A decade after ISIS, Iraqi Christians still feel the pain
June 10, 2014 will always be burned on the hearts and minds of millions of people in Iraq.
That’s when the Islamic State group—known as ISIS then—managed to take control of Mosul, the second-largest city in Iraq, and home to a sizeable Christian minority. Millions of people fled ISIS, including 10,000 Christians. Followers of Jesus knew they would be targets, as ISIS’s radical interpretation of Islam leaves no room for anyone else. Christians who remained were given a terrible choice: either deny Jesus and convert to Islam, pay jizya (taxes), leave quickly without taking their possessions or be killed. Christian homes were marked with the letter ‘N’, for “Nasrani.” In Arabic, the Quran uses this term to refer to Christians.
The houses and churches soon became the property of ISIS.
Before 2003, when the former strongman leader of Iraq, Saddam Hussein, was overthrown, around 50,000 Christians lived in Mosul. They steadily had trickled out of the city because of persecution, intimidation and killings, and the ISIS attack was the final push to force the Christian remnant out of the city.
Ten years later, ISIS has been expelled from Mosul – but only a few Christians have returned. It’s a sobering reminder of how much has been lost in Iraq, and how much restoration remains. But it’s also a chance to see how God has walked with His people in the region as they struggle to live out their faith.
Father Zakaria was a priest for the Syriac Orthodox church in Mosul before the ISIS invasion. And he knows the pain of the invasion firsthand. In July 2014, ISIS began to put up posters with a list of names of those who were “to be slaughtered.”
“My name was the first on the list, along with two other priests because they also made phone calls and asked Christians to leave,” Zakaria says through tears. “ISIS put the poster on walls and mosques.”
He fled, along with the rest of the believers in Mosul.
Like many, Father Zakaria hasn’t been able to return to his home. “I have a 16-year-old son,” he explains. “I refuse to go back and live there because I fear for him. He might not be physically harmed, but he could be verbally harassed and also he would not have any friends, and that would make him lonely and psychologically tired.”
Bushra* is a widow in her 40s who also fled Mosul. “While leaving, ISIS stopped us and took the little amount of money we had, our house keys and our official documents (identification cards) and let us leave,” she remembers. They left their valuables with neighbors, but soon those were taken as well–either by ISIS or stolen by their neighbors who saw an opportunity in the vulnerability of Christians.
Bushra believes this vulnerability continues, and it’s part of why she doesn’t want to return home. “They took our jewels and money; how can we return to live with them?” she asks. “They would kill us. We can’t stand living with them. It is hard. A Muslim bought our house. Christians like me, who had to sell their houses, probably all sold them to Muslims for a low price.” Bushra and her family now live in Kurdistan, where it’s relatively safer for Christians.
Father Zakaria shares this feeling. “We feel there is no safety in the city,” he says. “Why? Because our own neighbors stole from us. I have a house in Mosul and not only me, many families. When we were displaced in 2014, the neighbors entered my house and stole my furniture and oil barrel. How would I return to my house and knock on the door of my neighbor and ask them to return my furniture?”
‘Strengthen what remains’
Iraq’s Christian community is in danger of extinction. Before ISIS, there were an estimated 300,000 Christians in Iraq. Now, the 2024 World Watch List data finds that there are only 154,000 remaining.
Open Doors has always had a mission to “strengthen what remains”—that’s the vision that God gave Open Doors’ founder, Brother Andrew, from Revelation 3:2. In Iraq, those words (and vision) have been put into practice.
Open Doors works through local partners in Iraq to strengthen the church. Thanks to your gifts and prayers, there are now 150 Centres of Hope in Iraq—local churches that provide services and support to the Christian community. These centers offer everything from Christian discipleship, to trauma care, to microloans and job training.
Open Doors partners also helped those who fled from Mosul—and has been walking alongside believers like Bushra and Father Zakaria ever since. ISIS may have faded from the headlines, but Open Doors’ work in Iraq continues—and will continue, as long as a remnant remains.
For now, Christians in Iraq continue to live out their faith, even among the pain. “What we witnessed was difficult,” Bushra says while wiping away tears. “But praise God for everything. Praise the Lord. We suffered, but it is gone now.”
Father Zakaria keeps in touch with believers in Mosul and watches the efforts to restore the community. “When a church is opened, a believer won’t say that the situation is like the old days of 600 to 800 years ago,” he says. “But at least that building will stay as a church and we preserve it. It is a message for the people of the city that this is our church and this land is ours, and one day we might return and hold services and ring our bells.”
Mosul shows the true cost of persecution against Christians in Iraq. And it can sometimes seem hopeless. But as long as there are followers of Jesus who seek to be salt and light, the bells in Mosul—and across the country—will never be silent.
Please continue to pray for believers in Iraq as they rebuild and restore their churches, homes and lives after ISIS.
