Monday, March 4, 2002
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'Are you Christian or Muslim?'
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Posted: March 4, 2002
1:00 a.m. Eastern
Editor's note: Dennis Bennett, executive director of the relief group
Servant's Heart wrote the following letter to U.S. leaders and activists after
his recent trip to southern Sudan, where he found more evidence of forced
Islamization by the militant Muslim regime. Recipients of the letter are:
Speaker of the House Denny Hastert, Sen. Tom Daschle, Sen. Trent Lott, Sen.
Joseph Biden, Sen. Russell Feingold, Sen. Christopher Dodd, Sen. Barbara Boxer,
Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV, Sen. Bill Frist, Sen. Sam Brownback, Sen. Gordon
Smith, Sen. Jesse Helms, Rep. Frank Wolf, Rep. Henry Hyde, Rep. Tom Lantos, Rep.
Tom Tancredo, Rep. Chris Smith, Rep. Chris Cox, Rep. James Leach, Rep. Donald
Payne, Rep. Jennifer Dunn, Sen. John Danforth, Michael Young, Elliot Abrams,
Walter Kansteiner, Andrew Natsios, Roger Winter, Rev. Franklin Graham, Charles
Colson, Richard Land, Michael Horowitz, Nina Shea, Rev. Walter Fauntroy, Joe
Madison and Hugh Hewitt.
I have just returned from the Northeast Upper Nile/Southern Blue Nile region
of South Sudan. After witnessing once again the situation on the ground there, I
must ask "How long will the United States government allow the government
of Sudan (GOS) to continue its jihad against the Black African Christians of
South Sudan? How long will the U.S. permit the GOS to kill these unarmed
civilians – whether by aerial bombardment, or by direct ground military action
as is happening daily in NE Upper Nile/Southern Blue Nile? How long will these
atrocities, amounting to genocide, be permitted to continue?"
This war is a declared jihad – reaffirmed by First Vice President Taha on
October 4 (after September 11th). It is fueled by oil being pumped from South
Sudan, revenues from which sustain the well-decorated war criminals in command
of the GOS military and militia forces. The role of oil development in Western
Upper Nile has been amply documented, but the terrible realities of Eastern
Upper Nile/Southern Blue Nile can also be directly traced to oil development,
including the Chinese-dominated Adar Yel project in the region.
Here are examples of the consequences of ground attacks in this region, which
you will not know about unless you personally visit the Northeast Upper
Nile/Southern Blue Nile region of South Sudan:
In NE Upper Nile, when women are captured by the GOS regular military or
militia forces, they are asked only one question: "Are you Christian or
Muslim?" If the woman answers "Muslim," she is set free. If she
answers "Christian," the GOS soldiers gang-rape her (10-20 soldiers),
then cut off her breasts to ensure that she bleeds to death. Her body is then
left as an example to others. There are no survivors.
This makes less surprising the fact that approximately 25 percent of the
population in the Daga Post region of NE Upper Nile are orphan boys, aged 5-10
years old. You will know about the so-called "Lost Boys of Sudan"
whose parents and sisters were killed in Bor County in 1986-7; the only
survivors were the 5-10-year-old goat herders/cattle herders.
In NE Upper Nile, the GOS continues to do the same thing in 2001-2002.
Christian villages are burned to the ground by the GOS regular military and/or
militia forces, and all within these villages are killed in the most horrific
ways. Nearly the only survivors are the goat herders, who are in the bush and
run away from the sounds of slaughter in the villages. But don’t cry for these
boys, because soon there won’t be any left. The local lion population is
eating three to five boys every week.
In NE Upper Nile and Southern Blue Nile, the Government of Sudan continues to
use starvation as a tool for forced conversion from Christianity to Islam.
Moreover, whenever the GOS attacks a village, its military (regular and militia)
attempt to kill as many women and children as possible. However, the GOS
strategy has another element which Americans usually fail to recognize – the
intentional imposition of suffering and death-by-degrees upon the survivors of
the destroyed villages.
The deaths visited upon the civilian villagers in NE Upper Nile/Southern Blue
Nile are war crimes, as the inhabitants are killed in the most horrific means
imaginable. Subsequent suffering is just as appalling. The survivors lose
everything necessary to daily survival in the NE Upper Nile/Southern Blue Nile
region. Their farms, houses and crops are burned by the GOS. Their pots and
pans, water storage containers and even their clothes are burned or destroyed.
All farm tools and seed are also destroyed by the GOS.
The few survivors from the destroyed villages must typically flee for 2 or
more days through the wilderness (in 115-120 degree temperatures), with no food
and no water during their flight. After reaching a place of relative
"safety," these "survivors" of genocide must daily watch
their children become gradually weaker and weaker from hunger and thirst until
they start dying one by one. (The youngest die first.)
Survivors who are nursing mothers typically have their breast milk dry up due
to the stress of fleeing the GOS attack, as well as the lack of water and food
while they are fleeing from the GOS. In NE Upper Nile/Southern Blue Nile, this
amounts to a death sentence for the nursing baby. There are no mother’s milk
substitutes, so nursing babies die first.
Yet all the surviving Christians have to do is walk the 2 days back to the
GOS lines, and tell them they have converted to Islam. If they do this, they
will be well fed (with the U.N.'s Operation Lifeline Sudan food supplies) and
provided with medical attention.
As you might certainly imagine, persecution is not just a one-time event for
these people; it is a daily occurrence. And yet their faith sustains them. Would
we be strong enough to watch our children slowly die of hunger and thirst? Or
would we convert to Islam so that our children live? We are fortunate not to
have to make this terrible decision. But most Christians in this region choose
to remain Christian, condemned to watching their children die slowly and
painfully. It is impossible to imagine a more coercive and intolerant situation,
one more restrictive of religious liberty.
The government of Sudan continues to decorate and promote known war
criminals; commanders who practice atrocities on specific Christian populations.
Commander Taib Musba (Tie-EEB Moos-BAH) is a classic example. He is a
well-decorated current commander of the regular GOS army, yet:
In 1986-88 he commanded GOS soldiers that killed more than an estimated
15,000 unarmed civilian Uduk Christian men, women and children.
In 1999, he used Sarin gas (nerve-agent) against the SPLA soldiers while
defending Ulu in Southern Blue Nile.
In 1986, he entered Chali, the capital of the Uduk tribe of approximately
50,000 Christians. He told them "You are all going to convert from
Christianity to Islam today, because here is what’s going to happen to you if
you don’t" and personally killed five Christian church leaders in front
of the gathered villagers.
When the Uduks still refused to convert to Islam, Commander Taib Musba began
killing the unarmed Uduk men, women and children.
The "kindest" way Commander Musba killed Uduk civilians was to herd
them at gunpoint into a hut, and then drive over the hut with a 50-ton
Soviet-made tank.
Commander Musba would also personally herd a group of 12-15 Uduk men, women
and children into a hut, where he would ask the first person "Do you
renounce Jesus Christ?" When they refused, he would personally use a hammer
to drive a 3-inch nail into the top of their head. He would then ask the next
Uduk civilian if they would renounce Jesus Christ and convert to Islam. He would
do this until he had personally killed every person in the hut with a hammer and
3-inch nail to the head.
There are many witnesses to these atrocities, including some who were
admitted into the United States as religious refugees. The UNHCR finally granted
the Uduks international refugee status in 1992, after investigating the
atrocities committed against them by the GOS. Almost as many Uduks perished
during the six years waiting for the UNHCR to declare them refugees as from the
direct actions of GOS Commander Taib Musba and his butchers.
Presumably, then, the evidence is available to the United States government
both from its own refugee interviews and from the UNHCR. Yet this war criminal,
Commander Taib Musba, remains an active GOS commander and is a well-decorated
GOS war hero.
How long will the U.S. fail to make clear that we will no longer tolerate
these atrocities? That we condemn in the strongest possible terms a government
that not only shelters but decorates and promotes commanders like Taib Musba?
I must ask in concluding whether you believe the GOS should be allowed to
continue its human rights abuses and war crimes? If you do not, you must do more
to support freedom and self-determination for South Sudan. If the U.S. fails to
act, we may be sure that the GOS will export its jihad to other countries of
Eastern Africa (i.e., Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania, etc.) as well as to the United
States.
But perhaps you say that these are unsubstantiated rumors and unproven
allegations. That’s because the U.S. has refused to allow American
investigators into areas such as NE Upper Nile/Southern Blue Nile, claiming that
the region is too dangerous for US diplomats. However, we’re there, and
we’re safe. This is a matter of political will and a refusal to hear/witness
the truth of these atrocities. The UNHCR has evidence about Commander Taib Musba,
as does the U.S. State Department. You can gather more evidence by sending in
investigators to NE Upper Nile, Southern Blue Nile, and the Uduk refugee camps
in Ethiopia. We are willing to assist any investigation team you send into the
area.
My heart cries out for these Christians – unarmed civilian men, women and
children – whom we continue to abandon to the GOS jihad and political
expediency.
God and history will surely judge us harshly if we sit back and allow the GOS,
hunger, and the lions to destroy these innocent Christians.
May you have the strength to see the truth, and the will to defend these
defenseless victims of jihad.
Sincerely,
Dennis Bennett
Executive Director
Servant’s Heart
Related story:
Sudan
jihad forces Islam on Christians
Related Special Offers:
The March edition of WorldNetDaily's magazine Whistleblower examines the
untold story of
persecution
of Christians worldwide.
"Sudan:
The Hidden Holocaust"
