:04,710 There would be loud worldwide calls for action. 45 00:03:04,710 --> 00:03:08,910 But the silence in the mainstream Western media is, as they say, almost deafening. 46 00:03:08,910 --> 00:03:10,250 Why? 47 00:03:10,250 --> 00:03:14,920 Because Muslim persecution of Christians throws a wrench in the media’s narrative that “Muslim 48 00:03:14,920 --> 00:03:19,489 violence is a product of Muslim grievance.” That grievance is, first and foremost, portrayed 49 00:03:19,489 --> 00:03:25,080 as the sin of European colonialism and alleged American imperialism. In the Muslim world’s mind, 50 00:03:25,080 --> 00:03:28,860 those two sins are personified by the Jewish State of Israel, a nation the Muslim 51 00:03:28,860 --> 00:03:32,320 world believes was forced upon it by the colonial powers of Europe 52 00:03:32,320 --> 00:03:36,180 following World War II and is currently supported by the United States. 53 00:03:36,190 --> 00:03:40,730 Much of the Western world and the Western media have largely bought at least some of this narrative. 54 00:03:40,730 --> 00:03:42,030 Here’s how it works: 55 00:03:42,030 --> 00:03:46,270 Because Israel, with the backing of the United States, is stronger than its Muslim neighbors, 56 00:03:46,270 --> 00:03:51,280 the media, while not defending Islamic terrorism, often portray terror against Israel, America, 57 00:03:51,290 --> 00:03:55,909 and even Europe as the actions of understandably angry “underdogs” fighting for what they 58 00:03:55,909 --> 00:04:00,629 deem “justice.” But what happens to this media narrative when Islamic terror is directed 59 00:04:00,629 --> 00:04:04,739 against a minority weaker than them -- in this case, the millions of indigenous Christians 60 00:04:04,739 --> 00:04:09,639 throughout the Islamic world? The answer is that, rather than abandon this narrative, 61 00:04:09,640 --> 00:04:13,340 the media just don’t report Muslim persecution of Christians except for the most 62 00:04:13,349 --> 00:04:17,790 sensational cases. That’s why you probably don’t know that there are barely any Christians 63 00:04:17,790 --> 00:04:22,670 living in Algeria, Tunisia and Libya, nations where Christianity once thrived. 64 00:04:22,670 --> 00:04:26,880 Or, that this is happening in Egypt, Iraq, Iran, and even Lebanon. 65 00:04:26,880 --> 00:04:31,680 So, yes, Christians are indeed the most persecuted religious group in the world today. 66 00:04:31,680 --> 00:04:37,240 But reporting it would violate the media’s narrative of Christians as persecutors and Muslims as victims. 67 00:04:37,260 --> 00:04:42,000 I’m Raymond Ibrahim, author of the Al-Qaeda Reader, for Prager University.