{"id":34550,"date":"2019-11-06T15:16:39","date_gmt":"2019-11-06T15:16:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.acnmalta.org\/?p=34550"},"modified":"2019-11-06T15:16:39","modified_gmt":"2019-11-06T15:16:39","slug":"christian-family-narrowly-escapes-brutal-attack-by-boko-haram","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acnmalta.org\/_oldsite\/2019\/11\/06\/christian-family-narrowly-escapes-brutal-attack-by-boko-haram\/","title":{"rendered":"CHRISTIAN FAMILY NARROWLY ESCAPES BRUTAL ATTACK BY BOKO HARAM"},"content":{"rendered":"<style type=\"text\/css\"><\/style><p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The massacre lasted for five hours.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Esther listened from the makeshift outhouse as she hid behind the door. \u201cConvert or be killed!\u201d shouted Boko Haram militants. Their commands were followed by screams, the popping of machine guns, and the smell of burning flesh and hair as they made their way through the village.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Esther, whose name has been changed for her safety, tried to slow her breathing, but the foul stench only made her panic rise. She\u2019d told her children to stay put and be silent, but now she wasn\u2019t so sure if she\u2019d be able to sit still and wait.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">She had hidden her children in their village\u2019s graveyard, covering them with grass and leaves so the rebels wouldn\u2019t discover them. Esther had not seen her husband since they all fled. She\u2019d hidden in her family\u2019s latrine, prepared to climb inside the toilet if it came to that.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">As she peered wide-eyed through the slight crack in the door, she slowly caressed her growing stomach, wondering what kind of life her unborn child would have. She didn\u2019t know if\u00a0<em>any<\/em>\u00a0of her family would live through this day.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Her breath caught in her chest as two men with guns approached her house. She\u2019d already watched as they\u2019d burned down her neighbours\u2019 homes and their local church. The smoke still smeared the sky. Those who hadn\u2019t been shot in their homes died in the fires.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The men spoke to one another, arguing. Slowly they pointed to the next house and walked toward it. They shot everyone inside, then burned the house down.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The spray of bullets and anguished cries echoed in Esther\u2019s head as she continued to crouch in the outhouse. Every lengthy pause in the shooting gave her hope \u2014 but also made her entire body clench.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Finally, she summoned her courage and peered out again. It was eerily quiet; the rebels were gone. She ran to her children, gathered them up, and headed to her father\u2019s house.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">As they approached, she could see his house was still standing. But her heart dropped when she saw her brother\u2019s home next door. It was now a blanket of ash, still smoldering.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Esther said a quick prayer that her father, brother, and her brother\u2019s family had escaped and were all safe. She left her children standing at the threshold, tucked out of sight, as she quietly entered her father\u2019s house.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Her sister-in-law\u2019s body, littered with hundreds of bullets, was lying on the floor. Her intestines spilled out of her body.\u00a0 Gasping, Esther leaned forward, her hand searching for something to steady her shaking body. Suddenly, she doubled over and grabbed her stomach in agony. Her lower back throbbed with pain.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">She wept as silently as she could.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">After wiping the tears from her eyes, Esther looked down and noticed blood trickling down her thigh.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Another life \u2014 her unborn child \u2014 taken by Boko Haram.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Every day, Christians in places like Nigeria are being killed for not converting to Islam. Churches are being burned to the ground. \u00a0Eventually, Esther, her husband, and their children escaped the rebels \u2014 and death. They relocated several times, trying to stay ahead of the terror Boko Haram rained down on communities with Christians.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">But numerous families weren\u2019t as fortunate. Many of Esther\u2019s neighbours and friends hid in their ceilings \u2026 too afraid to come down even after the shooting stopped. They eventually starved to death in their attics.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The persecution of Christians is rapidly increasing across Nigeria \u2014 but these massacres rarely make the news.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The massacre lasted for five hours. Esther listened from the makeshift outhouse as she hid behind the door. \u201cConvert or be killed!\u201d shouted Boko Haram militants. Their commands were followed by screams, the popping of machine guns, and the smell of burning flesh and hair as they made their way through the village. Esther, whose&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34551,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34550","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-e-newsletters"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>CHRISTIAN FAMILY NARROWLY ESCAPES BRUTAL ATTACK BY BOKO HARAM - Aid to the Church in Need (Malta)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/acnmalta.org\/_oldsite\/2019\/11\/06\/christian-family-narrowly-escapes-brutal-attack-by-boko-haram\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"CHRISTIAN FAMILY NARROWLY ESCAPES BRUTAL ATTACK BY BOKO HARAM - Aid to the Church in Need (Malta)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The massacre lasted for five hours. Esther listened from the makeshift outhouse as she hid behind the door. \u201cConvert or be killed!\u201d shouted Boko Haram militants. Their commands were followed by screams, the popping of machine guns, and the smell of burning flesh and hair as they made their way through the village. 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