Church closures in Indonesia that peaked during the Christmas holidays have spilled over into January as Islamist groups continue to target Christian congregations, according to International Christian Concern.
The Ulema Advisory Council of Banda Aceh has instructed its Muslim community not to celebrate Christmas and New Year’s.
Extremists from the Islamic Defenders Front have disrupted the Sunday services of the Tandemn Huria Kristen Batak Protestant community of Binjai in the Indonesian province of Sumatra.
Islamists in Indonesia are demanding the removal of a new political appointee in a Muslim-majority region of West Java because she’s a Christian, according to Barnabas Aid.
Within one year and without any legal pretext, 17 churches and chapels in the province of Aceh, Indonesia, have been closed under Islamic law.
Crowds cheered as a demolition crew destroyed the newly erected walls of the Batak Protestant Church in the Bekasi district of Jakarta Thursday in yet another setback for Christians trying to survive in the planet’s most populous Muslim nation.
Protestants from two officially restricted churches in West Java gave 6,000 postcards to Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, asking him for permission to worship in their own buildings for Christmas.
The new mayor of Tasikmalaya in West Java, Indonesia, has vowed to implement Shari’a in order to repay Muslim leaders who backed his successful election campaign.
In Bekasi, Indonesia, just a few miles south of Jakarta, unrestrained Muslims mobs are shutting down Christian services, threatening pastors and pressuring local officials to move congregations out of their churches.
Muslim protesters prevented a Protestant church from holding Sunday service in Bekasi district, West Java.
The Indonesian Minister for Home Affairs has told the GKI Yasmin Church congregation in Bogor, West Java, that it must again relocate.
Despite the presence of police, hundreds of Islamists again attacked the prayer house of the Protestant Christian Batak Church in Bekasi, Jakarta.
For three days an unidentified mob set fire to homes and vehicles in a predominantly Christian neighborhood in the Moluccas as dozens of families fled in fear of suspected Islamists.
Since May, the Aceh administration has shut down 16 Christian places of worship in Singkil, claiming they were operating without permits and causing complaints.
A mob of Muslims disrupted the worship services of about 100 members of a GKI Yasmin congregation that were being held at a member’s home in Bogor, West Java on Sunday.
A New Jersey community of 72 Indonesians who years ago were spared deportation after a pastor brokered an agreement with immigration authorities allowing them them to stay in the country temporarily may soon be deported thanks to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
Muslims of the Islamic Defender Front aided by local officials recently shut down a Protestant church in Jatinangor on rumors that the church was a haven for newly baptised Christians.
A suicide bomber attacked a Protestant church packed with worshippers in Indonesia’s Central Java province on Sunday, September 25, killing himself while injuring over 20 others, police and officials said.
The toll from recent clashes between Christians and Muslims in Ambon, capital of the Moluccas, is three dead and 60 wounded.
Bogor’s mayor has a new reason not to allow the Yasmin church to open: the name of the street on which it is built bears an Islamic name.