“Many Christians will be killed as a punishment for their disbelief in Allah the Great”
A week after a deadly attack on an Orthodox church in the Dagestan region of Russia which killed at least five people, Islamic State is inciting its followers to kill and kidnap Christians in “Russian-occupied Muslim areas,” according to a report.
The website of the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors online communications by terrorist groups, carries a letter, titled “Strike Their Necks and Strike Each One of Their Sons,” in which Islamic State is urging supporters to kill and kidnap Christians in Russia’s Muslim-majority republics, including Chechnya, Ingushetia and Dagestan.
The letter cites last Sunday’s church attack in Dagestan, calling the killer an “extraordinary mujtahid” and suggesting he needs to be seen as an example.
“Allah permitting, this will be the spark for more bloody attacks that will destroy a larger number of the Christian combatants in all the Russian-occupied Muslim areas,” the letter reads, according to Newsweek. “Many of them will be killed as a punishment for their disbelief in Allah the Great, and it will plant fear and horror inside the hearts of hundreds of thousands of their brothers and make them flee with fear.”
The Dagestan attack was carried out by a bearded man who used a knife and a hunting rifle to kill five people and injure several others during the worship service at the Orthodox church in Kizlyar, which is located in the mostly Muslim region of Dagestan where Russians reportedly account for only about 40 percent of the population.
