Kenyan Muslims Pledge to Form ‘Vigilante’ Groups to Protect Christian Churches Against al-Qaida-Linked Attacks
- Posted on July 3, 2012 at 9:05am by
Billy Hallowell
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NAIROBI, Kenya (The Blaze/AP) — Kenyan clerics across the religious divide vowed Tuesday to not allow sectarian violence to erupt following attacks on churches over the weekend that killed at least 15 people.
The Inter-Religious Council of Kenya said Muslims will form vigilante groups alongside Christians to guard churches in Kenya’s North Eastern Province, where the latest attacks occurred.
Adan Wachu, secretary general of the Supreme Council of Kenya Muslims and the chairman of Inter-Religious Council, said the weekend attacks, which are being blamed on an al-Qaida-linked militant group from Somalia, are meant to trigger sectarian violence between Christians and Muslims.
Wachu said clerics will actively preach against retaliation to prevent violence from spreading in Kenya like it has in Nigeria, where attacks on churches by a Muslim sect has ignited a spiral of violence
“This is not a religious war and it has to be addressed from a different paradigm shift,” he said.
Gunmen on Sunday killed two policemen guarding the African Inland Church, snatched their rifles and then opened fire on the congregation from inside and out, killing 15 people. A simultaneous attack took place on a Catholic church in the same area of the eastern Kenyan town of Garissa.
Areas of northern and eastern Kenya along the border with Somalia have suffered a series of gunfire and grenade attacks over the last year. Militants attacked a church in Garissa in December, killing two people.
A body of one of those killed in the attack lies covered by a sheet, outside the African Inland Church in Garissa, Kenya Sunday. (AP)
Kenya sent troops into Somalia last October to hunt al-Shabab fighters (we’re told you about the al-Shabab before). The militants, who are allied with al-Qaida, have threatened repeatedly to carry out revenge attacks for Kenya’s push into Somalia. Sunday’s attacks appear to be part of that trend.
Wachu said five people, two of them Muslim clerics, had been killed in northern Kenya since late last year for speaking out against al-Shabab.
Boniface Adoyo, a Christian cleric and an official of the council, complained of a series of attacks on Christian institutions that no one has been jailed for.
Religious leaders who incite their followers should be charged under the provision of laws against hate speech, which were designed to curtail instigation of violence by politicians following postelection violence in 2007-08, Adoyo said.
“Anybody inciting religious worshippers for evil actions, that is hate speech and it also covers whatever we do in our temples and in our mosques,” he said.
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loneindividual
Posted on July 4, 2012 at 11:28amBeautiful that Muslims and Christians actually see the other as brothers on that God forsaken continent. The most important thing is that they recognize Babylon and fight against it…it’s the only way for a lasting peace…cuz Babylon has infected Islam after it has already infected Judaism and Hi-jacked Christianity…although you can’t say that the Romans were Babylonian…at least the Romans were….well….Roman. Makes me laugh cuz there really isn’t much difference between Rome and Babylon…cept that the Romans trusted the Greeks a HELLOFALOTMORE than the Persians.
Still…I don’t trust any of them…cuz of how they mixed Athena with Baphomet … and what’s his face….just the most messed up **** imaginable. At least when Solomon was alive…God was God and Satan was the Devil….until David got jiggy with another man’s wife…tried to hide it by commanding Uriah to have sex with his wife during wartime…which was against tradition so David sent Uriah to the Front lines to die. David & Bethsheba’s child of adultery/murder died…and then later on they bore Solomon….who got jiggy with WAY too many women so he never commited adultery… but later on in his life he became an Idolater (worshipped idols…became a progressive) and then the son of Solomon commited adultery… which caused a Civil War which gave the opening for the Roman Empire to take over.
YUP.
It‘s more complicated than I’m telling it.
It’s that **** up. KISS!
Report Post »MrObvious
Posted on July 4, 2012 at 8:40amKenya good.
Report Post »Sharia Bad.
AQ Bad.
I hope the people in Kenya remain able to work together to resist internal violence, and find a way to stop the terrorists before they attack again.
MrObvious
Posted on July 4, 2012 at 8:37amWell, some good news out of Kenya. Almost makes up for the financial help they gave Obama’s campaign in 2008, and for sealing his birth records, as a state secret.
Report Post »Islam itself is not evil. Sharia law is. It’s an easy and clear distinction.
The AQ, Hamas, Hezbollah, Muslim Brotherhood, Iranian government, and Taliban all want and demand that Sharia be imposed; and, they’re all willing to commit horrific acts of violence to get Sharia imposed or keep it imposed.
Kenya, in contrast, is protecting freedom, while also trying to protect lives.
Citizens are helping each other as people.