Over 150 Christian Churches Plundered, Destroyed In Kosovo By Muslims

Dateline Kosovo, 05.01.2017: Was the infamous ISIS the first Islamic movement of its egregious kind? Maybe not. Kosovo begs to differ. Ever since NATO and the Clinton Administration engineered the Albanian Muslim takeover of Serbia’s ancient cradle of Christian Kosovo back in 1999, there have been over 150 Christian places of worship in Kosovo plundered, destroyed, burned down and trashed, as it is documented and reported by many sources, including those used for this article’s French documentary program aired in France, which is here reported from a French Catholic website. Numerous Serbian cultural sites in Kosovo were destroyed during and after the Kosovo War. According to the International Center for Transitional Justice, 155 Serbian Orthodox churches and monasteries were destroyed by Kosovo Albanian extremists between June 1999 and March 2004. Kosovo Serb communities and religious and cultural symbols were attacked by crowds of Albanians. Some of these locations were ostensibly under the protection of KFOR [Kosovo Protection Force sent in by NATO] at the time. During the March riots and violence, many dozens of Kosovo Serbians were killed. Among the targets of attack there was the property of cultural and architectural heritage of the Serb people, including 18 monuments of culture, all demolished, burnt or severely damaged. Some of that property was on the list of protected UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Since the NATO takeover of Kosovo after NATO’s victory over Serbia during a 3-month war in 1999, two-thirds of prewar Kosovo Serbs have fled Kosovo (in their hundreds of thousands). Only on the extreme northern edge of Kosovo, near the Serbian border, there is a Kosovo Serb city of Mitrovica where the last important political stronghold of non-Muslims in Kosovo is barely hanging on, with an extremely uncertain future.

Moreover, on one occasion in 2004 (on March 17) there was a pogrom of Serbs conducted by the Kosovo Albanian rioters under the rallying cry of “the need for no Serbs to be left in Kosovo!” and so more than 4,000 remaining Serbs scattered in outlaying areas far and wide were immediately forced out of their homes, with 900 of their homes and 35 religious structures destroyed on that day and the days that followed. The March violence in Kosovo involved more than 50,000 Muslim rioters, and international officials quickly described the violence as organized by “ethnic extremists” – because they are not allowed to call a spade a spade and blame the Islamic ideology for the crimes of Albanian Muslims. UNMIK (“United Nations Mission in Kosovo”) spokesperson Derek Chappell described the acts of violence as having “a degree of organization behind them.” On March 23, during a visit to the violence-affected city of Obilic, UNMIK head Harri Holkeri stated that Albanian extremists “had a ready-made plan for the violence”. In his report to the U.N. Security Council, Secretary-General Kofi Annan stated that “the onslaught led by Kosovo Albanian extremists against the Serb, Roma and Ashkali communities of Kosovo was an organized, widespread, and targeted campaign.” Even the NATO Secretary General condemned it (probably because his NATO troops in Kosovo did almost nothing to prevent barbarism against Christians).

The Serbs found themselves under siege across Kosovo in all of their dozens of isolated strongholds, including the largest one in the northern Serb town of Mitrovica that also came under attack but was protected by a river that separates the Serbs from the Albanian side of Kosovo, and bridges are the only way in. A group of several hundred Albanians had gone onto a bridge and begun throwing stones at Serb homes. They were unable to cross the bridge completely because of the presence of permanently stationed French KFOR troops on the bridge. Almost immediately, two armed Albanian men ran towards the bridge with AK-47 assault rifles and started shooting at the Serb side. Intense exchanges of gunfire followed, leaving four Albanians dead and many more wounded, and further inflaming Albanian sentiment across Kosovo. UNMIK police sources later claimed that the French soldiers had refused to use their stun grenades to stop the crowd, and had no ammunition to return fire when the two Albanian gunmen approached the bridge and began firing.

Interestingly, the Serbs in other parts of Kosovo (such as the city of Prizren), where the German KFOR troops were tasked with policing law and order, reported the failure of the German troops to do their job, allowing Albanians to run wild and rampage across the Serb neighborhoods and property. In those hot March days many isolated Serbs, and other non-Albanian individuals were caught in the back alleys, abused and beheaded (or kidnapped so their internal organs can be used for illicit organ trafficking in Albania). Almost all Christian cemeteries in Kosovo were desecrated, assaulted and trashed. The Kosovo province descended into an orgy of widespread barbarian rampage by primitive Muslim rioters and youths who were hell-bent on assaulting and eradicating every trace of non-Muslim presence in the once Christian province of Kosovo. Albanians acted in March 2004 like an early European version of ISIS. On a positive note, some in Europe are taking note of this, such as some Roman Catholic organizations. It is far from enough. Overall, Europe does not care….

“Kosovo, Christianity In Jeopardy”, a documentary that challenges the viewer

by Jacques Berset

In Kosovo, since 2000, nearly 150 Christian places of worship have been plundered, destroyed, burned down, recalls the documentary “Kosovo, Christianity In Jeopardy”.

Available on YouTube, directed by Eddy Vicken and Yvon Bertorello, in co-production with Catholic television KTO and Vicken production, this documentary, produced with the support of “Solidarity Kosovo” organization, was broadcast for the first time on KTO.

The young republic of Kosovo, self-proclaimed in 2008 in the wake of the wars that tore up the nations of the former Yugoslavia, and then following the NATO bombing of Serbia with her leader Milosevic, is populated mostly by Kosovars, of the Muslims Albanian strain. Formerly known for their religious tolerance, a part of the Kosovars became radicalized under the influence of Saudi-funded extremist imams [flooding in].

A radicalization under Saudi influence

Kosovo is home to a Serb and Orthodox minority, which sees itself as the symbolic foundation of the Serbian nation going back more than seven centuries. This “cradle” of Orthodox Christianity in Serbia has several monuments on UNESCO’s World Heritage List, but also on the list of World Heritage Sites in Danger. For the Serbian Orthodox, this is a matter of prime importance since Albanian Kosovo has proclaimed itself to be independent (recognized by a lot of countries but not by all): to maintain the perennial flame of the Serb memory and to preserve everything that can be preserved.

The documentary “Kosovo, Christianity In Jeopardy” is a kind of status of the situation in which both the tradition and the Serbian Orthodox presence endure. It shows how it keeps itself alive in its monasteries and shines in its villages, among the faithful. However, this community is being challenged by a demographically dominant Islamic majority in Kosovo that’s strongly tempted by Islamic radicalization efforts.

Kosovo Albanian Muslim rioters assaulting an ancient Christian Monastery

Protégé : “Kosovo, une chrétienté en péril”, un documentaire qui interpelle