Paul KeenanThe arrival of Islamic State increases the pressure on Libya’s Christians, writes Paul Keenan
Majid Suayman Shihata was working for funds to educate his children. Brothers Bishoy and Samuel Stephanos were saving wages earned towards their respective weddings. Luqa Najati’s existence as a migrant worker meant he had missed his daughter’s birth back in Egypt. Abanub Ayyad Atiyyah was sending money from his job to support his extended family back home.
Compelled by different goals to seek employment in troubled Libya, Shihata and 20 of his compatriot Egyptian migrants were united in the timing and manner of their deaths on a beach on February 15.
In yet another ‘glossy’ production from Islamic State (IS) – fanatically entitled A Message Signed in Blood to the Nation of the Cross – the men were first denounced for their ‘Crusader faith’ and finally beheaded in a grisly communication aimed towards Europe – Rome in particular. The choice of a beach on the northern fringes of Libya was itself intended to remind European nations of how far IS has advanced.
While confined for now by the Mediterranean barrier, the emergence of IS in Libya is a most troubling development both in international affairs for the struggling Christian community locally.
For Egypt, prompted by the slaughter of its citizens to launch airstrikes on the IS stronghold town of Derna, the existence of a Libyan wing of IS not only threatens the nearly one million Egyptian migrant workers still in-country, but leaves Egypt’s military facing IS and its supporters on two fronts simultaneously. The Sinai is now an area of operations for the base and scene of recent bloodshed courtesy of the group.
Refugees
Libya’s neighbours to the west, Tunisia and Algeria, already struggle to cater for refugees flooding their own border areas while facing down individual Islamist threats, are keeping wary eyes on events.
For Italy, meanwhile, the raising of the IS flag in Libya can only mean added pressure to an already catastrophic flow of refugees towards the nearly-overwhelmed island of Lampedusa. So far in 2015, and in the face of the dangerous sea conditions of the season, at least 6,000 desperate migrants have taken to boats, less afraid of what lies ahead on the water than that behind on land. The figure is a doubling of migration numbers for the same period last year.
Rome, quick to assure that there is as yet no concrete intelligence to suggest any plot against the Vatican or the person of the Pope, has nevertheless upgraded security arrangements in the capital, while Colonel Christoph Graf, commander of the Swiss Guard informed the Italian daily Il Giornale that “following the terrorists’ threats, we’re asking the guards to be more attentive and observe peoples’ movements closely… we’re ready, as are the men of the Gendarmerie”.
The most immediate danger, clearly, is that presented to the dwindling Christian community within Libya itself. That community, it has been estimated by the Christian advocacy group Open Doors, has plummeted by at least 75% since the 2011 overthrow of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. Its most recent figures assert Libya is home to just 35,000 Christians in an overall population of 6.3 million, though the figures do not account for the inflow of Christian workers or the outward rush of refugees sparked by Libya’s implosion.
That descent into ‘failed state’ status in the wake of Colonel Gaddafi’s ignominious death has seen Libyan Christians become the focus of increased persecution by various militant factions bent on demonstrating their credentials in the most bloody of ways. Exactly this time last year, Islamists were being blamed for the murders of seven Christians on a beach near the city of Benghazi (held by al Qaeda) after gunmen had gone door-to-door to identify and abduct Christians.
At that time, the sundering of Libya into roughly two opposing sides was in full swing, with Islamist fighters, Fajr Libya (Libyan Dawn) announcing their supremacy from the western capital of Tripoli, and a comparatively secular force, under Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni, asserting power from the eastern city of Tobruk. It is this latter grouping which is favoured by the current Egyptian regime and the international community.
Into the middle ground fell the Christians, struggling under the guidance of Apostolic Vicar of Tripoli Bishop Martinelli to steer a course between the warring sides. And now IS have arrived to complicate matters further and fatally.
In truth, the signs of the emerging threat of IS came well before the February 15 massacre. In revisiting the reality on the ground for Libyans since 2011, the BBC reported from the country on February 5 and, via anecdotal reports, found reason to look towards the city of Derna with concern. There were, the broadcaster reported, incidents which saw gunmen in the town ordering businesses to remove mannequins from shop windows, cigarette sellers being driven out of their trade and one case of a hairdressing salon bombed, activities very familiar to observers of areas in Syria and Iraq now under IS control.
According to one local voice, a woman from Derna now resident in Tripoli, there is widespread fear of male family members being targeted for conscription to the ranks of IS or murder by militants: “Can you believe some families have reached the stage where they prevent their sons from going to pray at the mosque?” she asked the BBC.
Crowning all of this, vested interests from abroad continue individual efforts to control and shape the chaos in Libya. Qatar and Turkey have been accused of backing Tripoli’s Islamists (Qatar recalled its ambassador to Egypt in protest when the airstrikes were launched against Derna), while Egypt and the United Arab Emirates reportedly back Tobruk.
A clear illustration of the biases at play came at the United Nations when Egypt declared support for the lifting of an arms embargo to help Tobruk, while simultaneously calling for a naval blockade against arms shipments to Tripoli.
Against such manoeuvrings is the voice of Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin, who, in the immediate aftermath of the Coptic slaughter, urged the international community to view the “military option [as] the last resort and under the umbrella of the United Nations” and to press for the “re-launch [of] a diplomatic initiative”.
This may be a wise and timely exhortation. It is true that in Libya right now the one point of unity between factions east and west is a shared horror at the arrival of IS, offering a good reason for the sides to engage in talks against a common foe.
The Christians of Libya continue to hold out, regardless. As Bishop Martinelli has pointed out, many of the community now are Filipino nurses who have steadfastly refused to leave at a time when human suffering is so manifest. He hoped, he said, that Christians would ultimately “strive to be instruments of unity” when Cardinal Parolin’s hoped-for dialogue commences.
And, prompted by the Coptic martyrs, who quite visibly in that horrendous footage can be seen to intone their “Lord Jesus Christ”, Bishop Martinelli insisted of those left behind: “We are ready to bear witness to whom we are and what we do according to the words of Christ.”