Crucified Again: Exposing Islam's New War on Christians (23 page)

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Authors: Raymond Ibrahim

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As Amnesty International reported back in 1994,
Several dozen people have been charged with blasphemy in Pakistan over the last few years;
in all the cases known to Amnesty International, the charges of blasphemy appear to have been arbitrarily brought
, founded solely on the individuals’ minority religious beliefs.... The available evidence in all these cases suggests that charges were brought as a measure
to intimidate and punish members of minority religious communities
. . .
hostility towards religious minority groups appeared in many cases to be compounded by personal enmity, professional or economic rivalry or a desire to gain political advantage
. As a consequence, Amnesty International has concluded that most of the individuals now facing charges of blasphemy, or convicted on such charges,
are prisoners of conscience, detained solely for their real or imputed religious beliefs in violation of their right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion
. [Emphasis added.]
111
 
The most notorious blasphemy case against a Christian in Pakistan in modern times illustrates Amnesty’s point here. In November 2010, Asia Bibi, a married mother of five, was sentenced to death in accordance to Section 295-C for “defaming” the Muslim prophet Muhammad.
Back in June 2009 while working as a farm laborer, she had been told to fetch water. When Asia returned, some Muslim coworkers refused to drink the water, complaining that it was “unclean” because a Christian brought it. Arguments ensued. Moreover, there was already a feud between Asia and one of her Muslim neighbors concerning property damage. It was not long before her coworkers went and complained to a Muslim cleric, accusing Asia of making insulting statements about the Muslim prophet Muhammad. A mob stormed her home, severely beating Asia and her family, including children. She was later arrested and in November 2010 a Punjabi court fined her and sentenced her to death by hanging for insulting Muhammad.
Asia’s case, like that of the Iranian pastor Nardkhani, was one of the rare cases actually to receive media coverage, resulting in international calls for her release—as well as threats from Pakistani Muslims that if she were released, they would take the (Sharia) law in their own hands and slaughter her. One mosque prayer leader has even offered $6,000 to anyone who kills her.
Two of the most prominent advocates for Asia Bibi, Governor Salmaan Taseer and Minority Affairs Minister Shabaz Bhatti, were both murdered. Taseer was shot twenty-seven times by his own bodyguard as he exited his mother’s home. The assassin cited as his motivation the fact that the governor was supportive of the Christian woman accused of blasphemy. As for Bhatti, a Christian, Muslims from al-Qaeda or the Taliban assassinated him for his outspoken position against Pakistan’s blasphemy law and his support for Asia. His car was ambushed and sprayed with bullets. A letter left at the scene said that anyone who tried to tamper with Pakistan’s blasphemy law would suffer the same fate.
112
Bhatti, who received a large number of death threats, had predicted his own murder. In a prerecorded video released after his assassination he said, “I believe in Jesus Christ who has given his own life for us . . . and I am ready to die for a cause . . . I’m living for my community . . . and I will die to defend their rights.”
113
The investigation into his murder was so lax (a series of suspects were freed) as to suggest that the Pakistani government may have been involved in—or at least sympathetic to—the assassination of the anti-blasphemy law Christian.
114
Because her case garnered so much attention and condemnation from the international community, Asia Bibi has not yet been executed. But she still languishes in jail, sick and isolated, and regularly beaten by both prison guards and Muslim inmates. In late 2011 it was reported that the female prison officer assigned to provide security for Asia beat her, “because of the Muslim officer’s anti-Christian bias, while other staff members deployed for her security looked on in silence.”
115
While Asia Bibi’s case is one of the most notorious examples of the abuse of Pakistani Christians under the accusation of blasphemy, there are countless other instances of the same phenomenon.
In March 2012 twenty-six-year-old Shamim Bibi, a Christian mother of a newborn baby, was arrested after neighbors accused her of “uttering remarks against Muhammad.” A few days earlier, some of her relatives who had converted to Islam pressured her to do likewise, but she had refused, “telling them that she was satisfied with Christianity and did not want to convert.”
116
Shamim was arrested for blasphemy soon thereafter. According to her husband Bashir, the accusation is completely baseless: “I was present with her at the time of the alleged incident . . . nothing of the sort happened. The Muslims cooked up a false story, though it’s still not clear who provoked them into leveling this accusation.” Other witnesses concur. After visiting her in jail, her husband said that Shamim “was holding fast to her Christian faith and firmly believed that God would rescue her soon from the false charge,” adding that “She is alright otherwise, but she especially misses her daughter. . . .”
117
In February 2012, Muslims targeted Saira Khokhar, a Christian teacher, on the baseless allegation that she had burned a Koran. A mob stormed her school, which is run by City Foundation, a Christian NGO, and seized her, but local police intervened and took her into custody.
118
In June 2011, Dildar Masih, a twenty-seven-year-old married Christian father of two, was arrested and charged with “blasphemy” after he rescued his eight-year-old nephew, known as Sunny, from a beating at the hands of Muslim youths who were trying to force him to convert to Islam by making him recite the
shehada
. “Seeing the attack from a distance, Masih shouted and rushed to the scene, rescued his nephew and then went to his work as a painter. Soon after the incident, a Muslim mob of about 55 led by the village prayer leader besieged Masih’s house,” insisting that “the blasphemer” be turned over to them and shouting other Islamic slogans. According to Masih’s elderly father, who witnessed the attack, “They pounced on him like tigers.... They slapped him, kicked him, and my poor son didn’t even know why he was being tortured.” He was arrested but eventually released from prison after being threatened and harassed by Muslim inmates and jail officials.
119
In June 2012 an Islamic group attempted to burn down a Christian village after accusing a mentally retarded Christian, Ramzan Masih, of blasphemy. In the words of a villager, “These people [Muslims] do not let us live. We are poor but are working hard to survive. On the night of the incident a mob of Muslim clerics gathered [around] our colony to burn us all because of the Blapshemy [
sic
] Ramzan [was said to have] committed. Everyone was very scared. We all have small children in our houses and we didn’t know what to do. The mob surrounded our colony and raised a slogan to burn all the houses; they had torches in their hands and petrol in the cans. We called police and thank God police arrived just in time. ”
120
In May 2012, a twenty-year-old Christian man, Sajid Inayat, was arrested and charged with “blasphemy” after vengeful Muslims accused him of burning a Koran after they lost a billiard game. The Muslims kept taunting and threatening him, and the Christian “dared them to do whatever they wanted and walked away.” Days later came the accusation and arrest, which caused Muslim riots, spreading “panic among Christians.” As a result, “several people left their houses anticipating violence.”
121
In August 2012, a Pakistani flag—which has the name of “Allah” on it—flew from a Christian’s property to a Muslim’s, and the latter accused the former of deliberately trying to blaspheme the name of Allah. This accusation was publicized in local mosques, prompting enraged Muslims to threaten to burn the homes of the Christian families in the area.
122
In December 2011, after a quarrel about the rent, a Muslim landlord accused his Christian tenant, twenty-five-year-old Khuram Masih, of desecrating the Koran. The accusation led crowds of Muslims to surround the Christian’s home, making threats and hurling anti-Christian slogans. Muslim leaders from several mosques made loud announcements calling for “severe punishment.” Accordingly, Khuram was arrested and charged under Pakistan’s blasphemy laws.
123
In September 2011, Faryal Tauseef Bhatti, a Christian student in eighth grade, was expelled from school because she misspelled an Urdu word in a way that apparently changed its meaning from praise to disparagement of Muhammad, “leading to accusations of ‘blasphemy.’” After the teacher severely beat her, the principal was notified and local Muslims demonstrated, “demanding registration of a criminal case against the eighth-grader and her eviction from the area.” As riots and violence were about to erupt, the military intervened: “They bundled the family in an ambulance and took them away.... ”
124
In September 2011,“Javed Masih,” a Christian high school teacher, “suffered false accusations of blasphemy by a student and some Muslim professors, because of dislike, revenge and hatred towards Christians.” He was forced to leave his job; he appealed to court, but the judge simply suggested he “leave the country.” A married father of three, he has been uprooted and is in hiding.
125
Also in September 2011, Aslam Masih, a thirty-year-old Christian man who had been accused of blasphemy and subsequently imprisoned, died in his cell from “‘a treatable disease’ after officials denied him proper medical care.”
126
While in prison, he and others “accused of blasphemy, were kept in solitary confinement without access to a toilet, water or electricity.”
127
The case against Aslam was at one point dropped because of a lack of evidence but reinstated as a result of pressure exerted by Islamic fanatics.
In March 2011, Qamar David, a Christian serving a life sentence on accusations that he had sent text messages blaspheming the prophet of Islam, died amid suspicions that he was murdered. The Christian had expressed fears for his life several times during the trial. “David did not die of a heart attack as the jail officials are claiming,” said his former lawyer. “He was being threatened ever since the trial began, and he had also submitted a written application with the jail authorities for provision of security, but no step was taken in this regard.” Conflicting versions of his death from jail officials have also raised doubts.
128
In May 2011, hundreds of Muslims “attacked Christians’ homes, a school and a Presbyterian church building after learning” that a Christian father and son who had earlier been accused of “blasphemy”—under the absurd allegation that they had disseminated a letter commanding Muslims to convert to Christianity—had been released from jail. (A handwriting expert concluded that they had not written the threatening note to Muslims.) Soon thereafter, mosques began blasting on the megaphones that the men had burned pages of the Koran, further exacerbating the riots and causing many Christians to flee the region.
129
In February 2011, following a property dispute with Muslim neighbors, Agnes Nuggo, a fifty-year-old Christian woman, was accused by the same neighbors of insulting Islam and subsequently arrested. As in so many other cases, she insists that the accusations against her concerning insulting Islam are fabricated.
130
In November 2010, twenty-two-year-old Latif Masih, a Christian, was shot dead by “two Muslim extremists” near his home after he was released on bail from jail, where he had served a five-month sentence for allegedly desecrating the Koran.
131
In October 2012, a sixteen-year-old boy, Ryan Stanten, was arrested on “charges of blasphemy, terrorism, and cybercrimes,” because he forwarded text messages to his friends that were intercepted and deemed blasphemous by Muslims. A “furious Muslim mob” attacked the boy’s home, setting furniture on fire and shouting “Death to Blasphemer” and “Kill Christian Infidels.” Other Christians in the region fled.
132
Spotlight on Egypt
 
If Pakistan is the Muslim nation par excellence when it comes to persecuting Christians in the context (or pretext) of blasphemy, Egypt has been rivaling its Asian counterpart since the “Arab Spring.” With the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak and the rise to power of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafis—many of whom were previously in Egypt’s jails, including President Morsi—Egypt’s Christians have been experiencing persecution unprecedented in modern times, including for “blasphemy.”
Article 98(f) of Egypt’s current penal code states,
Confinement for a period of not less than six months and not exceeding five years . . . shall be the penalty inflicted on whoever makes use of religion in propagating, either by words, in writing, or in any other means, extreme ideas for the purpose of inciting strife, ridiculing or insulting a heavenly religion or a sect following it, or damaging national unity.
133
 
If this law were interpreted equitably, it would penalize Egypt’s many Muslim clerics and preachers who regularly use religion to incite violence against the nation’s Christian minority, thus damaging national unity. But just as in Pakistan, it is almost exclusively Christians who are targeted for prosecution. Under the new constitution introduced by the Muslim Brotherhood-led government of Egypt, Christians are likely to suffer even more draconian punishments for insulting Muhammad. The following incidents are all from the period since the “January 25 Revolution.”
134

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