Religious persecution is the systematic oppression of an individual or a group of individuals as a response to theirreligious beliefs or affiliations or theirlack thereof. The tendency of societies or groups within societies to alienate or repress differentsubcultures is a recurrent theme inhuman history. Moreover, because a person's religion frequently determines his or her sense ofmorality,worldview,self-image, attitudes towards others, and overallpersonal identity to a significant extent, religious differences can be significant cultural, personal, and social factors. Religious persecution may be triggered by religious orantireligious stances (when members of a dominant group denigrate religions other than their own or religion itself where the irreligious are the dominant group) or it may be triggered by the state when it views a particular religious group as a threat to its interests or security. At a societal level, thedehumanization of a particular religious group may readily lead to acts of violence or other forms ofpersecution. Religious persecution may be the result of societal and/or governmental regulation. Governmental regulation refers to the laws which the government imposes in order to regulate a religion, and societal regulation is discrimination against citizens because they adhere to one or more religions.[1] In many countries, religious persecution has resulted in so much violence that it is considered a human rights problem.
David T. Smith, inReligious Persecution and Political Order in the United States, defines religious persecution as "violence or discrimination against members of a religious minority because of their religious affiliation," referring to "actions that are intended to deprive individuals of theirpolitical rights and force minorities to assimilate, leave, or live assecond-class citizens.[2] In the aspect of a state's policy, it may be defined as violations offreedom of thought,conscience and belief which are spread in accordance with a systematic and active state policy which encourages actions such asharassment,intimidation and the imposition ofpunishments in order to infringe or threaten the targeted minority'sright to life,integrity orliberty.[3] The distinction between religious persecution andreligious intolerance lies in the fact that in most cases, the latter is motivated by the sentiment of the population, which may be tolerated or encouraged by the state.[3] The denial of people'scivil rights on the basis of their religion is most frequently described asreligious discrimination, rather than religious persecution.
Examples ofpersecution include the confiscation or destruction of property,incitement ofhatred, arrests, imprisonment, beatings,torture, murder, and executions. Religious persecution can be considered the opposite offreedom of religion.
Bateman has differentiated different degrees of persecution. "It must be personally costly... It must be unjust and undeserved... it must be a direct result of one's faith."[4]
From asociological perspective, the identity formation of strongsocial groups such as those which are generated bynationalism,ethnicity, or religion, is a causal aspect of practices of persecution.Hans G. Kippenberg [de] says that it is these communities, which can be a majority or a minority, that generate violence.[5]: 8, 19, 24 Since the development of identity involves 'what we are not' as much as 'what we are', there are grounds for the fear that tolerance of 'what we are not' can contribute to the erosion of identity.[6]Brian J. Grim andRoger Finke say that the perception that plurality is dangerous leads to religious persecution.[7]: 2 Both the state and any dominant religion, share the concern that to "leave religion unchecked and without adequate controls will result in the uprising of religions that are dangerous to both state and citizenry," and this concern gives both the dominant religion and the state motives for restricting religious activity.[7]: 2, 6 Grim and Finke say it is specifically this religious regulation that leads to religious persecution.[8] R.I. Moore says that persecution during theMiddle Ages "provides a striking illustration of the classicdeviance theory, [which is based on identity formation], as it was propounded by the father of sociology,Émile Durkheim".[9]: 100 Persecution is also, often, part of a larger conflict involving emerging states as well as established states in the process of redefining their national identity.[7]: xii, xiii
James L.Gibson[10] adds that the greater the attitudes of loyalty and solidarity to the group identity, and the more the benefits to belonging there are perceived to be, the more likely a social identity will become intolerant of challenges.[11]: 93 [12]: 64 Combining a strong social identity with the state, increases the benefits, therefore it is likely persecution from that social group will increase.[7]: 8 Legal restriction from the state relies on social cooperation, so the state in its turn must protect the social group that supports it, increasing the likelihood of persecution from the state as well.[7]: 9 Grim and Finke say their studies indicate that the higher the degree of religious freedom, the lower the degree of violent religious persecution.[7]: 3 "When religious freedoms are denied through the regulation of religious profession or practice, violent religious persecution and conflict increase."[7]: 6
Perez Zagorin writes "According to some philosophers, tolerance is a moral virtue; if this is the case, it would follow that intolerance is a vice. But virtue and vice are qualities solely of individuals, and intolerance and persecution [in the Christian Middle Ages] were social and collective phenomena sanctioned by society and hardly questioned by anyone. Religious intolerance and persecution, therefore, were not seen as vices, but as necessary and salutary for the preservation of religious truth and orthodoxy and all that was seen to depend upon them."[13] This view of persecution is not limited to the Middle Ages. As Christian R. Raschle[14] and Jitse H. F. Dijkstra,[15] say: "Religious violence is a complex phenomenon that exists in all places and times."[16]: 4, 6
In theancient societies ofEgypt,Greece andRome, torture was an accepted aspect of the legal system.[17]: 22 Gillian Clark says violence was taken for granted in the fourth century as part of both war and punishment; torture from thecarnifex, the professional torturer of the Roman legal system, was an accepted part of that system.[18]: 137 Except for a few rare exceptions, such as the Persian empire underCyrus andDarius,[19] Denis Lacorne says that examples of religious tolerance in ancient societies, "from ancient Greece to the Roman empire, medieval Spain to the Ottoman Empire and the Venetian Republic", are not examples of tolerance in the modern sense of the term.[20]
The sociological view regards religious intolerance and persecution as largely social processes that are determined more by the context within which the social community exists than anything else.[21][11]: 94 [5]: 19, 24 When governments ensure equal freedom for all, there is less persecution.[7]: 8
Statistics fromPew Research Center show that Christianity and Islam are persecuted in more countries around the world than other religions,[22] and that Jews and Muslims are "most likely to live in countries where their groups experience harassment".[23] As of 2018, Christians face harassment in 145 countries, Muslims face harassment in 139 countries, and Jews face harassment in 88 countries.[22] Respectively: Christians account for 31% of the world's population, Muslims account for 24%, and Jews account for 0.2%.[24] According to a 2019 report, government restrictions and social hostilities toward religion have risen in 187 countries.[25]
"Religious cleansing" is sometimes used in reference to the removal of a population from a certain territory based on its religion.[26] More recently, “religious cleansing” has been used in reference to the elimination of all religious structures or all individuals who adhere to a particular religion and live within a larger community which is composed of people who are members of the same ethnicity.[27]
Throughoutantiquity,population cleansing was largely motivated by economic and political factors, but occasionally, ethnic factors also played a role.[26] During theMiddle Ages, population cleansing took on a largely religious character.[26] The religious motivation for population cleansing lost much of its salience early in the modern era, but until the 18th century, ethnic enmity in Europe continued to be couched in religious terms.[26]Richard Dawkins has argued that references toethnic cleansing in the formerYugoslavia andIraq areeuphemisms for what should more accurately be called religious cleansing.[28] According to Adrian Koopman, the widespread use of the termethnic cleansing in such cases suggests that in many situations, there is confusion between ethnicity and religion.[28]
Other acts of violence which are not always committed against adherents of particular religions such aswar,torture, andethnic cleansing, may take on the qualities of religious persecution when one or more of the parties which are involved in them are characterized by their religious homogeneity; an example of this occurs when conflicting populations that belong to differentethnic groups also belong to different religions or denominations. The difference between religious andethnic identity might sometimes be obscure (seeEthnoreligious); nevertheless, cases ofgenocide in the 20th century cannot be fully-explained by the citation of religious differences. Still, cases ofgenocide such as theGreek genocide, theArmenian genocide, and theAssyrian genocide are sometimes seen as cases of religious persecution and as a result, the lines betweenethnic violence andreligious violence are sometimes blurry.
Since theEarly modern period, an increasing number ofreligious cleansings were entwined with ethnic elements.[29] Since religion is an important or a central marker of ethnic identity, some conflicts can best be described as "ethno-religious conflicts".[30]
Naziantisemitism provides another example of the contentious divide between ethnic persecution and religious persecution, becauseNazi propaganda tended to construct its image of Jews by portraying them as people who were members of an inferiorrace (seeRacial antisemitism andNazi racial theories), itdehumanized anddemonized Jews by classifying them as a race rather than a religion. In keeping with what they were taught in Nazi propaganda, theperpetrators of theHolocaust made no distinction betweensecular Jews,atheistic Jews,orthodox Jews andJews who had converted to Christianity.
The descriptive use of the term religious persecution is rather difficult. Religious persecution has occurred in different historical, geographical and social contexts since at leastantiquity. Until the 18th century, some groups were nearly universally persecuted for their religious views, such asatheists,[31]Jews[32] andZoroastrians.[33]
Early Christianity also came into conflict with the Roman Empire, and it may have been more threatening to the established polytheistic order than Judaism had been, because of the importance ofevangelism in Christianity. UnderNero, the Jewish exemption from the requirement to participate in public cults was lifted and Rome began to actively persecutemonotheists. This persecution ended in 313 AD with theEdict of Milan, and Christianity was made theofficial religion of the empire in 380 AD. By the eighth century, Christianity had attained a clear ascendancy across Europe and neighboring regions, and a period of consolidation began which was marked by the pursuit ofheretics,heathens, Jews,Muslims, and various other religious groups.
By contrast to the notion of civil tolerance inearly modern Europe, the subjects were required to attend thestate church; this attitude can be described asterritoriality orreligious uniformity, and its underlying assumption is brought to a point by a statement of the Anglican theologianRichard Hooker: "There is not any man of the Church of England, but the same man is also a member of the [English] commonwealth; nor any man a member of the commonwealth, which is not also of the Church of England."[34]
Before a vigorous debate about religious persecution took place in England (starting in the 1640s), for centuries in Europe, religion had been tied to territory. In England, there had been severalActs of Uniformity; in continental Europe, the Latin phrase "cuius regio, eius religio" had been coined in the 16th century and applied as a fundament for thePeace of Augsburg (1555). It was pushed to the extreme byabsolutist regimes, particularly by the French kingsLouis XIV and his successors. It was under their rule thatCatholicism became the sole compulsory allowed religion in France and that thehuguenots had to massively leave the country. Persecution meant that the state was committed to secure religious uniformity by coercive measures, as eminently obvious in a statement ofRoger L'Estrange: "That which you call persecution, I translate Uniformity".[35]
However, in the 17th century, writers likePierre Bayle,John Locke,Richard Overton and Roger William broke the link between territory and faith, which eventually resulted in a shift from territoriality to religious voluntarism.[36] It was Locke who, in hisLetter Concerning Toleration, defined the state in purely secular terms:[37] "The commonwealth seems to me to be a society of men constituted only for the procuring, preserving, and advancing their own civil interests."[38] Concerning the church, he went on: "A church, then, I take to be a voluntary society of men, joining themselves together of their own accord."[38] With this treatise, John Locke laid one of the most important intellectual foundations of theseparation of church and state, which ultimately led to thesecular state.
One period of religious persecution, which has been extensively studied, isearly modern England. This is where the rejection of religious persecution originated, which is now common in the Western world. The English 'Call for Toleration' was a turning point in theChristian debate on persecution and toleration, and early modern England stands out to historians as a place and time in which "hundreds of books and tracts were published either for or against religious toleration."[39]
The most ambitious chronicle of that time isW.K. Jordan'smagnum opusThe Development of Religious Toleration in England, 1558–1660 (four volumes, published 1932–1940). Jordan wrote as the threat offascism rose in Europe, and this work is seen as a defense of the fragilevalues ofhumanism andtolerance.[40] More recent introductions to this period arePersecution and Toleration in Protestant England, 1558–1689 (2000) byJohn Coffey andCharitable hatred: Tolerance and intolerance in England, 1500–1700 (2006) by Alexandra Walsham. To understand why religious persecution has occurred, historians like Coffey "pay close attention to what the persecutors said they were doing."[39]
No religion is free from internal dissent, although the degree of dissent tolerated within a particular religious organization can strongly vary. This degree of diversity tolerated within a particular church is described asecclesiastical tolerance,[41] and is one form ofreligious toleration. However, when people nowadays speak of religious tolerance, they most often meancivil tolerance, which refers to the degree of religious diversity that is tolerated within the state.
In the absence of civil toleration, someone who finds himself in disagreement with his congregation does not have the option to leave and choose a different faith—simply because there is only one recognized faith in the country (at least officially). In modern westerncivil law any citizen may join and leave a religious organization at will; in western societies, this is taken for granted, but this legalseparation of Church and State only started to emerge a few centuries ago.
In theChristian debate on persecution and toleration, the notion of civil tolerance allowed Christian theologians to reconcile Jesus' commandment tolove one's enemies with other parts of theNew Testament that are rather strict regarding dissent within the church. Before that, theologians likeJoseph Hall had reasoned from the ecclesiastical intolerance of the early Christian church in the New Testament to the civil intolerance of the Christian state.[42]
The Bishop of Vladimir, Feodor, turned some people into slaves; others were imprisoned, beheaded, blinded, mutilated, or crucified on walls. Some heretics were executed by burning them alive. According to an inscription of Khan Mengual-Temir, Metropolitan Kiril was granted the right to heavily punish with death for blasphemy against the Orthodox Church or breach of ecclesiastical privileges. He advised all means of destruction to be used against heretics, but without bloodshed, in the name of 'saving souls'. Heretics were drowned. Novgorod Bishop Gennady Gonzov turned to TsarIvan III requesting the death of heretics. Gennady admired the Spanish inquisitors, especially his contemporaryTorquemada, who for 15 years of inquisition activity burned and punished thousands of people.[citation needed] As in Rome, the persecuted fled to depopulated areas. The most terrible punishment was considered an underground pit, where rats lived. Some people had been imprisoned and tied to the wall there, and untied after their death.[43]Old Believers were persecuted and executed; the order was that even those who completely renounced their beliefs and were baptized in the state church were to be lynched without mercy. The writerLomonosov opposed the religious teachings and by his initiative a scientific book against them was published. The book was destroyed, the Russian synod insisted Lomonosov's works to be burned and requested his punishment.[citation needed]
...were cutting heads, hanging, some by the neck, some by the foot, many of them were stabbed with sharp sticks and impaled on hooks. This included the tethering to a ponytail, drowning and freezing people alive in lakes. The winners did not spare even the sick and the elderly, taking them out of the monastery and throwing them mercilessly in icy 'vises'. The words step back, the pen does not move, in eternal darkness the ancient Solovetsky monastery is going. Of the more than 500 people, only a few managed to avoid the terrible court.[44]
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Although his book was written before theSeptember 11 attacks, John Coffey explicitly comparesIslamophobia in the contemporary Western world to the EnglishWhig Party'sparanoia about the fictitiousPopish Plot.[45]Mehdi Ghezali andMurat Kurnaz were among the Muslims who were imprisoned in theGuantanamo Bay detention camp, but they were not found to have any connections toterrorism, because they had previously traveled toAfghanistan andPakistan to pursue their religious interests.
The United States submits an annual report on religious freedom and persecution to the Congress. The report contains data which the United States collects from U.S. embassies around the world in collaboration with theOffice of International Religious Freedom and other relevant U.S. government and non-governmental institutions. The data is available to the public.[46] The 2018 study details, country by country, the violations of religious freedom taking place in approximately 75% of the 195 countries in the world. Between 2007 and 2017, the PEW organization[47] found that "Christians experienced harassment by governments or social groups in the largest number of countries"—144 countries—but that it is almost equal to the number of countries (142) in which Muslims experience harassment.[47] PEW has published a caution concerning the interpretation of these numbers: "The Center's recent report ... does not attempt to estimate the number of victims in each country... it does not speak to the intensity of harassment..."[48]
No religious group is free fromharassment in thecontemporary world. Klaus Wetzel, an expert on religious persecution for the GermanBundestag, theHouse of Lords, theUS House of Representatives, theEuropean Parliament, and the International Institute for Religious Freedom, explains that "In around a quarter of all countries in the world, the restrictions imposed by governments, or hostilities towards one or more religious groups, arehigh orvery high. Some of the most populous countries in the world belong to this group, such as China, India, Indonesia and Pakistan. Therefore, around three quarters of the world's population live in them."[49]
At the symposium on law and religion in 2014, Michelle Mack said: "Despite what appears to be a near-universal expression of commitment to religious human rights, the frequency-and severity-of religious persecution worldwide is staggering. Although it is impossible to determine with certainty the exact numbers of people persecuted for their faith or religious affiliation, it is unquestioned that "violations of freedom of religion and belief, including acts of severe persecution, occur with fearful frequency."[50]: 462, note 24 She quotes Irwin Colter, human rights advocate and author as saying "[F]reedom of religion remains the most persistently violated human right in the annals of the species."[51]
Despite the ubiquitous nature of religious persecution, the traditionalhuman rights community typically chooses to emphasize "more tangible encroachments on human dignity," such as violations which are based onrace,gender, andclass by using national, ethnic, and linguistic groupings rather than religious groupings.[52]
The persecution of beliefs that are deemedschismatic is one thing; the persecution of beliefs that are deemed heretical or blasphemous is another. Although a public disagreement on secondary matters might be serious enough, frequently, it has only led toreligious discrimination. On the other hand, the public renunciation of the core elements of a religious doctrine under the same circumstances would have put one in far greater danger. Whiledissenters from the official Church only faced fines and imprisonment in Protestant England, six people were executed for heresy or blasphemy during the reign ofElizabeth I, and two other people were executed in 1612 during the reign ofJames I.[53]
Similarly, heretical sects likeCathars,Waldensians andLollards were brutally suppressed in Western Europe, but in the borderlands of Eastern Europe, at the same time, Catholic Christians and 'schismatic' Orthodox Christians lived side by side after theEast-West Schism.[54]
Traditional African religions have faced religious persecution from Christians and Muslims.[55][56] Adherents of these religions have beenforcefully converted toIslam andChristianity, demonized andmarginalized.[57] The atrocities include killings, waging war, destroying of sacred places, and other atrocities.[58][59]
For almost 1000 years,[60] theDogon people, an ancient tribe inMali[61] had faced religious and ethnic persecution—throughjihads by dominant Muslim communities.[60] These jihadic expeditions were undertaken in order to force the Dogon to abandontheir traditional religious beliefs and convert to Islam. Such jihads caused the Dogon to abandon their original villages and move up to thecliffs of Bandiagara in search of a place where they could defend themselves more efficiently and escape persecution—which they often did by building their dwellings in little nooks and crannies.[60][62] In the early era ofFrench colonialism in Mali, the French authorities appointed Muslim relatives ofEl Hadj Umar Tall as chiefs of theBandiagara—despite the fact that the area has been a Dogon area for centuries.[63]
In 1864,Tidiani Tall, the nephew and successor of the 19th centurySenegambian jihadist and Muslim leader—El Hadj Umar Tall, chose to make Bandiagara the capital of theToucouleur Empire thereby exacerbating the inter-religious and inter-ethnic conflict. In recent years, the Dogon have accused theFulanis of supportingIslamic terrorist groups likeAl-Qaeda and they have also accused the Fulanis of sheltering members of these same terrorist groups in Dogon country, leading to the creation of the Dogon militiaDan Na Ambassagou in 2016—whose aim is to defend the Dogon against systematic attacks. That action resulted in theOgossagou massacre of Fulanis in March 2019, and the Fula retaliated by committing theSobane Da massacre in June of that year. In the wake of the Ogossagou massacre, thePresident of Mali,Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta and his government ordered the dissolution of Dan Na Ambassagou—whom they hold partly responsible for the attacks. The Dogon militia group denied its involvement in the massacre and it also rejected calls to disband itself.[64]
The persecution of theSerer people ofSenegal,Gambia andMauritania is multifaceted, and as a result, it includes religious and ethnic elements. The religious and ethnic persecution of the Serer people dates back to the 11th century, whenKing War Jabi usurped the throne ofTekrur (a part of present-day Senegal) in 1030, and in 1035, he introducedSharia law and forced his subjects to submit toIslam.[65] With the assistance of his son Leb, theirAlmoravid allies and otherAfrican ethnic groups which had embraced Islam, the Muslim coalition army launchedjihads against the Serer people of Tekrur because they refused to abandon theSerer religion in favour of Islam.[66][67][68][69] The number of Serers who were killed is unknown, but the defeat of the Serers at Tekrur triggered their exodus from Tekrur to the south, where they were granted asylum by thelamanes.[69] The persecution of the Serer people continued from themedieval era to the 19th century, resulting inthe Battle of Fandane-Thiouthioune. Since the 20th century, the persecution of the Serers has been less visible, nevertheless, they are still the objects of scorn and prejudice.[70][71]
Used before the 18th century as an insult,[72]atheism was punishable by death inancient Greece as well as in theChristian[disputed –discuss] andMuslim worlds during theMiddle Ages.[citation needed] Today, atheism is punishable by death in 12 countries (Afghanistan,Iran,Malaysia, theMaldives,Mauritania[citation needed],Nigeria[citation needed],Pakistan,Qatar,Saudi Arabia,Somalia,Sudan andYemen), all of them Muslim-majority, while "the overwhelming majority" of the 193 United Nations member countries "at best discriminate against citizens who have no belief in a god and at worst they can jail them for offences which are dubbed blasphemy".[73][74]
State atheism has been defined by David Kowalewski as the official "promotion ofatheism" by a government, typically by the active suppression ofreligious freedom and practice.[75] It is amisnomer which is used in reference to a government'santi-clericalism, its opposition to religious institutional power and influence, whether it is real or alleged, in all aspects of public and political life, including the involvement of religion in the everyday life of the citizen.[76]
State atheism was first practiced for a brief period inRevolutionary France[citation needed] and later it was practiced inRevolutionary Mexico andMarxist-Leninist states. The Soviet Union had a long history of state atheism,[77] in which social success largely required individuals to profess atheism, stay away from churches and even vandalize them; this attitude was especially militant during the middle Stalinist era from 1929 to 1939.[78][79][80] The Soviet Union attempted to suppress religion over wide areas of its influence, including places like central Asia,[81] and the post-World War IIEastern bloc. One state within that bloc, theSocialist People's Republic of Albania underEnver Hoxha, went so far as to officially ban all religious practices.[82]
TheBaháʼís are Iran's largest religious minority, and Iran is the location of one of the seventh largest Baháʼí population in the world, with just over 251,100 as of 2010.[83] Baháʼís in Iran have been subject to unwarranted arrests, false imprisonment, beatings, torture, unjustified executions, confiscation and destruction of property owned by individuals and the Baháʼí community, denial of employment, denial of government benefits, denial of civil rights and liberties, and denial of access to higher education.
More recently, in the later months of 2005, an intensive anti-Baháʼí campaign was conducted by Iranian newspapers and radio stations. The state-run and influentialKayhan newspaper, whosemanaging editor is appointed by Iran's supreme leader,Ayatollah Khamenei The press in Iran, ran nearly three dozen articles defaming the Baháʼí Faith. Furthermore, a confidential letter sent on 29 October 2005 by the Chairman of the Command Headquarters of the Armed Forced in Iran states that the Supreme Leader of Iran,Ayatollah Khamenei has instructed the Command Headquarters to identify people who adhere to the Baháʼí Faith and to monitor their activities and gather any and all information about the members of the Baháʼí Faith. The letter was brought to the attention of the international community by Asma Jahangir, theSpecial Rapporteur of theUnited Nations Commission on Human Rights on freedom of religion or belief, in a 20 March 2006 press release[2].[dead link]
In the press release the Special Rapporteur states that she "is highly concerned by information she has received concerning the treatment of members of the Baháʼí community in Iran." She further states that "The Special Rapporteur is concerned that this latest development indicates that the situation with regard to religious minorities in Iran is, in fact, deteriorating."[3].[dead link]
The persecution of Buddhists has been a widespread phenomenon throughout thehistory of Buddhism, a phenomenon which continues to occur today. As early as the 3rd century AD, Buddhists were persecuted by Kirder, the Zoroastrian high priest of theSasanian Empire.[citation needed]
Anti-Buddhist sentiments inImperial China between the 5th and 10th century led to theFour Buddhist Persecutions in China of which theGreat Anti-Buddhist Persecution of 845 was probably the most severe. However Buddhism managed to survive but was greatly weakened. During theNorthern Expedition, in 1926 inGuangxi,Kuomintang Muslim GeneralBai Chongxi led his troops in destroying Buddhist temples and smashing idols, turning the temples into schools and Kuomintang party headquarters.[84] During theKuomintang Pacification of Qinghai, the Muslim General Ma Bufang and his army wiped out many Tibetan Buddhists in the northeast and eastern Qinghai, and destroyedTibetan Buddhist temples.[85]
TheMuslim invasion of the Indian subcontinent was the first greaticonoclastic invasion into theIndian subcontinent.[86] According to William Johnston, hundreds of Buddhist monasteries and shrines were destroyed, Buddhist texts wereburnt by the Muslim armies, monks and nuns killed during the 12th and 13th centuries in theIndo-Gangetic Plain region.[87] The Buddhist university ofNalanda was mistaken for a fort because of the walled campus. The Buddhist monks who had been slaughtered were mistaken for Brahmins according toMinhaj-i-Siraj.[88] The walled town, theOdantapuri monastery, was also conquered by his forces. Sumpa basing his account on that ofŚākyaśribhadra who was atMagadha in 1200, states that the Buddhist university complexes of Odantapuri andVikramshila were also destroyed and the monks massacred.[89] Muslim forces attacked the north-western regions of the Indian subcontinent many times.[90] Many places were destroyed and renamed. For example, Odantapuri's monasteries were destroyed in 1197 byMuhammad bin Bakhtiyar Khilji and the town was renamed.[91] Likewise,Vikramashila was destroyed by the forces of Muhammad bin Bakhtiyar Khilji around 1200.[92] The sacredMahabodhi Temple was almost completely destroyed by the Muslim invaders.[93][94] Many Buddhist monks fled toNepal, Tibet, andSouth India to avoid the consequences of war.[95] Tibetan pilgrim Chöjepal (1179–1264), who arrived in India in 1234,[96] had to flee advancing Muslim troops multiple times, as they were sacking Buddhist sites.[97]
In Japan, thehaibutsu kishaku during theMeiji Restoration (starting in 1868) was an event triggered by the official policy of separation ofShinto and Buddhism (orshinbutsu bunri). This caused great destruction toBuddhism in Japan, the destruction of Buddhist temples, images and texts took place on a large scale all over the country and Buddhist monks were forced to return to secular life.[citation needed]
During the2012 Ramu violence in Bangladesh, a 25,000-strong Muslim mob set fire to destroy at least twelve Buddhist temples and around fifty homes throughout the town and surrounding villages after seeing a picture of an allegedly desecratedQuran, which they claimed had been posted on Facebook by Uttam Barua, a local Buddhist man.[98][99] The actual posting of the photo was not done by the Buddhist who was falsely slandered.[100]
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From the beginnings of Christianity as amovement within Judaism,Early Christians were persecuted for theirfaith at the hands of bothJews and theRoman Empire, which controlled much of theareas where Christianity was first distributed. This continued from thefirst century until the earlyfourth, when the religion was legalized by theEdict of Milan, eventually becoming theState church of the Roman Empire. Many Christians fled persecution in the Roman empire by emigrating to the Persian empire where for a century and a half after Constantine's conversion, they were persecuted under the Sassanids, with thousands losing their lives.[101]: 76 Christianity continued to spread through "merchants, slaves, traders, captives and contacts with Jewish communities" as well as missionaries who were often killed for their efforts.[101]: 97, 131, 224–225, 551 This killing continued into theEarly modern period beginning in the fifteenth century, to theLate modern period of the twentieth century, and into thecontemporary period today.[102][103][104][105][106]
In contemporary society, Christians are persecuted inIran and other parts of the Middle East, for example, forproselytising, which is illegal there.[109][110][111] Of the 100–200 million Christians alleged to be under assault, the majority are persecuted in Muslim-majority nations.[112] Every year, the Christian non-profit organizationOpen Doors publishes the World Watch List—a list of the top 50 countries which it designates as the most dangerous for Christians.
The 2018 World Watch List has the following countries as its top ten:North Korea, andEritrea, whose Christian and Muslim religions are controlled by the state, andAfghanistan,Myanmar,Somalia,Sudan,Pakistan,Libya,Iraq,Yemen, India andIran, which are all predominantly non-Christian.[113] Due to the large number of Christian majority countries, differing groups of Christians are harassed and persecuted in Christian countries such as Eritrea[114] and Mexico[115] more often than in Muslim countries, although not in greater numbers.[116]
There are low to moderate restrictions on religious freedom in three-quarters of the world's countries, with high and very high restrictions in a quarter of them, according to the State Department's report on religious freedom and persecution delivered annually to Congress.[117] The Internationale Gesellschaft für Menschenrechte[118]—the International Society for Human Rights—in Frankfurt, Germany is a non-governmental organization with 30,000 members from 38 countries who monitor human rights. In September 2009, then chairman Martin Lessenthin,[119] issued a report estimating that 80% of acts of religious persecution around the world were aimed at Christians at that time.[120][121] According to theWorld Evangelical Alliance, over 200 million Christians are denied fundamental human rights solely because of their faith.[122]
A report released by the UK'sSecretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, and a report by the PEW organization studying worldwide restrictions of religious freedom, both have Christians suffering in the highest number of countries, rising from 125 in 2015 to 144 as of 2018.[123][47][124] PEW has published a caution concerning the interpretation of these numbers: "The Center's recent report ... does not attempt to estimate the number of victims in each country... it does not speak to the intensity of harassment..."[48]
In December 2016, the Center for the Study of Global Christianity (CSGC) atGordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Massachusetts, published a statement that "between 2005 and 2015 there were 900,000 Christian martyrs worldwide—an average of 90,000 per year, marking aChristian as persecuted every 8 minutes."[125] However, the BBC has reported that others such as Open Doors and theInternational Society for Human Rights have disputed that number's accuracy.[126][49][127] Gina Zurlo, the CSGC's assistant director, explained that two-thirds of the 90,000 died in tribal conflicts, and nearly half were victims of the civil war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.[128] Klaus Wetzel, an internationally recognized expert on religious persecution, explains that Gordon-Conwell defines Christian martyrdom in the widest possible sense, while Wetzel and Open doors and others such asThe International Institute for Religious Freedom (IIRF) use a more restricted definition: "those who are killed,who would not have been killed, if they had not been Christians."[129] Open Doors documents that anti-Christian sentiment is presently based on direct evidence and makes conservative estimates based on indirect evidence.[130] This approach dramatically lowers the numerical count. Open Doors says that, while numbers fluctuate every year, they estimate 11 Christians are currently dying for their faith somewhere in the world every day.[131]
The persecution of Copts is a historical and ongoing issue inEgypt againstCoptic Orthodox Christianity and its followers. It is also a prominent example of the poor status ofChristians in the Middle East despite the religion being native to the region.Copts are theChrist followers in Egypt, usuallyOriental Orthodox, who currently make up around 10% of the population of Egypt—the largest religious minority of that country.[a] Copts have cited instances of persecution throughout their history andHuman Rights Watch has noted "growing religious intolerance" and sectarian violence against Coptic Christians in recent years, as well as a failure by the Egyptian government to effectively investigate properly and prosecute those responsible.[136][137]
TheMuslim conquest of Egypt took place in AD 639, during theByzantine Empire. Despite the political upheaval, Egypt remained a mainly Christian, but Copts lost their majority status after the 14th century,[138] as a result of the intermittent persecution and the destruction of the Christian churches there,[139] accompanied by heavy taxes for those who refused to convert.[140] From theMuslim conquest of Egypt onwards, the Coptic Christians were persecuted by different Muslims regimes,[141] such as theUmayyad Caliphate,[142]Abbasid Caliphate,[143][144][145]Fatimid Caliphate,[146][147][148]Mamluk Sultanate,[149][150] andOttoman Empire; the persecution of Coptic Christians included closing and demolishing churches andforced conversion toIslam.[151][152][153]
Since 2011 hundreds of Egyptian Copts have been killed in sectarian clashes, and many homes, Churches and businesses have been destroyed. In just one province (Minya), 77 cases of sectarian attacks on Copts between 2011 and 2016 have been documented by theEgyptian Initiative for Personal Rights.[154] The abduction and disappearance of Coptic Christian women and girls also remains a serious ongoing problem.[155][156][157]
Political and religious animosity against Jehovah's Witnesses has at times led tomob action and government oppression in various countries. Their stance regarding political neutrality and their refusal to serve in the military has led to imprisonment of members whorefused conscription duringWorld War II and at other times wherenational service has been compulsory. Their religious activities are currently banned or restricted in some countries,[158] including China,Vietnam, and manyIslamic states.[159][160]
Authors includingWilliam Whalen, Shawn Francis Peters and former WitnessesBarbara Grizzuti Harrison, Alan Rogerson and William Schnell have claimed the arrests and mob violence in the United States in the 1930s and 1940s were the consequence of what appeared to be a deliberate course of provocation of authorities and other religious groups by Jehovah's Witnesses. Whalen, Harrison and Schnell have suggestedRutherford invited and cultivated opposition for publicity purposes in a bid to attract dispossessed members of society, and to convince members that persecution from the outside world was evidence of the truth of their struggle to serve God.[175][176][177][178][179] Watch Tower Society literature of the period directed that Witnesses should "never seek a controversy" nor resist arrest, but also advised members not to co-operate with police officers or courts that ordered them to stop preaching, and to prefer jail rather than pay fines.[180]
Historically the relationship between theDruze andMuslims has been characterized by intense persecution.[182][183][184] The Druze faith is often classified as a branch ofIsma'ilism. Even though the faith originally developed out ofIsmaili Islam, mostDruze do not identify as Muslims,[185][186][187] and they do not accept theFive Pillars of Islam.[188] The Druze have frequently experienced persecution by different Muslim regimes such as theShiaFatimid Caliphate,[189]Mamluk,[190]SunniOttoman Empire,[191] andEgypt Eyalet.[192][193] The persecution of the Druze includedmassacres, demolishing Druze prayer houses and holy places andforced conversion to Islam.[194] Those were no ordinary killings in the Druze's narrative, they were meant to eradicate the whole community according to the Druze narrative.[195] Most recently, theSyrian Civil War, which began in 2011, saw persecution of the Druze at the hands ofIslamic extremists.[196][197]
Ibn Taymiyya a prominentMuslim scholarmuhaddith, dismissed the Druze as non-Muslims,[198] and hisfatwa cited that Druzes: "Are not at the level of ′Ahl al-Kitāb (People of the Book) normushrikin (polytheists). Rather, they are from the most deviantkuffār (Infidel) ... Their women can be taken as slaves and their property can be seized ... they are to be killed whenever they are found and cursed as they described ... It is obligatory to kill their scholars and religious figures so that they do not misguide others",[199] which in that setting would have legitimized violence against them asapostates.[200][201]Ottomans have often relied on Ibn Taymiyya religious ruling to justify their persecution of Druze.[202]
The persecution of theFalun Gongspiritual practice began with campaigns initiated in 1999 by theChinese Communist Party (CCP) to eliminate Falun Gong in China. It is characterised by multifaceted propaganda campaign, a program of enforced ideological conversion and re-education, and a variety of extralegal coercive measures such as arbitrary arrests,forced labor, andphysical torture, sometimes resulting in death.[203]
There have being reports of organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners in China. Several researchers—most notably Canadian human rights lawyerDavid Matas, former parliamentarianDavid Kilgour, and investigative journalistEthan Gutmann—estimate that tens of thousands of Falun Gongprisoners of conscience have been killed to supply a lucrative trade in human organs and cadavers.[204]
For example, Hindus have been one of the targeted and persecuted minorities inPakistan. Militancy and sectarianism has been rising in Pakistan since the 1990s, and the religious minorities have "borne the brunt of the Islamist's ferocity" suffering "greater persecution than in any earlier decade", statesFarahnaz Ispahani—a Public Policy Scholar at theWilson Center. This has led to attacks and forced conversion of Hindus, and other minorities such as Christians.[207][208][209] According to Tetsuya Nakatani—a Japanese scholar of Cultural Anthropology specializing in South Asia refugee history, after the mass exodus of Hindu, Sikh and other non-Muslim refugees during the 1947 partition of British India, there were several waves of Hindu refugees arrival into India from its neighbors.[210] The fearful and persecuted refugee movements were often after various religious riots between 1949 and 1971 that targeted non-Muslims within West Pakistan or East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). The status of these persecuted Hindu refugees in India was in political limbo until the passage ofCitizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 by the Indian Government. Systemically in Pakistan, Hindus are persecuted under the government's Blasphemy Law (with often consequence of death irrelevant of the legal claim's accuracy), and as per the rhetoric of mainstream politicians interpreting vague constitutional law, have second-class rights in the nation regarding places of worship and facets of their religion.[citation needed]
Similar concerns about religious persecution of Hindu and other minorities in Bangladesh have also been expressed. A famous report by Dr. Abul Barkat, a famous Bangladeshi economist and research, projects that there will be no Hindus left in Bangladesh in 30 years.[211][212][213] The USCIRF notes hundreds of cases of "killings, attempted killings, death threats, assaults, rapes, kidnappings, and attacks on homes, businesses, and places of worship" on religious minorities in 2017.[214] Since the 1990s, Hindus have been a persecuted minority in Afghanistan, and a subject of "intense hate" with the rise of religious fundamentalism in Afghanistan.[215] Their "targeted persecution" triggered an exodus and forced them to seek asylum.[216] The persecuted Hindus have remained stateless and without citizenship rights in India, since it has historically lacked any refugee law or uniform policy for persecuted refugees, state Ashish Bose and Hafizullah Emadi, though the recent Citizen Amendment Act passed by India is a form of solace for those Hindus having entered India before 2015.[215][217]
TheBangladesh Liberation War (1971) resulted in one of the largest genocides of the 20th century. While estimates of the number of casualties was 3,000,000, it is reasonably certain that Hindus bore a disproportionate brunt of the Pakistan Army's onslaught against the Bengali population of what was East Pakistan. An article inTime magazine dated 2 August 1971, stated "the Hindus, who account for three-fourths of the refugees and a majority of the dead, have borne the brunt of the Muslim military hatred."[218] SenatorEdward Kennedy wrote in a report that was part ofUnited States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations testimony dated 1 November 1971, "Hardest hit have been members of the Hindu community who have been robbed of their lands and shops, systematically slaughtered, and in some places, painted with yellow patches marked "H". All of this has been officially sanctioned, ordered and implemented under martial law fromIslamabad". In the same report, Senator Kennedy reported that 80% of the refugees in India were Hindus and according to numerous international relief agencies such asUNESCO andWorld Health Organization the number of East Pakistani refugees at their peak in India was close to 10 million. Given that the Hindu population in East Pakistan was around 11 million in 1971, this suggests that up to 8 million, or more than 70% of the Hindu population had fled the country. ThePulitzer Prize–winning journalistSydney Schanberg covered the start of the war and wrote extensively on the suffering of the East Bengalis, including the Hindus both during and after the conflict. In a syndicated column "The Pakistani Slaughter That Nixon Ignored", he wrote about his return to liberated Bangladesh in 1972. "Other reminders were the yellow "H"s the Pakistanis had painted on the homes of Hindus, particular targets of the Muslim army" (by "Muslim army", meaning thePakistan Army, which had targeted Bengali Muslims as well), (Newsday, 29 April 1994).
Hindus constitute approximately 0.5% of the total population of the United States. Hindus in the US enjoy bothde jure andde facto legal equality. However, a series of attacks were made on people Indian origin by a street gang called the "Dotbusters" inNew Jersey in 1987, the dot signifying theBindi dot sticker worn on the forehead by Indian women.[219] The lackadaisical attitude of the local police prompted the South Asian community to arrange small groups all across the state to fight back against the street gang. The perpetrators have been put to trial. On 2 January 2012, a Hindu worship center in New York City was firebombed.[220] TheDotbusters were primarily based in New York and New Jersey and committed most of their crimes inJersey City. A number of perpetrators have been brought to trial for these assaults. Although tougher anti-hate crime laws were passed by the New Jersey legislature in 1990, the attacks continued, with 58 cases of hate crimes against Indians in New Jersey reported in 1991.[221]
Persecution of Hindus also contemporarily has been seen in the Indian-administered union territory ofJammu and Kashmir. In theKashmir region, approximately 300Kashmiri Pandits were killed between September 1989 to 1990 in various incidents.[222] In early 1990, local Urdu newspapersAftab andAl Safa called upon Kashmiris to wagejihad against India and ordered the expulsion of all Hindus choosing to remain in Kashmir.[222] In the following days masked men ran in the streets withAK-47s, shooting to kill Hindus who would not leave.[222] Notices were placed on the houses of all Hindus, telling them to leave within 24 hours or die.[222] Since March 1990, estimates of between300,000 and 500,000 pandits have migrated outside Kashmir due to persecution byIslamic fundamentalists in the largest case of ethnic cleansing since the partition of India.[223] ManyKashmiri Pandits have been killed byIslamist militants in incidents such as theWandhama massacre and the2000 Amarnath pilgrimage massacre.[224][225][226] The incidents of massacring and forced eviction have been termedethnic cleansing by some observers.[222]
In Bangladesh, on 28 February 2013, theInternational Crimes Tribunal sentencedDelwar Hossain Sayeedi, the Vice President of theJamaat-e-Islami to death for the war crimes committed during the 1971Bangladesh Liberation War. Following the sentence, the Hindus were attacked in different parts of the country. Hindu properties were looted, Hindu houses were burnt into ashes and Hindu temples were desecrated and set on fire.[227][additional citation(s) needed] This trend has continued, sadly; Islamist groups in Bangladesh, nearing the 50th anniversary of the Bengali Hindu Genocide, set fire to and vandalized several Hindu temples along with 80 houses.[228][229]
A major component ofJewish history, persecutions have been committed bySeleucids,[230]ancient Greeks,[32]ancient Romans, Christians (Catholic,Orthodox andProtestant),Muslims,Nazis, etc. Some of the most important events which constitute thishistory include the1066 Granada massacre, theRhineland massacres (by Catholics, but they were committed against papal orders, see also :Sicut Judaeis), theAlhambra Decree which was issued after theReconquista and the establishment of theSpanish Inquisition, the publication ofOn the Jews and Their Lies byMartin Luther which furthered Protestantanti-Judaism and was later used to strengthenGerman antisemitism and justifypogroms andthe Holocaust.[citation needed]
According to theFBI's statistics, the majority of religiously motivatedhate crimes which are committed in the United States are committed against Jews. In 2018, anti-Jewish hate crimes represented 57.8% of all religiously motivated hate crimes; followed by anti-Muslim hate crimes, which were the second most common, representing 14.5%.[231]
Persecution of Muslims is the religious persecution that is inflicted upon followers of theIslamic faith. In the early days of Islam atMecca, the new Muslims were often subjected to abuse and persecution by thepagan Meccans (often called Mushrikin: the unbelievers orpolytheists).[232][233] Muslims were persecuted byMeccans at the time ofMuhammed.
Currently, Muslims face religious restrictions in 142 countries according to the PEW report on rising religious restrictions around the world.[234] According to the US State Department's 2019 freedom of religion report, theCentral African Republic remains divided between the Christian anti-Balaka and the predominantly Muslim ex-Seleka militia forces with many Muslim communities displaced and not allowed to practice their religion freely.[235] In Nigeria, "conflicts between predominantly Muslim Fulani herdsmen and predominantly Christian farmers in the North Central states continued throughout 2019."[236]
Shia-Sunni conflicts persist.Indonesia is approximately 87% Sunni Muslim, and "Shia and Ahmadi Muslims reported feeling under constant threat." Anti-Shia rhetoric was common throughout 2019 in some online media outlets and on social media."[237]
InSaudi Arabia, the government "is based largely on sharia as interpreted by the Hanbali school of Sunni Islamic jurisprudence. Freedom of religion is not provided under the law." In January and May 2019, police raided predominantly Shia villages in the al-Qatif Governorate... In April the government executed 37 citizens ... 33 of the 37 were from the country's minorityShia community and had been convicted following what they stated were unfair trials for various alleged crimes, including protest-related offenses... Authorities detained ... three Shia Muslims who have written in the past on the discrimination faced by Shia Muslims, with no official charges filed; they remained in detention at year's end... Instances of prejudice and discrimination against Shia Muslims continued to occur..."[238]
Islamophobia can referprejudice against Muslims, which can be distinct frompersecution of Muslims. In Finland, "A report by the European Commission Against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) said hate crimes and intolerant speech in public discourse, principally against Muslims and asylum seekers (many of whom belong to religious minorities), had increased in recent years... A Finns Party politician publicly compared Muslim asylum seekers to an invasive species." There were several demonstrations by neo-Nazis and nativist groups in 2019. One neo-Nazi group, the NRM (the Nordic Resistance Movement), "continued to post anti-Muslim and anti-Semitic statements online and demonstrated with the anti-immigrant groupSoldiers of Odin."[239]
The ongoingRohingya genocide has resulted in over 25,000 deaths from 2016 to present.[240][241] Over 700,000 refugees have been sent abroad since 2017.[242]Gang rapes and other acts ofsexual violence, mainly against Rohingya women and girls, have also been committed by the Rakhine Buddhists and the Burmese military's soldiers, along with the arson of Rohingya homes and mosques, as well as many other human rights violations.[243]
TheChinese government haspersecuted the majority-Muslim Uyghur people and other ethnic and religious minorities in and around the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of thePeople's Republic of China.[244][245][246] Since 2014,[247] the Chinese government, under the direction of the CCP during theadministration ofCCP general secretary Xi Jinping, has pursued policies leading to more than one millionMuslims[248][249][250][251][252] (the majority of them Uyghurs) being held in secretiveinternment camps without anylegal process[253][254] in what has become the largest-scale and most systematic detention of ethnic and religious minorities sincethe Holocaust.[255][256][257] The Chinese Government has subjected hundreds of thousands of members of Muslim minority groups living in Xinjiang toforced abortions,forced sterilizations, and the forced administration of contraceptives (including contraceptive implants), methods of birth control that had exempted ethnic minorities up until that point.[258][259][260] Uyghurs and members of other minority groups have been made subject to a widespread forced labor apparatus.[261][262][263][264][257] Uyghurs and other religious minorities detained within theXinjiang internment camps have also been subjected to systematic rape and torture.[265][266][267]
In China, General SecretaryXi Jinping has decreed that all members of theChinese Communist Party (CCP) must be "unyielding Marxist atheists". InXinjiang province, the government enforced restrictions on Muslims. The U.S. government estimates that
... since April 2017, the Chinese government arbitrarily detained more than one million Uighurs, ethnic Kazakhs, Hui, and members of other Muslim groups, as well as Uighur Christians, in specially built or converted internment camps in Xinjiang and subjected them toforced disappearance, political indoctrination, torture, physical and psychological abuse, including forced sterilization and sexual abuse, forced labor, and prolonged detention without trial because of their religion and ethnicity. There were reports of individuals dying as a result of injuries sustained during interrogations...Authorities in Xinjiang restricted access to mosques and barred youths from participating in religious activities, including fasting during Ramadan... maintained extensive and invasive security and surveillance... forcing Uighurs and other ethnic and religious minorities to install spyware on their mobile phones and accept government officials and CCP members living in their homes. Satellite imagery and other sources indicated the government destroyed mosques, cemeteries, and other religious sites... The government sought the forcible repatriation of Uighur and other Muslims from foreign countries and detained some of those who returned... Anti-Muslim speech in social media remained widespread."[268]
Sikhism is aDharmic religion that originated in thePunjab region of theIndian subcontinent[269]: 207 around the end of the 15th century CE. The Sikh religion developed and evolved during periods of religious persecution, gaining converts fromHinduism andIslam.[270]Mughal emperors of India tortured and executed two of the Sikh gurus—Guru Arjan (1563–1605) andGuru Tegh Bahadur (1621–1675)—afterthey refused to convert to Islam.[271][272][273][274][275]
The persecution of Sikhs during the Islamic era triggered the founding of theKhalsa by Guru Gobind Singh in 1699, the Khalsa is an order which was founded for the purpose of protecting thefreedom of conscience andreligion of the Sikhs,[271][276][277] with members expressing the qualities of aSant-Sipāhī—a saint-soldier.[278][279]
In February 1762,Afghan emperorAhmad Shah Durrani perpetrated a massacre against the families and camp followers of theSikh Army, killing between 10,000 and 30,000 people, in a massacre that is now known asVadda Ghalughara.[280] Following the massacre, he attackedAmritsar and desecrated theGolden Temple by throwing cow carcasses into its sacred lake and then filling it with rubble from demolishedgurdwaras andtemples.[281]
According to Ashish Bose, a population research scholar, Sikhs and Hindus were well integrated inAfghanistan until theSoviet invasion when their economic condition worsened. Thereafter, they became the objects of "intense hate" as a result of the rise of religious fundamentalism in Afghanistan.[215] Their "targeted persecution" triggered an exodus and forced them to seek asylum.[216][215] Many of them started arriving in and after 1992 as refugees in India, with some seeking asylum in the United Kingdom and other western countries.[215][216] Unlike the arrivals in the West, the persecuted Sikh refugees who arrived in India have remained stateless and lived as refugees because India has historically lacked any refugee law or uniform policy for persecuted refugees, state Ashish Bose and Hafizullah Emadi.[215][217]
On 7 November 1947, thousands of Hindus and Sikhs were targeted in theRajouri Massacre in theJammu and Kashmir princely state. It is estimated 30,000+ Hindus and Sikhs were either killed, abducted or injured.[282][283][284] In one instance, on 12 November 1947 alone between 3000 and 7000 were killed.[285] A few weeks after on 25 November 1947, tribal forces began the1947 Mirpur massacre of thousands more Hindus and Sikhs. An estimated 20,000+ died in the massacre.[286][287][288][289][290][291][292][293]
In June 1984, duringOperation Blue Star,Indira Gandhi ordered theIndian Army to attack theGolden Temple and eliminate any insurgents, as it had been occupied by Sikh separatists who were stockpiling weapons.Later operations by Indian paramilitary forces were initiated to clear the separatists from the countryside ofPunjab state.[294]
The 1984 anti-Sikhs riots were a series ofpogroms[295][296][297] directed againstSikhs in India, by anti-Sikh mobs, in response to theassassination of Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards. There were more than 8,000[298] deaths, including 3,000 in Delhi.[297]
The violence in Delhi was triggered by the assassination ofIndira Gandhi, India's prime minister, on 31 October 1984, by two of her Sikhbodyguards in response to her actions authorising the military operation. After theassassination followingOperation Blue Star, manyIndian National Congress workers includingJagdish Tytler,Sajjan Kumar and Kamal Nath were accused of inciting and participating in riots targeting the Sikh population of the capital. The Indian government reported 2,700 deaths in the ensuing chaos. In the aftermath of the riots, the Indian government reported 20,000 had fled the city, however thePeople's Union for Civil Liberties reported "at least" 1,000displaced persons.[299] The most affected regions were the Sikh neighbourhoods in Delhi. TheCentral Bureau of Investigation, the main Indian investigating agency, is of the opinion that the acts of violence were organized with the support from the then Delhi police officials and the central government headed by Indira Gandhi's son,Rajiv Gandhi.[300] Rajiv Gandhi was sworn in as Prime Minister after his mother's death and, when asked about the riots, said "when a big tree falls (Mrs. Gandhi's death), the earth shakes (occurrence of riots)" thus trying to justify communal strife.[301]
It has been alleged that at that time, theIndian National Congress's government destroyed evidence and shielded the guilty. TheAsian Age front-page story called the government's actions "the Mother of all Cover-ups"[302][303] There are allegations that the violence was led and often perpetrated by Indian National Congress activists and sympathisers during the riots.[304] The government, then led by the Congress, was widely criticised for doing very little at the time, possibly acting as a conspirator. Theconspiracy theory is supported by the fact that voting lists were used to identify Sikh families. Despite the communal conflict and despite the record of the riots, the Indian National Congress claims that it is a secular political party.
The Chittisinghpura massacre, the murder of 35 villagers who were members of theSikh faith, was committed on 20 March 2000, in the Chittisinghpora (Chittisinghpura) village of theAnantnag district,Jammu and Kashmir, India, on the eve of PresidentBill Clinton's state visit to India. The identities of the perpetrators of the massacre remain unknown. The Indian government asserts that the massacre was conducted by the Pakistan-basedmilitant groupLashkar-e-Taiba (LeT). Other accounts accuse theIndian Army andRSS of the massacre.[305][306][307][308]
On25 March 2020, ISIS-Haqqani network Gunmen and Suicide bombers attacked the Gurdwara Har Rai Sahib (aSikh shrine) inKabul, Afghanistan.
According to reports, about 200 worshipers were inside the building, 25 of them were killed and at least 8 others were wounded after an hour-long siege ended when all of the assailants were killed by responding security forces. At least one child was said to have been among the people who were killed, according to the ministry of interior's statement.
The Persecution ofYazidis has been ongoing since at least the 10th century.[309][310] TheYazidi religion is regarded asdevil worship byIslamists.[311] Yazidis have been persecuted by MuslimKurdish tribes since the 10th century,[309] and they were also persecuted by theOttoman Empire from the 17th century to the 20th century.[312] After the 2014Sinjar massacre of thousands of Yazidis by theIslamic State, Yazidis still face violence at the hands of theTurkish Armed Forces and its ally theSyrian National Army, as well as discrimination at the hands of theKurdistan Regional Government. According to Yazidi tradition (based on oral traditions and folk songs), it is estimated that during the last 800 years, 74genocides were committed against the Yazidis.[313]
Thepersecution of Zoroastrians is the religious persecution which has been inflicted upon adherents of theZoroastrian faith. The persecution of Zoroastrians has occurred throughout their religion's history. The discrimination and harassment began in the form of sparse violence andforced conversions. According to Zoroastrian records,Muslims destroyedfire temples. Zoroastrians who lived under Muslim rule were required to pay a tax which was called thejizya.[314]
Zoroastrianplaces of worship were desecrated,fire temples were destroyed and mosques were built in their place. Many libraries wereburned and much of the cultural heritage of the Zoroastrians was lost. Gradually, an increasing number of discriminatory laws were passed, these laws regulated the behavior of Zoroastrians and they also limited the Zoroastrians' ability to participate in society. Over time, the persecution of Zoroastrians became more common and it also became widespread, and as a result, the number of believers significantly decreased by force.[314]
Most Zoroastrians were forced to convert to Islam due to the systematic abuse and discrimination which was inflicted upon them by followers ofIslam. Once a Zoroastrian family was forced to convert toIslam, the children were sent to anIslamic school, where they were required to learnArabic and study the teachings of Islam, as a result, some of these people lost their Zoroastrian faith. However, under theSamanids, who were Zoroastrian converts to Islam, thePersian language flourished. On some occasions, the Zoroastrian clergy assisted Muslims when they launched their attacks against people who they considered Zoroastrian heretics.[314]
A Zoroastrian astrologer who was namedMulla Gushtasp predicted the fall of theZand dynasty to the Qajar army in Kerman. Because of Gushtasp's forecast, the Zoroastrians of Kerman were spared by the conquering army ofAgha Mohammad Khan Qajar. Despite the aforementioned favorable incident, the Zoroastrians remained in agony during theQajar dynasty and as a result, their population continued to decline. Even during the rule of Agha Mohammad Khan, the founder of the dynasty, many Zoroastrians were killed and some of them were taken captive and deported toAzerbaijan.[315] Zoroastrians regard the Qajar period as one of their worst.[316] During the Qajar dynasty, the religious persecution of the Zoroastrians was rampant. Due to their increasing contacts with influentialParsi philanthropists such asManeckji Limji Hataria, many Zoroastrians leftIran and migrated to India. There, they formed theIranis, India's second largest Zoroastrian community.[317]
Throughout thehistory of philosophy, philosophers have been imprisoned for various offenses by courts and tribunals, often as a result of their philosophical activities, and some of them have even been put to death. The most famous case in which a philosopher was put on trial is the case ofSocrates, who was tried for, amongst other charges, corrupting the youth and impiety.[318] Others include:
More than 300 Roman Catholics were put to death fortreason by English governments between 1535 and 1681, thus they were officially executed for secular rather thanreligious offenses.[53] In 1570,Pope Pius V issued hispapal bullRegnans in Excelsis, which absolved Catholics from their obligations to the government.[324] This dramatically worsened the persecution of Catholics in England. The 1584Parliament of England, declared in "An Act against Jesuits, seminary priests, and such other like disobedient persons" that the purpose of all Catholic missionaries who had come to Britain was "to stir up and move sedition, rebellion and open hostility".[325] Consequently, even strictly apolitical priests likeSaint John Ogilvie,Dermot O'Hurley, andRobert Southwell were subjected to torture and execution, as were members of the laity like Sts.Margaret Clitherow andRichard Gwyn. This drastically contrasts with the image of theElizabethan era as a golden age, but compared to the antecedentMarian Persecutions there is an important difference to consider.Queen Mary was motivated by determination to exterminateProtestantism from all her Kingdoms and to restore the independence of the English Church from control by the state. During her short reign from 1553 to 1558, about 290 Protestants[326] were burned at the stake. While Mary's sisterQueen Elizabeth I allegedly, "acted out of fear for the security of her realm",[327] she sought to coerce both Catholics and Protestants to embrace anational church that was completelysubservient to the state.
Over the centuries that followed, English governments continued to fear and prosecute both real and imaginary conspiracies like thePopish Plot, an alleged plan to assassinateKing Charles II and massacre the Protestants of theBritish Isles. In reality, the plot was a fictitious concoction byTitus Oates andWhig politicianLord Shaftesbury. Before the falsity of their claims were exposed, however, at least 22 innocent clergy and laity, including ArchbishopOliver Plunkett, had been unjustly convicted ofhigh treason and executed atTyburn.
"Persecution" in this study refers to violence or discrimination against members of a religious minority because of their religious affiliation. Persecution involves the most damaging expressions ofprejudice against anout-group, expressions that go beyond verbal abuse and social avoidance. It refers to actions that are intended to deprive individuals of their political rights and force minorities to assimilate, leave, or live assecond-class citizens. When these actions persistently happen over a period of time, and when they also include large numbers of perpetrators and victims, we may refer to them as being part of a "campaign" of persecution that usually has the goal of excluding the targeted minority from the polity.
Sidney W. Souers Professor of Government
Université de Montréal, Histoire, Faculty Member
ʿUmar is depicted as having ordered that "the poll-tax should be taken from all men who would not become Muslims"
Al Hakim Bi-Amr Allah (r. 996—1021), however, who became the greatest persecutor of Copts.... within the church that also appears to coincide with a period of forced rapid conversion to Islam
By late 1012 the persecution had moved into high gear with demolitions of churches and the forced conversion of Christian ...
Some Muslim rulers and jurists have advocated the persecution of members of the Druze Movement beginning with the seventh Fatimi Caliph Al-Zahir, in 1022. Recurring period of persecutions in subsequent centuries ... failure to elucidate their beliefs and practices, have contributed to the ambiguous relationship between Muslims and Druzes
Historically, Islam classified Christians, Jews, and Zoroastrians as protected "People of the Book," a secondary status subject to payment of a poll tax. Nevertheless, Zoroastrians suffered significant persecution. Other religions such as the Alawites, Alevis, and Druze often suffered more.
the Druze religion, though originating from the Isma'lliyya, an extreme branch of the Shia, seceded completely from Islam and has, therefore, experienced periods of persecution by the latter.
Most Druze do not consider themselves Muslim. Historically they faced much persecution and keep their religious beliefs secrets.
While they appear parallel to those of normative Islam, in the Druze religion they are different in meaning and interpretation. The religion is considered distinct from the Ismaili as well as from other Muslims belief and practice... Most Druze consider themselves fully assimilated in American society and do not necessarily identify as Muslims..
Theologically, one would have to conclude that the Druze are not Muslims. They do not accept the five pillars of Islam. In place of these principles the Druze have instituted the seven precepts noted above..
With the succession of al-Zahir to the Fatimid caliphate a mass persecution (known by the Druze as the period of themihna) of the Muwaḥḥidūn was instigated ...
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)Therefore, many of these scholars follow Ibn Taymiyya'sfatwa from the beginning of the fourteenth century that declared the Druzes and the Alawis as heretics outside Islam ...
Subsequently, Muslim opponents of the Druzes have often relied on Ibn Taymiyya's religious ruling to justify their attitudes and actions against Druzes...
...[O]pposition to China's Uyghur genocide is gaining momentum in Norway, where some politicians are fearful of jeopardizing ties with Beijing.
It appears to be the largest imprisonment of people on the basis of religion since the Holocaust.
China regularly conducts pregnancy checks, forces intrauterine devices, sterilization and even abortion on some of the Xinjiang region's minority women.
there is evidence of authorities running enforce labour transfer programmes, as well as systemic rape and torture, forced sterilisation of women, child separation and mass surveillance and intimidation
A large number of Hindu and Muslim peasants converted to Sikhism from conviction, fear, economic motives, or a combination of the three (Khushwant Singh 1999: 106; Ganda Singh 1935: 73).
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)The 25th anniversary of Indira Gandhi's assassination revives stark memories of some 3,000 Sikhs killed brutally in the orderly pogrom that followed her killing
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
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