Fulani attackers killed 18 Christians late Friday night (July 19) in central Nigeria, said local residents. The attack happened in Mbacher village, a mostly Christian community in Benue state’s Katsina-Ala County, around 11 p.m., said Joseph Achiv.
“A group of Fulani Muslims with deadly weapons attacked Mbacher village,” Achiv told Christian Daily International-Morning Star News. “Eighteen Christians were killed while they were sleeping.”
Justine Shaku, chairman of the Katsina-Ala Local Government Council, said they got distressed calls and texts from villagers about the attack.
Nigeria is the deadliest place to follow Christ, with 4,118 people killed for their faith from Oct. 1, 2022, to Sept. 30, 2023, according to Open Doors’ 2024 World Watch List (WWL) report. More Christians were kidnapped here than in any other country, with 3,300 kidnappings. Nigeria was also the third highest in attacks on churches and other Christian buildings like hospitals, schools, and cemeteries, with 750 attacks. In the 2024 WWL of the hardest places to be a Christian, Nigeria was ranked No. 6, the same as the previous year.
Millions of Fulani live across Nigeria and the Sahel. Though many do not hold extremist views, some follow radical Islamist ideology, noted the United Kingdom’s All-Party Parliamentary Group for International Freedom or Belief (APPG) in a 2020 report.
“They use a strategy similar to Boko Haram and ISWAP and clearly aim to target Christians and Christian symbols,” the APPG report states.
Christian leaders in Nigeria believe herdsmen attacks on Christian communities in the Middle Belt are driven by a desire to take over Christian lands and impose Islam, as desertification makes it hard for them to sustain their herds.
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• via Wikimedia Commons
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• via Wikimedia Commons