ICC Note: In a speech the day following the murder of a Dutch Priest who had served in Syria for decades, Lord Alton of Liverpool highlights the dangerous ideology that is driving targeted persecution of Christians across the Middle East. Syria has become the focal point of this crisis, one that could be framed in the language of a ‘Final Solution’, recalling the targeted killings of Jews by Nazi’s in the middle of the 20^th century.
By Lord David Alton 
04/10/2014 Syria (Catholic Herald) – This is the text of a speech given by Lord Alton of Liverpool at a Vigil for Syria held at Farm Street Jesuit Church on Tuesday, just a day after the murder of Fr van der Lugt in Homs. 
In a talk at the beginning of Lent at Brentwood Cathedral I cited the heroic and faithful work of a 75-ear-old Dutch Jesuit, Fr.Franz van der Lugt who, in the face of extraordinary danger and acute suffering, refused to desert the suffering people of Homs.
Father Frans van der Lugt was born on April 10, 1938 in the Netherlands and entered the Society of Jesus in 1959.
During 50 years he has been active in Syria, working in education and in a project for disabled people. Since the beginning of the civil war he wanted to stay with the local population (Christians and Muslims) in the Centre of Homs as a man of peace, even when some weeks ago part of the enclosed population had been allowed to be rescued.
Our British Jesuit provincial, Fr Dermot Preston SJ, is currently traveling back from Guyana and in a message to me last night he said: “In amongst the mayhem of Homs, it is perhaps characteristic of Fr Frans that the only personal thing that he had been feeling the lack of in the last couple of years were new batteries for his hearing-aid. May he rest in the Peace of Christ.”
Fr Franz had worked in Syria since 1967 and had been looking after 89 Christians trapped in the Old City who were sheltering in an old monastery. In February the number fell to about 20 or 25, after a three-day truce between warring sides allowed people to leave the Old City, but a fellow Jesuit, Fr Ziad Hillal reported that his confrere had remained to take care of those who could not leave.
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Fr Franz’s death in Syria is a stark reminder of the systematic campaign by jihadists intent on the destruction of the region’s ancient churches and the contemporary Passion and suffering being inflicted on the Middle East’s Christians. It is also a moment to reflect on the outstanding work of Aid to The Church In need, who had provided more than £2 million of support to the humanitarian work in Homs.
Tonight we have a moment to honour a great man but also to raise our voices and prayers.
Tonight I want to highlight the systematic killing and outright persecution of Christians, which takes place without hardly a murmur of protest – and also challenge the mistaken belief that somehow this has little or nothing to do with us.
Unless we lay bare the ideology which lies behind radical Islamist thinking – and which too often reduces God to the status of a faction leader or tribal chief – and challenge the conspiracy of silence which surrounds the question of religious persecution, at the hands of radical Islamists and atheists alike, we will sleep-walk into a tragedy which has implications well beyond the ancient biblical lands.
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Aid To the Church In Need has provided me with some first-hand accounts from Syrian Christians. Typical is this note from Basman Kassouha, a refugee now in the Bekaa Valley area of Lebanon. He says that the militias,
“stormed my house, giving me one hour to evacuate or else they will kill me … I’m heartbroken. I’ve lost everything”.
The Maronite Bishop Elias Sleman of Laodicea says Christians have been specifically targeted in a number of places. I hope, as we collect evidence of the atrocities and crimes against humanity that none of the evidence will ever be lost to history but will one day be used to bring those responsible to justice.
Bishop Sleman says: “There are many events that show that Christians are targeted, such as those of Maaloula, Sadad, Hafar, Deir Atiyeh, Carah, Nabk, Kseir, Rablé, Dmaineh, Michtayeh, Hassaniyeh, Knaïeh, and some villages of the Valley of Christians, Yabroud, Aafrd, the Jazirah region such as Hassaké, Ras El-Ain Kamechleh, and many other areas. Christians are increasingly targeted in horrible and unspeakable massacres”.
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