Persecution

Persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or group by another individual or group. The most common forms are religious persecution, racism, and political persecution, though there is naturally some overlap between these terms. The inflicting of suffering, harassment, imprisonment, internment, fear or pain are all factors that may establish persecution, but not all suffering will necessarily establish persecution. The threshold of severity has been a source of much debate.

International law

As part of the Nuremberg Principles, crimes against humanity are part of international law. Principle VI of the Nuremberg Principles states that

Telford Taylor, who was Counsel for the Prosecution at the Nuremberg Trials wrote " tthe Nuremberg war crimes trials, the tribunals rebuffed several efforts by the prosecution to bring such 'domestic' atrocities within the scope of international law as 'crimes against humanity". Several subsequent international treaties incorporate this principle, but some have dropped the restriction "in connection with any crime against peace or any war crime" that is in Nuremberg Principles.

The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which is binding on 111 states, defines crimes against humanity in Article 7.1. The article criminalizes certain acts "committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack". These include:

Religious

Religious persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or group due to their religious affiliation. Not only theorists of secularization (who presume a decline of religiosity in general) would willingly assume that religious persecution is a thing of the past. However, with the rise of fundamentalism and religiously related terrorism, this assumption has become even more controversial. Indeed, in many countries of the world today, religious persecution is a Human Rights problem.

Atheists

Atheists have experienced persecution throughout their history. Persecution may refer to unwarranted arrest, imprisonment, beating, torture, or execution. It also may refer to the confiscation or destruction of property.

Baháʼís

The persecution of Baháʼís refers to the religious persecution of Baháʼís in various countries, especially in Iran, which has the seventh largest Baháʼí population in the world, with just over 251,100 as of 2010. The Baháʼí Faith originated in Iran, and it represents the largest religious minority in that country.

Buddhists

The persecution of Buddhists has been a widespread phenomenon throughout the history of Buddhism, a phenomenon which is continuing today. As early as the 3rd century AD, Buddhists were persecuted by Kirder, the Zoroastrian high priest of the Sasanian Empire.

Anti-Buddhist sentiment in Imperial China between the 5th and 10th century led to the ''Four Buddhist Persecutions in China'' of which the '' Great Anti-Buddhist Persecution'' of 845 was probably the most severe. However, Buddhism managed to survive in China, but it was greatly weakened. During the Northern Expedition, in 1926 in Guangxi, the Kuomintang Muslim General Bai Chongxi led his troops on a campaign to destroy Buddhist temples and smash idols, they turned the temples into schools and Kuomintang party headquarters. During the Kuomintang Pacification of Qinghai, the Muslim General Ma Bufang and his army wiped out many Tibetan Buddhists in the northeast and eastern Qinghai, and destroyed Tibetan Buddhist temples.

The Muslim invasion of the Indian subcontinent was the first great iconoclastic invasion of the Indian subcontinent. According to William Johnston, hundreds of Buddhist monasteries and shrines were destroyed, Buddhist texts were burnt by the Muslim armies, monks and nuns were killed on the Indo-Gangetic Plain during the 12th and 13th centuries. The Buddhist university of Nalanda was mistaken for a fort because of its walled campus. The Buddhist monks who had been slaughtered were mistaken for Brahmins according to Minhaj-i-Siraj. The walled town, the Odantapuri monastery, was also destroyed by his forces. Sumpa based his account on that of Śākyaśrībhadra who was at Magadha in 1200, states that the Buddhist university complexes of Odantapuri and Vikramshila were also destroyed and the monks were massacred. Muslim forces attacked the north-western regions of the Indian subcontinent many times. Many places were destroyed and renamed. For example, Odantapuri's monasteries were destroyed in 1197 by Muhammad bin Bakhtiyar Khilji and the town was renamed. Likewise, Vikramashila was destroyed by the forces of Muhammad bin Bakhtiyar Khilji around 1200. The sacred Mahabodhi Temple was almost completely destroyed by the Muslim invaders. Many Buddhist monks fled to Nepal, Tibet, and South India to avoid the consequences of war. Tibetan pilgrim Chöjepal (1179-1264), who arrived in India in 1234, had to flee advancing Muslim troops multiple times, as they were sacking Buddhist sites.

In Japan, the haibutsu kishaku during the Meiji Restoration (starting in 1868) was an event which was triggered by the official policy of separation of Shinto and Buddhism (or shinbutsu bunri). This policy caused great destruction to Buddhism 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.

During the 2012 Ramu violence in Bangladesh, a 25,000-strong Muslim mob set fire to at least five Buddhist temples and dozens of homes throughout the town and throughout the surrounding villages after they saw a picture of an allegedly desecrated Quran, which they claimed had been posted on Facebook by Uttam Barua, a local Buddhist man.

Christians

The persecution of Christians is religious persecution that Christians may be subjected to as a consequence of professing their faith, both historically and in the modern era. Early Christians were persecuted for their faith at the hands of both Jews from whose religion Christianity arose and the Roman Empire which controlled much of the land across which early Christianity was distributed. Early in the fourth century, the religion was legalized by the Edict of Milan, and it eventually became the State church of the Roman Empire.

Christian missionaries, as well as the people that they converted to Christianity, have been the target of persecution, many times to the point of being martyred for their faith.

There is also a history of individual Christian denominations suffering persecution at the hands of other Christians under the charge of heresy, particularly during the 16th century Protestant Reformation as well as throughout the Middle Ages when various Christian groups deemed heretical were persecuted by the Papacy.

In the 20th century, Christians have been persecuted by various groups, and by atheistic states such as the USSR and North Korea. During the Second World War members of many Christian churches were persecuted in Germany for resisting the Nazi ideology.

In more recent times the Christian missionary organization Open Doors (UK) estimates 100 million Christians face persecution, particularly in Muslim-dominated countries such as Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. According to the International Society for Human Rights, up to 80% of all acts of persecution are directed against people of the Christian faith.

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormonism)

The Missouri extermination order forced Mormons to move to Illinois. This was after Sidney Rigdon gave his July 4th Oration which meant to state that Mormons would defend their lives and property. This speech was taken critically by the state government. Missouri state militia troops slaughtered Mormons in what is now known as the Haun's Mill massacre. Their forcible expulsion from the state caused the death of over a hundred due to exposure, starvation, and resulting illnesses. The founder of the church, Joseph Smith, was killed in Carthage, Illinois by a mob of about 200 men, almost all of whom were members of the Illinois state militia including some members of the militia who were assigned to guard him. The Mormons suffered through tarring and feathering, their lands and possessions being repeatedly taken from them, mob attacks, false imprisonments, and the US sending an army to Utah to deal with the "Mormon problem" in the Utah War which resulted in a group of Mormons led by John D. Lee massacring settlers at the Mountain Meadows Massacre.

Jehovah's Witnesses

Throughout the history of Jehovah's Witnesses, their beliefs, doctrines and practices have engendered controversy and opposition from local governments, communities, and mainstream Christian groups.

Copts

The persecution of Copts is a historical and ongoing issue in Egypt against Coptic Orthodox Christianity and its followers. It is also a prominent example of the poor status of Christians in the Middle East despite the religion being native to the region. Copts are the Christ followers in Egypt, usually Oriental Orthodox, who currently make up around 10% of the population of Egypt — the largest religious minority of that country. Copts have cited instances of persecution throughout their history and Human 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.

The Muslim conquest of Egypt took place in AD 639, during the Byzantine empire. Despite the political upheaval, Egypt remained a mainly Christian, but Copts lost their majority status after the 14th century, as a result of the intermittent persecution and the destruction of the Christian churches there, accompanied by heavy taxes for those who refused to convert. From the Muslim conquest of Egypt onwards, the Coptic Christians were persecuted by different Muslims regimes, such as the Umayyad Caliphate, Abbasid Caliphate, Fatimid Caliphate,Robert Ousterhout, "Rebuilding the Temple: Constantine Monomachus and the Holy Sepulchre" in ''The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians'', Vol. 48, No. 1 (March, 1989), pp.66–78 Mamluk Sultanate, and Ottoman Empire; the persecution of Coptic Christians included closing and demolishing churches and forced conversion to Islam.

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 the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights. The abduction and disappearance of Coptic Christian women and girls also remains a serious ongoing problem.

Dogons

For almost 1000 years, the Dogon people, an ancient tribe of Mali had faced religious and ethnic persecution—through jihads by dominant Muslim communities. Griaule, Marcel; Dieterlen, Germaine; (1965). ''Le mythe cosmologique. Le renard pâle.'', 1. Paris: Institut d'Ethnologie Musée de l'homme, p. 17 These jihadic expeditions were to forced the Dogon to abandon their traditional religious beliefs for Islam. Such jihads caused the Dogon to abandon their original villages and moved up to the cliffs of Bandiagara for better defense and to escape persecution—often building their dwellings in little nooks and crannies.
In the early era of French colonialism in Mali, the French authorities appointed Muslim relatives of El Hadj Umar Tall as chiefs of the Bandiagara—despite the fact that the area has been a Dogon area for centuries.

In 1864, Tidiani Tall, nephew and successor of the 19th century Senegambian jihadist and Muslim leader—El Hadj Umar Tall, chose Bandiagara as the capital of the Toucouleur Empire thereby exacerbating the inter-religious and inter-ethnic conflict. In recent years, the Dogon accused the Fulanis of supporting and sheltering Islamic terrorist groups like Al-Qaeda in Dogon country, leading to the creation of the Dogon militia Dan Na Ambassagou in 2016—whose aim is to defend the Dogon from systematic attacks. That resulted in the Ogossagou massacre of Fulanis in March 2019, and a Fula retaliation with the Sobane Da massacre in June of that year. In the wake of the Ogossagou massacre, the President 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 any involvement in the massacre and rejected calls to disband.

Druze

Historically the relationship between the Druze and Muslims has been characterized by intense persecution. The Druze faith is often classified as a branch of Isma'ili. Even though the faith originally developed out of Ismaili Islam, most Druze do not identify as Muslims, and they do not accept the five pillars of Islam. The Druze have frequently experienced persecution by different Muslim regimes such as the Shia Fatimid Caliphate, Mamluk, Sunni Ottoman Empire, and Egypt Eyalet.Goren, Haim. ''Dead Sea Level: Science, Exploration and Imperial Interests in the Near East.'' p.95-96. The persecution of the Druze included massacres, demolishing Druze prayer houses and holy places and forced conversion to Islam. Those were no ordinary killings in the Druze's narrative, they were meant to eradicate the whole community according to the Druze narrative. Most recently, the Syrian Civil War, which began in 2011, saw persecution of the Druze at the hands of Islamic extremists.

Ibn Taymiyya a prominent Muslim scholar muhaddith, dismissed the Druze as non-Muslims, and his fatwa cited that Druzes: "Are not at the level of ′Ahl al-Kitāb (People of the Book) nor mushrikin ( polytheists). Rather, they are from the most deviant kuffār ( 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", which in that setting would have legitimized violence against them as apostates. Ottomans have often relied on Ibn Taymiyya religious ruling to justify their persecution of Druze.

Falun Gong

Falun Gong was introduced to the general public by Li Hongzhi in Changchun, China, in 1992. For the next few years, Falun Gong was the fastest growing '' qigong'' practice in Chinese history and, by 1999, there were millions of practitioners. Following the seven years of widespread popularity, on July 20, 1999, the government of the People's Republic of China began a nationwide persecution campaign against Falun Gong practitioners, except in the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macau. In late 1999, legislation was created to outlaw "heterodox religions" and retroactively applied to Falun Gong.Leung, Beatrice (2002) 'China and Falun Gong: Party and society relations in the modern era', Journal of Contemporary China, 11:33, 761 – 784 Amnesty International states that the persecution is "politically motivated" with "legislation being used retroactively to convict people on driven charges, and new regulations introduced to further restrict fundamental freedoms".The crackdown on Falun Gong and other so-called ''heretical organizations''
The Amnesty International

Hindus

Persecution of Hindus refers to the religious persecution inflicted upon Hindus that may undergo as a consequence of professing their faith, both historically and in the current era. Hindus have been brutally persecuted during the historical Islamic rule of the Indian subcontinent and during Portuguese rule of Goa.

Even in modern times, Hindus in Pakistan and Bangladesh have suffered persecution. Most recently, thousands of Hindus from Sindh province in Pakistan have been fleeing to India voicing fear for their safety. After the Partition of India in 1947, there were 8.8 million Hindus in Pakistan (excluding Bangladesh) in 1951. In 1951, Hindus constituted 22% of the Pakistani population (including present-day Bangladesh which formed part of Pakistan). Today, the Hindu minority amounts to 1.7 percent of Pakistan's population.

The Bangladesh 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 in ''Time'' 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." Senator Edward Kennedy wrote in a report that was part of United 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, mass rape and in some places, painted with yellow patches marked "H". All of this has been officially sanctioned, ordered and implemented under martial law from Islamabad". In the same report, Senator Kennedy reported that 80% of the refugees in India were Hindus and according to numerous international relief agencies such as UNESCO and World Health Organization the number of East Pakistani refugees at their peak in India was close to 10 million. In a syndicated column "The Pakistani Slaughter That Nixon Ignored", Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Sydney Schanberg 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 the Pakistan Army, which had targeted Bengali Muslims as well), ( Newsday, 29 April 1994).

In Bangladesh, on 28 February 2013, the International Crimes Tribunal sentenced Delwar Hossain Sayeedi, the Vice President of the Jamaat-e-Islami to death for the war crimes committed during the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War. Following the sentence, activists of Jamaat-e-Islami and its student wing Islami Chhatra Shibir attacked the Hindus 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. The violence included the looting of Hindu properties and businesses, the burning of Hindu homes, the rape of Hindu women, and the desecration and destruction of, according to community leaders, more than 50 Hindu temples; 1,500 Hindu homes were destroyed in 20 districts. While the government has held the Jamaat-e-Islami responsible for the attacks on the minorities, the Jamaat-e-Islami leadership has denied any involvement. The minority leaders have protested the attacks and appealed for justice. The Supreme Court of Bangladesh has directed the law enforcement to start '' suo motu'' investigation into the attacks. US Ambassador to Bangladesh express concern about attack of Jamaat on Bengali Hindu community.

Jews

The persecution of Jews is a recurring phenomenon throughout Jewish history. It has occurred on numerous occasions in widely different geographic locations. It may include pogroms, looting and the demolition of private and public Jewish property (e.g., Kristallnacht), unwarranted arrest, imprisonment, torture, killing, or even mass execution (in World War II alone, approximately six million people were deliberately killed because they were Jewish). They have been expelled from their hometowns/countries, hoping to find safe havens in other polities. In recent times anti-Semitism has often been manifested as Anti-Zionism, where Anti-Zionism is a prejudice against the Jewish movement for self-determination and the right of the Jewish people to a homeland in the State of Israel. Anti-Zionism can include threats to destroy the State of Israel (or otherwise eliminate its Jewish character), unfounded and inaccurate characterizations of Israel’s power in the world, and language or actions that hold Israel to a different standard than other countries.

Muslims

The persecution of Muslims has been a recurring phenomenon throughout the history of Islam. Persecution may refer to unwarranted arrest, imprisonment, beatings, torture, or execution. It may also refer to the confiscation or destruction of property, or incitement to hate Muslims.

Persecution can extend beyond those who perceive themselves to be Muslims and include those who are perceived by others as Muslims, or it can include Muslims who are considered non-Muslims by fellow Muslims. The Ahmadiyya regard themselves as Muslims, but are seen by many other Muslims as non-Muslims and "heretics". In 1984, the Government of Pakistan, under General Zia-ul-Haq, passed Ordinance XX, which banned proselytizing by Ahmadis and also banned Ahmadis from referring to themselves as Muslims. According to this ordinance, any Ahmadi who refers to oneself as a Muslim by words, either spoken or written, or by visible representation, directly or indirectly, or makes the call for prayer as other Muslims do, is punishable by imprisonment of up to 3 years. Because of these difficulties, Mirza Tahir Ahmad migrated to London.

Pagans & Heathens

Philosophers

Philosophers throughout the history of philosophy have been held in courts and tribunals for various offenses, often as a result of their philosophical activity, and some have even been put to death. The most famous example of a philosopher being put on trial is the case of Socrates, who was tried for, amongst other charges, corrupting the youth and impiety. Others include:

* Giordano Bruno - pantheist philosopher who was burned at the stake by the Roman Inquisition for his heretical religious views, his cosmological views, or both;

* Tommaso Campanella - confined to a convent for his heretical views, namely, an opposition to the authority of Aristotle, and later imprisoned in a castle for 27 years during which he wrote his most famous works, including '' The City of the Sun'';

* Baruch Spinoza - Jewish philosopher who, at age 23, was put in cherem (similar to excommunication) by Jewish religious authorities for heresies such as his controversial ideas regarding the authenticity of the Hebrew Bible

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