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Iraq: Gunmen kill elderly Christian couple inside their Baghdad home - CNN.com
Iraq: Gunmen kill elderly Christian couple inside their Baghdad home
By the CNN Wire Staff
December 5, 2010 -- Updated 2138 GMT (0538 HKT)
Christians pray at the Sayidat al-Nejat Cathedral in central Baghdad on November 7, a week after 46 fellow worshippers taken hostage in the church by al Qaeda gunmen were massacred. Religiously rooted violence is causing increasing concern.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Attackers shot dead an elderly Christian couple Sunday in their home, an Iraqi official says
- The attack was the latest in recent months targeting Christians in Iraq
- The official says 5 of 15 responsible for 3 major attacks remain at large
- Iraq's prime minister assures an Italian minister the attackers will be "severely punished"
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(CNN) -- Attackers gunned down an elderly Christian couple late Sunday inside their Baghdad home, the latest in a string of religious-rooted violence that has spurred international outcry and a full-court press for justice from Iraqi authorities.
Gunmen broke into the couple's residence in Baladiyat, a predominantly Shiite area in eastern Baghdad, during the night and shot them dead, an Iraqi Interior Ministry official said.
Hours earlier, Maj. Gen. Qassim Atta said in a press conference broadcast on state-run Iraqiya TV that 15 "Arabs" -- in Iraq, a euphemism indicating they came from outside the country -- were responsible for three deadly attacks in Baghdad in recent months, including a bloody church siege.
The spokesman for the Iraqi military command in Baghdad showed pictures of each of the men, whom he called "terrorists" and said they had entered Iraq from unidentified countries between June and August.
Ten of them had died while carrying out suicide attacks or had been killed by Iraqi security forces, Atta said. The other five remain at large, with Atta urging the public to help in tracking them down.
"According to our intelligence information, four of the five terrorists are still in Iraq and one of them has fled to Syria," he said.
Iraqiya TV has run these photos of these men suspected in three recent attacks. They say these are non-Iraqi Arabs.
While Atta did not immediately link Sunday's killings to the remaining suspects from the group of 15, he did tie the group to a deadly attack on a Christian church as well as two other incidents.
The first of the three attacks happened August 17, when suicide bombers killed at least 48 people at a military recruitment center in the Bab al-Moudham commercial area of central Baghdad. On September 5, at least eight people died in a suicide bombing at a military base in that same area.
And the deadliest attack that Atta referred to occurred October 31, when militants stormed the Sayidat al-Nejat Cathedral, or Our Lady of Salvation Church, in Baghdad. Some 70 people died and 75 others, including 51 congregants and two priests, were wounded.
About a month later, Iraqi authorities announced they had arrested 12 people who had a role in either plotting or executing the operation. They included Huthaifa al-Batawi, described by Iraqi officials as the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and the "mastermind, direct supervisor and planner" of the attack.
That siege was among the first of many attacks in recent weeks targeting Christians, which have left scores dead and many more wounded throughout the Middle Eastern nation.
While there have been a few larger scale operations, most were more like what happened Sunday evening, with gunfire or bombs targeting a few Christians at a time.
While the issue has become more public in recent months, the threat has been real for years. Christians are among the religious minorities in a country dominated by Sunnis and Shiites, and tens of thousands have fled Iraq in recent years.
The violence had led the United States, the United Nations Security Council and an American Catholic archbishop to express concerns for Christians and other religious groups in Iraq.
Pope Benedict XVI said after the siege that he was praying "for the victims of this absurd violence, all the more ferocious in that it hit defenseless people gathered in the house of the Lord, which is home to reconciliation and love."
Cardinal Emmanuel Delly III -- the patriarch of Iraq's largest Christian community, the Chaldean Catholic Church -- urged Iraqi Christians in a televised address last month to "stand firm" within their country during these "difficult times."
On Sunday, Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said that he pressed the need to protect Christians in conversations with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, calling it an issue "of paramount interest for my country and for me personally."
Frattini -- who also met this week with survivors of the church siege, as well as Cardinal Delly -- also said it was important that Christians felt secure in Iraq, and that they remained there.
"We shouldn't tolerate Christians leaving Iraq," the Italian minister said. "If Christians leave, the terrorists and al Qaeda would have won."
Al-Maliki gave "assurances" that those behind the violence would be "severely punished," according to the Italian cabinet minister, and that Christian leaders in Iraq would be kept up-to-date on key developments.
Frattini also said the Iraqi prime minister told him that a Christian would head a new parliamentary committee looking into how best to safeguard security for members of this religious group. Iraqis are also mulling forming police units specifically charged with protecting Christians, according to the Italian foreign minister.
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; pero creo recordar ( No me hagas caso ) que el parlamento de la república islámica " concede " a las minorías un representante. En ello entrarían cristianos, judíos y zoroastrianos. 
. Aunque es curioso que absolutamente todos los que han intentado poner un pie allí han salido corriendo (OLP, Siria e Israel).
Hoy, Jueves Santo por la noche, después de cenar, he podido ir a rezar a rezar a Gallicantum y al huerto de los Olivos. Me ha impactado mucho, como todos los años, esa hora de oración en los dos sitios. En primer lugar, mientras tenía lugar la hora santa oficial en Getsemaní, fui a rezar a Gallicantum, el lugar donde Pedro negó tres veces al Señor y donde se supone que estuvo Jesús encerrado esa noche. Hay unas escaleras a un lado de la iglesia que son muy antiguas -ya existían en la época del Señor- y los expertos aseguran que por ellas Jesús pasó seguramente varias veces mientras le llevaban de un sitio a otro. A lo largo de las escaleras había velas encendidas, y gente sentada en los escalones rezando. Ahí estuve un buen rato. Después fui al huerto de los Olivos. Rezar allí la noche en que el Señor estuvo allí en agonía, antes de ser apresado, es algo muy especial. La mayoría de la gente rezaba alrededor de la roca que está dentro de la Iglesia, pero yo me fui fuera, al huerto, a un lugar donde casi no había gente. Me senté en el suelo y estuve allí más de media hora. Los olivos casi no tenían luz, como probablemente los vería el Señor en ese momento tan duro. Ahí es fácil sacar propósitos para aceptar la voluntad de Dios -como hizo Jesucristo- y decidirse para ayudarle a llevar la Cruz con las cosas ordinarias que a cada uno le tocan.
Hoy sábado, a las 7.30 de la mañana, he celebrado la Pascua de Resurrección en el Santo Sepulcro. La ceremonia del fuego ha tenido lugar en la entrada -en la parte de dentro- de la Basílica. Después en procesión nos hemos dirigido al lugar de la tumba. Ahí estaba dispuesto el altar - como se puede ver en la fotografía- y los sacerdotes nos pusimos en bancos que había rodeando la parte central de la estructura que rodea la Tumba del Señor. Especialmente emocionante ha sido el pregón pascual -como siempre- y de manera particular el gloria. Para introducirlo el órgano ha emitido un sonido ensordecedor, para luego introducir las notas primeras de la canción. Era fácil imaginar en ese mismo sitio al Señor Resucitando con su cuerpo ya glorificado en ese mismo sitio. La ceremonia ha sido larga, con todas las lecturas y los salmos cantados, pero muy bonita. Ayudaba mucho la liturgia, muy bien cuidada por los franciscanos y los sacerdotes del Patriarcado. También en la Consagración he pensado que en ese momento, sobre el altar, aparecía Jesucristo Resucitado, que -desde ese instante- estaba con nosotros con su Cuerpo glorioso, como en aquel día.
En la misa oficiada por Benedicto XVI en Ammán, primer acto multitudinario de su estancia en Jordania, primera etapa de su viaje a Tierra Santa, El Papa ha pedido “respeto” hacia las mujeres y ha subrayado la necesidad de defender su “dignidad” para no tratarlas con “los criterios fríos de la explotación y el beneficio”. Ante más de 25.000 personas que llenaron el Estadio Internacional de la capital jordana, el Papa ha solicitado “valor” y coraje” a los cristianos en Jordania y en toda Tierra Santa para “dar testimonio de la fe cristiana y mantener la presencia de la Iglesia en la trasformación del tejido social en vuestra antigua tierra”.
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