Nov 20, 2015 / 12:47 pm
Christians fleeing violence in the Middle East are sometimes avoiding refugee camps because they fear genocide even within the camps, some observers are warning.
"It is increasingly clear that because Christians fear that the persecution and genocide will continue in these refugee camps, they often don't enter them, and as a result find it nearly impossible to qualify for resettlement as refugees," said Carl Anderson, head of the Knights of Columbus, in a statement last week.
"This country and others should protect those who are experiencing this genocide. We must ensure that Christians and other religious minorities, who are the most vulnerable people in the region, receive the chance for asylum and don't simply fall through the bureaucratic cracks."
The Knights are warning about the plight of Middle East Christians through a new ad, which ran this week in Roll Call, Politico and The Hill.
The ad quotes statements by British politicians Lord David Alton and Fiona Bruce, from press reports.
"Many minorities escaping Syria have either fled refugee camps in Lebanon, Jordan and the Kurdish Autonomous Region – or have never risked entering them. Because they suffer attacks, inside the camps, by radical Islamists, they are now instead living in informal tented settlements," Alton and Bruce said.
"A British newspaper recently reported that ISIS is sending teams of men posing as refugees with the mission of either kidnapping or killing Christians, and sending gangsters to the camps to kidnap young refugee girls and sell them as sex slaves. Aid workers dare not report such occurrences because of fears for their own lives," they continued.
A previous ad by the Knights of Columbus called for a U.S. Congressional resolution to protect vulnerable minorities in the Middle East.
With nearly 1.9 million members across the globe, the Knights of Columbus is the world's largest Catholic fraternal organization.
The Knights have donated more than $4.4 million to help Christians and other religious minorities in the Middle East, including half a million dollars to educate refugees in Jordanian Catholic schools and more than $800,000 to give food assistance to displaced families.
In addition, the organization has set up a website, christiansatrisk.org, to raise awareness and funds to help those fleeing persecution in the region.
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