The principle is always and everywhere the same: in Muslim countries, non-Muslims are expected to conform their behavior to Islamic sensibilities. And in non-Muslim countries, non-Muslims are expected to conform their behavior to Islamic sensibilities.
“Yemeni Christians pressured to conform to Islamic law: ‘We were forced to wear the hijab,’” ACI MENA, September 23, 2024:
Christians in southwestern Arabia, and specifically in Aden, a port city located in Yemen, have a deeply-rooted history dating back to the fourth century. Despite persecution over the centuries, the Christian faith continued to flourish and expand, becoming the most widespread religion in Aden before the advent of Islam. But with the rise of extremist religious thought, the Christian minority there has experienced hardship.
Badr, a Yemeni Catholic woman born in the 1980s and living in Aden, spoke recently about the plight of Christians there with ACI Mena, CNA’s Arabic-language news partner.Wishing to remain anonymous, she explained: “I didn’t realize that we, as Christians, were a minority until I reached middle school. There, I experienced harsh challenges related to my faith and to the loss of our rights.”
She continued: “Although some small churches became nationalized in the 1970s, Christians maintained the right to education in schools and employment in government jobs before 1994. Women enjoyed the freedom to dress [as they wish], and on the religious level, we were allowed to pray inside churches that were tax-free like mosques. The state also provided visas and residency status for foreign priests. No one pressured us to change our religion.”
However, Badr said all of that changed when the Muslim Brotherhood came to power.
“We were forced to wear the hijab,” she told ACI Mena. “The government officially prohibited us from celebrating midnight Mass on Christmas and New Year’s Eve. Christians accepted the situation and did not raise their voices. Some emigrated, others changed their religion, fearing to lose their homes and jobs. Many practiced their faith behind closed doors at a time when the Church did not support young people or work on strengthening families.”
She continued: “After 1994, the authorities tried to make Yemen an Islamic state. They wiped out our identity as Christians and refused to write ‘Christian’ on documents. Christians had to write either ‘Muslim’ or leave a blank space. They accused us of being ‘remnants of British colonialism’ and said that ‘the United States funds us.’ Teachers pressured me to change my religion and forced me to read the Quran daily. When I got full marks in Islamic education, they would reduce my grades, because they told me ‘a Christian couldn’t be equal to a Muslim.’”
Badr said the most critical period for Christians in Aden began with the outbreak of the 2015 war and the subsequent closure of churches.
“After being banned from praying, we started praying secretly in the convent of the nuns,” she said. “Unfortunately, all the nuns were later killed. The priest was kidnapped. The churches were stolen, and some were vandalized.”
“In 2018, the authorities refused to renew our passports unless we wrote the word ‘Islam’ in the religion section of the application form, as we were told: ‘There are no Christians in Yemen.’”…
Gurek says
Interesting to know that women were allowed to dress as they wish in Yemen before. When Muslim brotherhood comes in, all freedom goes out. But this case is all too common with some other Muslim majority countries that were more tolerant and accepting before MB ideology poisoned them. A user here once stated that this organisation was founded as an islamic version of the Nazi party.
gravenimage says
I doubt that Christian and other non-Muslim women had much freedom of dress in Yemen–but they probably had a bit more freedom, and its lack was not codified by law.
Mike says
The Muslim Mutant Brotherhood is even worse than the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants from the X-Men series.
What a bunch of small-minded, petty,
low-IQ control freaks (I’m referring to the former, not the latter).
somehistory says
Just as it is in other parts of Africa. Christians hated and persecuted and the faithful being eliminated.
“When you are persecuted in one city, flee to the next. I tell you, you will not complete the circuit of the cities before the Son of Man arrives.” Jesus gives His followers, His children, hope and He will keep His promise to come before there is no place else for Christians to run.
࿗Infidel࿘ says
There are Christians in Yemen? 😲
gravenimage says
Infidel, over 99% of Yemenis are Muslim–Sunni or Shia.There are a handful of Christians surviving there, and literally a single Jew–Levi Marhabi–who was forced to move to the capitol Sa’naa so that he would not be murdered by more pious Muslims.
࿗Infidel࿘ says
Sana’a is now under Houthi control. He’s safer there than in, say, Aden?
gravenimage says
It’s much worse than I’d realized, Infidel–he has now been imprisoned by the Houthis:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levi_Marhabi
Wellington says
Islam is the perpetual adolescent among the world’s major religions.
N.B., I will often refer to Islam as a major religion but I never refer to it as a great religion. I reserve that descriptive for ALL the OTHER major religions of the world.
gravenimage says
+1
UMA MAHESWAR NAKKA says
Good Evening Dear Wellington,
You wrote, “I will often refer to Islam as a major religion, but I never refer to it as a great religion”.
THEN, WHAT KIND OF RELIGION IT IS?
Pardon me for stating so?
Regards
Uma
Regards
Uma
Wellington says
It is a major religion but alone among the major religions of the world it is an evil religion rather than a good one. I put it with other evil religions like Satanism and the Aztec religion of old. After all, where is it written that a religion must be good? Most are, including all major religion except Islam, but, yes, a religion can be evil just as a secular ideology can be, for instance Nazism and Marxism.
gravenimage says
Yes–not everything large is automatically great.
gravenimage says
Yemen: Muslims pressure Christians to conform to Islamic law
……………………………………..
In the West Muslims openly laugh at the idea that Shari’ah is ever to be imposed on non-Muslims. In Dar-al-Islam is it a different matter, of course…
Troybeam says
Read Reliance of the Traveller: Islamic Sacred Law, Chapter 9 titled Jihad.
I know I keep mentioning this book it is however a book into the mentality and ingrained thinking of the Muslim.
gravenimage says
It’s an important book re Jihad, Torybeam–yiu are quite right, and many Infidels know nothing about it.
Lizabee says
Islam is a bully “religion.”
It was invented in the 7th century after other major religions were already established.
It arose out of a barbaric, misogynistic, Arabic warmongering culture that perverted ideas from pre-existing Christianity and Judaism.
It is a dangerous “religion” since it is intrinsically hostile to anyone who is not under the control of their supremacist, fascistic theo-political ideology.
Muslims attack other Muslims who are considered heretics, therefore there’s no chance that Islam can be reformed.