The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) produced a photo gallery of the Islamic State’s church vandalism, reprinted by the UK’s Daily Mail. The photos show “ISIS terrorists toppling crosses, smashing Christian relics with hammers, and erecting the black flag of ISIS on churches in Iraq.” Collecting the images wasn’t difficult — ISIS has been triumphantly posting them on its website.
As the Daily Mail explains, ISIS believes “ancient relics promote idolatry that violates their fundamentalist interpretation of Islamic law.” This has the useful (for them) side effect of allowing them to obliterate cultural resistance through genocide and vandalism. The Vatican’s representative at the U.N., Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, accused the Islamic State of perpetrating genocide just yesterday, as part of a rare Vatican endorsement of military force.