Representatives of a Messianic Jewish community in the southern Israeli town of Arad said Monday, March 21, they face “increased persecution” by ultra-Orthodox Jews who accuse the believers of missionary activities and want them to leave Israel.
Five Iranian house church Christians were behind bars Wednesday, March 15, after being sentenced to one year imprisonment on charges of “crimes against the Islamic order” and there were reports that Iranian authorities have been burning Bibles.
At least over 30 Christians who were recently detained remained behind bars in Iran Tuesday, February 22, but there were reports that scores of other believers were released after being held by security forces in several parts of the strict Islamic nation.
An Iranian court has told arrested evangelical Christians who may face execution on charges of apostasy that they “should be punished”, but that their trial “has been postpone for April,” a senior church official said Thursday, February 17.
A modern day exodus of Christians into the autonomous Kurdish regions of Iraq greatly increased after a series of attacks against them, according to the International Organization for Migration.
According to the Iranian Christian News Agency (Mohabat News), 10 new Christians from the city of Dezful about to celebrate Christmas Eve with fellow Christians from Ahvaz and Andimeshk were arrested by security forces the day before Christmas.
Iranian Christian leaders called for a day of prayer following a new wave of arrests of believers with Muslim backgrounds in Tehran and other cities.
Last Christmas, the Iranian government began arresting Christians, raiding and ransacking their homes as they are taken to prison and interogation.
An Iranian Christian by name of Reza T. was temporarily freed from prison after posting a $15,000 bail, Worthy News has learned.
Iranian Christians requested prayers Sunday, January 16, amid a new wave of arrests of Christian converts, many of them former Muslims.
Up to 70 Christians have been detained in Iran as part of a government crackdown on evangelical believers, Worthy News established Saturday, January 8. Most of those behind bare are thought to be former Muslims.
“Many” church services have been canceled in Iraq over the Christmas period following deadly attacks and new terror threats, several church groups said Friday December 24.
Several Christians in Iran prepared Wednesday, December 22, to spend Christmas behind bars, including at least two Iranian pastors who face the death penalty on charges of ‘apostasy’, or abandoning Islam.
Rights activists urged Egypt’s government Friday, December 10, to free hundreds of Eritrean and other African refugees, including Christians, who they said have been held as hostages by human traffickers in the Sinai Desert for over a month, and probably sold to other dealers.
Hundreds of Iraqi Christian families are fleeing Iraq’s capital Baghdad and the town of Mosul as murderers target families in their own homes and workplaces, a well-informed advocacy group said Wednesday, December 8.
An elderly Christian couple was gunned down in their Baghdad home Sunday night in what is the latest incident in a string of religious-rooted attacks against Christians in Iraq.
A Christian member of the European Parliament urged the European Union’s executive body, the European Commission, on Wednesday, December 1, to prevent the death sentence of Iranian house church leader Yousef Nadarkhani.
Iraq said Saturday, November 27, that its security forces have detained a dozen militants suspected of helping take Christians hostage in a church siege that killed scores of worshipers and two priests last month.
A detained pastor of a major network of Christian house churches in Iran will be executed by hanging for “apostasy”, or abandoning Islam, according to translated court documents seen by Worthy News Wednesday, November 24.
In a series of brazen attacks against a beseiged religious minority, gunmen recently broke into a home in northern Iraq, killing two Christian men while a bombing of a Christian home in Mosul Monday wounded a bystander.