Malaysia churches firebombed - |
Two Christian churches in Malaysia have been firebombed amid tensions over the use of the word "Allah" by non-Muslims in the country.
Attackers threw a petrol bomb at church in the capital, Kuala Lumpur, and tried to set another ablaze in a nearby suburb in the early hours of Friday, witnesses and officials said.
A Malaysian court had last week overturned a government ban on non-Muslims using the word "Allah" in their literature, allowing Roman Catholic newspaper, the Herald, to use the term to refer to God in the Malay language.
The judge has since suspended the implementation of the ruling, after the government appealed the ruling and the Catholic church agreed to the suspension.
The fire in Friday's first incident gutted the administrative office on the first floor of the three-storey Metro Tabernacle Assembly of God church, shortly after midnight.
"There are witness reports two persons on a motorbike came near the entrance and hurled in something looking like a petrol bomb," Kevin Ang, a church spokesman, said.
Separately, Lawrence Andrew, the editor of the Herald, said a Molotov cocktail was thrown into the compound of the Roman Catholic Assumption church in Petaling Jaya, just outside the capital, around 4am on Friday.
other links from Sivin Kit's Garden who call for Mourning for Malaysia
Malaysian church fire-bombed ahead of Muslim protests
Malaysia church torched amid Allah row
Church damaged in midnight fire
Malaysian church set on fire: officials
Is this the right approach? When the due process of the law do not give you what you want, you resort to violence to get what you want? Then these "respect" you give to the "due process of the law" is just so much empty words. And the issue is about? The content and context of a word.It is a sad day for Malaysia.
.
I think for me, the day when the word "Allah" became an issue with the gar'men, it was already a sad day in Malaysia. I'm not surprised at all that this would happen.
ReplyDeletePeople underestimate the power of words and its plausible connection to political, social and religious powers. The Rites Controversy in China is one example. It is indeed a sad day for Malaysia.