Samuel Ben-Ur - Is Christian persecution a warning sign for America's enemies?

Around the world, Christians face violence, imprisonment, and government repression from terrorist groups, authoritarian regimes, and hostile governments. Some foreign policy experts argue that where Christians are persecuted, broader threats to freedom and stability often follow. Should religious persecution play a larger role in shaping American foreign policy?

Samuel Ben-Ur is a research analyst focusing on the Middle East at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. He joins the show to discuss global Christian persecution, the Trump administration's efforts to elevate religious freedom as a foreign policy priority, and what attacks on Christians in places like Nigeria and China reveal about America's geopolitical adversaries.

Transcript

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Welcome back to the Lars Lars and Joe on First Amendment Friday. The question is: is Christian persecution a foreign policy roadmap that America has been ignoring and now ought to pay more attention to? I'd like to welcome to the program Samuel Ben Urr, who's a research analyst who focuses on the Middle East at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Samuel, welcome to the program. Thanks for having me back. Have we been ignoring uh the plight of Christians around the globe? And is it time for the United States uh to take a role in protecting those people? I certainly think that Trump is the first president to make it uh an explicit and distinct dimension of our international religious freedom policy. He did that in his first term as well. Mike Pence really championed that uh from the vice presidency. But in his second term, you've seen it bleed into more explicit policy decisions, uh, such as in Nigeria, where the U.S. has been conducting airstrikes against ISIS and other terror groups. So it seems like the Trump admin is working towards a framework that could last and hopefully does last after they're out of office on how to treat Christian persecution uh as a political indicator and foreign policy issue. You know, Tim, I've got a kind of a confession to make, and that is my number one concern on every foreign policy for the United States is to say we've got to make sure that we are uh, you know, do uh first supporting American national security. And if somebody said, well, what's the American national security aim in protecting Christians or any other particular religious group? I'd have to admit, I don't I don't think we have one. You know, we can't necessarily say that defending uh Christians against persecution or uh or k or death uh somewhere on the globe is gonna necessarily protect American national security. So help me out with that one. Can you help me find a way uh that we say this this is a legitimate foreign policy? Because usually I I like to restrict my opinion on foreign policy to simply saying if it supports American national security, it's something we ought to do. If it doesn't have a direct role in American uh national security, then um then then do we still do it anyway because it seems like the right thing to do for a country founded by Christians on Christian principles? It I'm certainly not making the argument that defending Christianity is inherently morally uh more valuable than other forms of religious persecution. Uh, but the argument that we're making uh when we talk about this is saying that the same forces that America combats anyway for strategic reasons, which is uh jihadism, authoritarianism, state weakness, those often overlap um scarily well with Christian persecution in many of the countries that we both partner with and are adversaries with. So, as an example, we talked about um Nigeria in this article where we laid this argument out. But, you know, because uh terrorism in West Africa is expanding, it's part of the U.S. strategic um doctrine, as the Trump administration just outlined, to make Nigeria a reliable partner in combating terrorism in West Africa. Now, the problem with that is the Nigerian state is so weak that they can't even police the terrorists within their own borders. Now, at the same time, those terrorists disproportionately target Christians. So when you're making policy in Nigeria, you should be conscious of both. And this just in this example, the way that Christian persecution plays in is that even though the US has been targeting uh ISIS and Boko Haram and Iswap so far in Nigeria, one of the main causes of instability are uh Fulani gangs who commit uh the majority numerically of attacks uh mostly against Christians. So if you're looking at that issue as a foreign policy issue, it can indicate where American priorities are not being utilized properly, at least in the case in Nigeria, and in the case of other countries like Egypt and China, it can serve different roles, which I'm happy to talk about. Okay, and let's talk about that because Tamiel, one of the things, I mean, I try not to be a hypocrite very often. I'm not a Democrat, so I'm I I'm I try not to be a hypocrite. And they say, well, hold on. Is there any way for the United States to legitimately bolster the strength, let's say, of the Niger of Nigeria's legitimate government without making it some kind of puppet state of the United States, but saying, we'd like you to be able to fight terrorism within your own, you know, within your own borders and in the in that way protect Christians from that kind of persecution and slaughter that they've been subject to. Is there a legitimate way to do that within what we've been doing in foreign policy? Absolutely. One of the key things here is that the Nigerian government wants their state to be secure. So in the strikes that we did a crump did a Christmas Eve strike on an ISIS camp, uh recently they just took out the number two ISIS commander in West Africa. All of that was in coordination with the Nigerian government. Now, the problem, and this is part of the reason why they haven't been successful in making their country a reliable and stable state, is that there's a ton of corruption on the local level in Nigeria, and the government is unwilling often to talk about their failings, especially when it comes to Christian persecution. So what the U.S. wants to see, and this has been part of Trump's policy, is a Nigerian government that takes accountability for its failings and says this is where we need the most help. And as it so happens, the thing they most often deny is that Nigeria is unsafe for Christians, even though it's the open doors theater report that showed that 72% of Christians killed every year uh for their faith were in Nigeria. So the fact that they're ignoring this shows that uh shows us exactly where they're failing to stabilize their country is most prominent. And it just happens to be Christian persecution in this case. Although, you know, as we argue, it's not necessarily a coincidence. Okay, let's go from Nigeria to the biggest dog on the planet, and that's communist China. Communist China is antithetical to all religion, uh, the way I understand their policies, and especially to the Christian faith. What do we do about them? So there are a couple of things we can do. And I think an important thing is absolutely Beijing is running cynicization programs for all religions. But if you want to look at the specific Christian element to it, there are far more Christians in China than any other religious group. It's hard to count because many of them are in underground churches, but they're about 130 to 160 million by most estimates. Now, Beijing is terrified of this. They've invested so much money in building out one of the largest surveillance, the largest surveillance state in the world. And much of that detention is now being turned on Christians in their places of worship. So it's clearly something that scares Beijing because it's the rise of a civil society that is fundamentally incompatible with their authoritarian worldview, which says that there's a higher power than the China uh Chinese Communist Party, which is God and Jesus. They don't like that. So they can't, no, they they certainly don't like that. Uh which is why they've tried to, I came on show and talked about this, but basically replace um Christian biblical teachings with CCP. Yeah, with the Chinese Christian Bible. Um so just by itself, that shows that if China is scared of this, we should be paying attention to what terrifies them. Right? That's just one part of it. And then, of course, on the um broader sort of domestic enforcement level, because they're applying so much of their surveillance tech to Christians, anything that the U.S. does in defense of Christians to, you know, as we argue, sanction the CCT body that is running these uh surveillance campaigns, that will weaken China's hold over the rest of their domestic population as well. And Donald Trump did bring up the case of this imprisoned pastor, didn't he? Would you mind explaining that? Yeah. So Donald Trump mentioned the case of Ezra Jin, who led the um Zion Church in Beijing, one of the largest underground churches in the world. That means it's a church that wasn't part of the state-permitted um three-self-patriotic movement that houses uh Protestant churches that Beijing allows to practice if they agree to all of these rules that sort of distorts Christianity and in unrecognizable ways. Um he had been very prominent online, uh, online evangelism through a popular Chinese app, especially during COVID. Uh, and because of that, he was one of the most prominent leaders uh of the underground Christian community in China. So in October, Beijing sent about a thousand uh thugs to go and raid this church, arrest him, and a couple dozen of the leaders of the Beijing church. And he's unbelievable. That is Samuel Ben Urr from the Foundation for Defense of Democracy. Samuel, thanks for the time. You've got the Lars Larson show.