Dozens of Christians missing after IS seizes town in central Syria

PanARMENIAN.Net - Dozens of Christian civilians are missing and are believed to be captives of the Islamic State extremist group after it seized their town in central Syria this week, according to conflict-monitoring groups and the Syrian Orthodox Church, the New York Times reports.

Contact with the Christians was lost after the jihadists attacked the isolated oasis town of Qariyatain in Homs Province this week and routed the Syrian Army, taking control of the town.

The town’s isolation and the collapse of its lines of communication made it difficult to determine the precise number of the missing and their fate, but the attack raised fears that the latest jihadist advance would be a new blow to the ancient Christian communities of the Middle East.

The spread of the Islamic State’s self-declared caliphate has already uprooted large Christian communities in parts of Iraq and Syria. While the jihadists have generally not slaughtered Christians as they have Shiites and other religious groups, they have seized their property, desecrated their churches and imposed special taxes on them, forcing them to flee.

The Islamic State affiliate in Libya distributed a video early this year of its fighters slaughtering a group of Egyptian Coptic Christians.

In statements this week, the Syrian Orthodox Archdiocese for the region that includes Qariyatain said that fighters from the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, attacked the town on Tuesday, Aug 4, sending many of its terrified Christian residents fleeing toward nearby communities. The jihadists took about 200 families captive, the church said, though some were later released, according to the NYT.

But about 250 Christians have been missing since Wednesday, with no news of their whereabouts.

“We don’t know if they are alive or dead,” the church said.

A Syrian priest from the town, reached by telephone elsewhere in Homs Province on Friday, said that the captives included women and children and that some had been taken away by the Islamic State while others had been forced to remain in their homes.

Church and community leaders were working to help residents sneak out of town and had succeeded in getting dozens out, the priest said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to protect his relatives still in the town. He said about 215 captives remained.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks the conflict from Britain through a network of contacts inside Syria, said that the jihadists attacked the town with suicide bombers and that 28 government soldiers and 24 Islamic State fighters were killed in battle.

Since its victory, the Islamic State has taken 230 captives, dozens of them Christians, the observatory said.

The attack spread anguish among many of Syria’s Christians.

“The village is gone,” a Christian police officer said by text message from the city of Homs, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.

He said he had been unable to reach his friends in the town or to get through to the police station. “The landline in the police station is ringing, but no one is answering,” he said.