The Inside Assyria Discussion Forum #5

=> Finally a Patriarch I like......

Finally a Patriarch I like......
Posted by Tiglath (Guest) - Monday, October 24 2011, 12:37:02 (UTC)
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Wikileaks and the Assyrian Church Patriarch in Syria

GMT 10-23-2011 0:13:0

Assyrian International News Agency

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(AINA) -- A cable written by Maura Connelly, the Chargé d'affaires of the U.S. Embassy in Damascus from 2008 to 2009, and published by Wikileaks, criticizes the Patriarch of the Assyrian Orthodox Church, H.H. Zakka Ewas, for making anti-American remarks.

The remarks were made at the opening session of a two-day international conference, sponsored by the British embassy, entitled "The Message of Peace in Islam," held on June 1 and 2, 2009. The Syrian Ministry of Religious Endowments hosted the conference in cooperation with the British Embassy.

The Assyrian Patriarch was not present at the conference but was represented by a priest (unnamed in the cable), who read the Patriarch's prepared speech.

According the to cable:


¶2. (SBU) A priest in the Assyrian Orthodox Church delivered the prepared speech of the Assyrian Orthodox Patriarch Mar Zakka Ewas, who was unable to attend, before a packed auditorium of more than 300 people. The Patriarch's speech lambasted the U.S. for having manipulated the events of 9/11 for political gain. The U.S., he said, preferred the "language of force" over the "language of diplomacy" in its effort to "force its hegemony on the world and plunder the world's resources."

¶3. (SBU) The speech blamed the U.S. for having failed both to develop a cogent definition of "terrorism" and to delineate between "terrorism" and "resistance," as the rest of the international community had done. In fact, he argued, the U.S. had used "Islamic terrorism" as a "Trojan horse to attack any part of the world it wanted." Hoping to distance the Christian church in Syria from its western counterparts, the Patriarch called on Syrian Muslims to continue living in harmony with their Christian brethren and to remember that just as Islam did not equal terrorism, the West was not exclusively representative of Christianity.


The cable further says "UK Ambassador Collis, however, told Charge [Maura Connelly] that the Assyrian Patriarch's remarks had been unacceptable and that he (Collis) would raise the matter with the Ministry."

Reactions from the Assyrian community have been generally critical of the Patriarch's statements while also dismissing them as not a genuine reflection of his views. According to Assyrian community leaders, the Patriarch's statements are calculated to keep the Syrian government from persecuting the church, whose See is officially in Damascus and has been so for nearly 1500 years.

Freelance journalist Dikran Ego contributed to this report.



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