[link removed]

In this mailing:
* Raymond Ibrahim: 'Remove Your Church': The Persecution of Christians, March 2023
* Amir Taheri: Iran: The Dollarization Temptation


** 'Remove Your Church': The Persecution of Christians, March 2023 ([link removed])
------------------------------------------------------------

by Raymond Ibrahim • April 16, 2023 at 5:00 am
[link removed] [link removed] [link removed] [link removed]
istians%2C+March+2023 [link removed] [link removed]
* "You should remove your church, because we cannot watch our members turning to Christianity and keep quiet." — Sheikh Shafi Mukama "ordering the father and son to leave [their church] in 2022, while other from the mob kept watch outside," morningstarnews.org, March 22, 2023, Uganda.
* "Requirements for obtaining permission to build houses of worship in Indonesia are onerous and hamper the establishment of such buildings for Christians and other faiths.... [T]hey are often met with delays or lack of response from officials. Well-organized radical Muslims secretly mobilize outside people to intimidate and pressure members of minority faiths." — morningstarnews.org, March 24, 2023, Indonesia.
* "According to the UN, ongoing insecurity in eastern DRC [Democratic Republic of Congo] has displaced 300,000 from their homes in February alone." — opendoors.ph, March 22, 2023, Democratic Republic of Congo.
* "It is a massacre like...killing animals." — A key church minister, persecution.org, International Christian Concern March 20, 2023, Democratic Republic of Congo.
* "For leaving Islam to accept Christ," say a Mar. 19 report, "a young mother... was chained in her home, subjected to electrical shocks at a psychiatric hospital and has lost her children." .... [H]er problems began, chiefly from her Muslim husband, who "tried to force her to renounce her faith by chaining her legs and tightening the chains.... [H]er parents and siblings are all Muslims [a local source said ([link removed]) ], who believe she is suffering mental illness for believing in Christ." — morningstarnews, March 19, 2023, Sudan.
* "[S]ince the start of the war, the Christian population has reportedly diminished by more than 80 per cent, from an estimated 1.5 million to 250,000... More than 350 churches have been destroyed in attacks carried out by terrorists during this period.... On the 20th anniversary of the Iraq war, therefore, I want to raise awareness about the country's Christians, in the hope that the international community acts to prevent their tragedy from continuing before it is too late." — Report by Natasha Dado, thenationalnews.com, April 16, 2023.
* "The rampant trafficking of Coptic women and girls is a direct violation of their most basic rights.... The crimes committed against these women must be urgently addressed by the Egyptian government, ending impunity for kidnappers, their accomplices, and police who refuse to perform their duties.... The large majority of these women are never reunited with their families or friends because police response in Egypt is dismissive and corrupt. There are countless families who report that police have either been complicit in the kidnapping or at the very least bribed into silence." — copticsolidarity.org, March 16, 2023 and September 10, 2020, Egypt.
* "For Christians in the Middle East, the Christmas season is not 'the most beautiful time of the year' as in the popular Andy Williams song. On the contrary, after two millennia of Christian presence, the Middle East is slowly but surely being cleansed of Christians.... It is striking that the Western powers, which have a majority Christian population, are not concerned at all by such a disaster." — Matija Šerić, "Christians In The Middle East: A Persecuted And Forgotten People," eurasiareview.com, April 15,2023.
* "The only country in the region with a growing Christian community is Israel, where the Christian population grew by 1.4% in 2020.... Christians in Israel benefit from the only functioning democracy in the Middle East... According to the Israel Bureau of Statistics from December 2021, 84% of Christians surveyed said they were satisfied with life in Israel." — Matija Šerić, "Christians In The Middle East: A Persecuted And Forgotten People."
* The report further makes clear that Christians suffer, not just from "terrorists," but Muslim state and society: "The legal political and social order in many Arab countries is a source of discrimination....[T]he system is hostile towards all non-Muslims, especially Christians. Christians are often not second or third but tenth class citizens, they suffer discrimination in the educational system, in the workplace, the community tries to ostracize them." — Matija Šerić, "Christians In The Middle East: A Persecuted And Forgotten People."

According to a recent report titled, "Gaza Churches Struggle to Survive", "Gaza's Christian community is struggling to survive after years of steady decline in numbers. Only an estimated 1,000 Christian remain in the Gaza Strip, an area of more than 2 million residents." Pictured: St. Barfirious Church in Gaza City on September 15, 2006, shortly after terrorists attacked it with a hand grenade. (Photo by Mohammed Abed/AFP via Getty Images)

The following are among the murders and abuses inflicted on Christians by Muslims throughout the month of March 2023:

Muslim Attacks on Churches

France: On Mar. 16, a man, previously "on file for his Islamist radicalization," stormed the Saint-Hippolyte Church in Paris and disrupted its service. He also stole the church's six foot tall Plexiglas cross, which had supported a 400-year-old wooden Christ. It was later found nearby, said police, "smashed into many pieces." The man was "taken to the psychiatric infirmary of the Paris police headquarters, his condition not being considered compatible with his police custody."

Continue Reading Article ([link removed])


** Iran: The Dollarization Temptation ([link removed])
------------------------------------------------------------

by Amir Taheri • April 16, 2023 at 4:00 am
[link removed] [link removed] [link removed] [link removed] [link removed]
ran%3A+The+Dollarization+Temptation [link removed]
* [T]he inner circle is working on a different scheme aimed at tying the Iranian economy to the Chinese, and to a lesser extent, the Russian economies. This is presented as part of a scheme by the trio to "dethrone the dollar" and reduce US economic power globally. The first step in that direction is Tehran's decision to accept the Chinese currency in payment for part of oil imports from Iran.
* The trouble is that while the value of the dollar is worked out by the market, the value of the Chinese currency is decided by the Central Committee of the Communist Party. Thus, as in any monopsony, China would be able to pay Iran whatever the Central Committee decides.

To dollarize or not to dollarize? This is the question that the ruling elite in Tehran is beginning to ask both in private and, increasingly, in public. Pictured: A currency exchange shop in Tehran, Iran on February 21, 2023. (Photo by Atta Kenare/AFP via Getty Images)

To dollarize or not to dollarize? This is the question that the ruling elite in Tehran is beginning to ask both in private and, increasingly, in public. At issue is to accept the US dollar as a de facto second currency of Iran at a time that the national currency, often known as the touman, continues a plummeting trajectory that enters its fifth year.

According to the newly-appointed governor of the Central Bank of Iran, Muhammad Reza Farzin, Iran has just completed its fourth year of negative economic growth and is entering a fifth year with no prospect of a turnabout for at least two more years.

Continue Reading Article ([link removed])

============================================================
** Facebook ([link removed])
** Twitter ([link removed])
** RSS ([link removed])
** Donate ([link removed])
Copyright © Gatestone Institute, All rights reserved.

You are subscribed to this list as [email protected]

You can change how you receive these emails:
** Update your subscription preferences ([link removed])
or ** Unsubscribe from this list ([link removed])

** Gatestone Institute ([link removed])

14 East 60 St., Suite 705, New York, NY 10022