Hamas digging up Christian graves in Gaza, claims rights group
The leader of a Christian human rights group who arrived in Israel on Sunday claimed that Hamas is regularly digging up Christian graves in the Gaza
Strip and disposing of the bodies of believers in Jesus.
Speaking to The Jerusalem Post, Reverend Majed El Shafie, President of One Free World International (OFWI), asserted that "Hamas digs up the bodies
of Christians from Christian burial sites in the Gaza Strip claiming that they pollute the earth."
El Shafie is heading a delegation of human rights activists, Canadian lawmakers and religious personalities, and hopes to enlist Israel's help in
combatting the persecution of Christians in the Muslim world.
According to El Shafie, as many as 300 million Christians around the world today live under persecution, 80 percent of them in Muslim nations.
Christians living under Palestinian rule periodically speak out regarding the persecution they endure, but for the most part keep silent for fear of
their Muslim neighbors. The situation is much worse in the Gaza Strip, where less than 3,000 Christians live among 1.3 million Muslims, than it is in
the so-called "West Bank."
El Shafie himself has a history with Israel. Born to a conservative Muslim family in Cairo, El Shafie converted to Christianity in the late 1990s and
was subsequently arrested, tortured and condemned to death. He managed to escape to the Sinai Peninsula, and then to Israel, where he was arrested for
breaching the border and imprisoned in Beersheva for nearly a year.
Following his imprisonment in Israel, El Shafie obtained political asylum in Canada.
http://www.israeltoday.co.il/default.aspx?tabid=178&nid=20156
More info:
http://www.onefreeworldinternational.org/?q=home
http://www.onefreeworldinternational.org/?q=israel091115
That's quite a story of El Shafie and praise God for his asylum in Canada. The Palestinian Christians do have it really hard-between a rock and a
hard place.
They need our prayers.
Agreed Dave. That entire article was extraordinary. I hope Israel will help with the protection of Christians in the
Mulsim world.