Syria: Church leaders escape assassination attempt
By Joseph DeCaro, Worthy News Correspondent
(Worthy News) – Patriarch Ignatius Aphrem II and other senior leaders of the Syriac Orthodox Church survived an assassination attempt on June 19.
According to Barnabas Aid, an assassin disguised as a priest tried to infiltrate a church service in the Syrian town of Qamishli where a local congregation had gathered to memorialize the 3.5 million Christians who were slaughtered under Turkish Ottoman rule.
After the Patriarch’s bodyguards were alerted to the threat, they physically prevented the “priest” from reaching his intended target. So the would-be assassin instead decided to detonate his explosives then and there, killing three bodyguards and injuring scores of believers.
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