Boko Haram Beheads 23 People in Kano, Nigeria

How many more people have to be beheaded before we can have an open, honest discussion about Islam?

Kano, Nigeria (CNN)—Suspected Boko Haram gunmen decapitated 23 people in a raid on Buratai village in northeast Nigeria's Borno state, residents and a politician said Saturday.

Scores of attackers invaded the village at 11 p.m. Friday when residents were mostly asleep and set homes on fire, hacking residents who tried to flee.

"‎The gunmen slaughtered their 23 victims like rams and decapitated them. They injured several people," said Ibrahim Adamu, a local politician who fled.

"They burned a large part of the village and we are afraid some residents were burnt in the homes because most people had gone to bed when the gunmen struck," said Adamu, a ward councilor in the village.

A paramedic ‎at a government hospital in the nearby town of Biu said 32 people from Buratai were taken to the hospital with gunshot wounds and burns.

"The injured victims said a lot of people were beheaded by the attackers," the paramedic said. (Continue Reading.)

Boko Haram Pledges Allegiance to the Islamic State

THIS. IS. BAD.

Every day, the global jihad grows larger, more organized, and better equipped. Meanwhile, politicians and the media continue to protect and promote the ideology that calls for jihad.

Reuters—Nigeria's militant Islamist group Boko Haram has pledged allegiance to Islamic State, which rules a self-declared caliphate in parts of Iraq and Syria, according to a video posted online on Saturday.

"We announce our allegiance to the Caliph ... and will hear and obey in times of difficulty and prosperity," read an English language translation of the video broadcast in Arabic that purported to be from the Nigerian militant group.

The pledge of allegiance was attributed to Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau.

The video script identified the Caliph as Ibrahim ibn Awad ibn Ibrahim al-Awad al-Qurashi, who is better known as Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of Islamic State and self-proclaimed caliph of the Muslim world.

Baghdadi has already accepted pledges of allegiance from other jihadist groups in the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan and north Africa. (Continue Reading.)

Dozens Dead in Jihadists Attacks in Maiduguri, Nigeria

Millions of Europeans rallied in Paris in memory of slain Charlie Hebdo cartoonists. These millions of Europeans aren't nearly as upset about the daily jihad death toll in Africa.

Reuters—Four bomb blasts killed at least 50 people in Maiduguri in Nigeria's northeast on Saturday in the worst attacks there since Islamist militants tried to seize the city in two major assaults earlier this year.

There was no immediate claim for the bombings but they bore the hallmarks of the Islamist group Boko Haram, which has been waging a six-year insurgency to carve out an Islamic state in Africa's biggest economy.

President Goodluck Jonathan, who is seeking re-election on March 28, has been heavily criticized for failing to crush the group. The vote was postponed for six weeks from Feb. 14 for security reasons.

Around noon on Saturday, the driver of a motorized tricycle detonated a bomb when the vehicle was prevented from entering a fish market on the Baga road in the west of Maiduguri, market trader Mohammad Ajia said after fleeing the scene.

Another blast hit the busy Monday market shortly afterwards. A car bomb exploded later by a bus station near a Department of State Security (DSS) office, according to a civilian member of a joint task force.

State police commissioner Clement Adoda said via text message there had been four blasts in the city, without elaborating on the location or nature of the fourth explosion.

"We've received 50 dead bodies from the blast scenes and 36 injured people," Salisu Kwaya Bura, Chief Medical Officer of Borno Specialists Hospital, told reporters. (Continue Reading.)

Boko Haram Posts Beheading Video

Muslim groups are competing for the attention of potential recruits. For the past year, the Islamic State has won the most attention and the most recruits. Boko Haram took note of this success and has copied a play from the ISIS playbook. Other groups won't be far behind.

This is what happens when weak Western leaders are confronted by Islam. Leadership matters, my friends.

Reuters—Nigeria's Islamist sect Boko Haram released a video purporting to show it beheading two men, its first online posting using advanced graphics and editing techniques reminiscent of footage from Islamic State.

The film, released on Monday, shows militants standing behind the two men who are on their knees, their hands tied behind their backs, with one man standing over them, holding a knife.

One of the men is made to tell the camera that they had been paid by authorities to spy on the militant group, before the film moves to another scene showing their decapitated bodies. It was not possible to confirm the film's authenticity or date.

The footage will stoke concerns that Boko Haram, which evolved out of a clerical movement focused on northeast Nigeria, is expanding its scope and seeking inspiration from global militant networks including al Qaeda and Islamic State.

The militants who have killed thousands and kidnapped hundreds in their bid to carve out an Islamist state in their homeland, have in recent months stepped up cross-border raids into Cameroon, Chad and Niger.

Nigeria's President Goodluck Jonathan has said Boko Haram is allied to both al Qaeda and its offshoot Islamic State, though that has not been confirmed by the group itself.

The Boko Haram film's use of graphics, the footage of black-clad militants with a black flag, and the editing to show only the aftermath of the beheading, were particularly reminiscent of footage from Islamic state, which has seized large parts of Iraq and Syria and killed several hostages. (Continue Reading.)

Nigeria: At Least 48 Dead in Suicide Attack During High School Assembly in Yobe

It's easy for Western politicians and the media to lecture us on the peaceful and tolerant nature of Islam. They're not the ones being slaughtered in the name of Allah.

Yobe, Nigeria (Fox News)—A suicide bomber has killed at least 48 students at a high school assembly in northeastern Nigeria, witnesses say.

Survivors told the Associated Press that the explosives detonated Monday morning during the weekly assembly at the Government Technical Science College in Potiskum, capital of the Yobe state. They also said that the bomber was disguised in a school uniform and carried the explosives in a rucksack commonly used by students.

An estimated 2,000 students had gathered in the school's hall at the time of the blast.

Hospital workers say dozens are being treated and amputations are likely, while a morgue worker told the AP that at least 48 people had died.

Soldiers rushed to the grisly scene, but were chased away by people throwing stones, angry at the military's inability to halt a 5-year-old Islamic insurgency that has killed thousands and driven hundreds of thousands from their homes.

The region has been in the grip of fighting between government forces and Boko Haram, whose name, roughly translated, means "Western education is forbidden." A suicide bomber last week killed 30 people in the same city, Potiskum, the Yobe state capital.

The group made international headlines earlier this year when it kidnapped 276 girls from a school in the same region. Several of the girls later escaped, but the Nigerian government says 219 are still behind held by the group. (Continue Reading.)

Nigerian Security Forces Arrest Ten-Year-Old Suicide Bomber (and It's a Girl)

There were four suicide attacks by women in the past week in Kano, Nigeria. Now Boko Haram is strapping bombs to little girls. Meanwhile, politicians and the media in the West continue to defend the religion that leads to these tactics. Lots of blood on lots of hands.

Daily Independent—The security forces said on Wednesday they have arrested three suspected suicide bombers, among them two female teenagers, 10-year-old Hadiza Musa and 18-year-old Zainab Musa.

The third suspect, a male, was identified as Iliya Dahiru.

They were arrested along Zaria road in Katsina. . . .

Coordinator of the National Information Centre, Mike Omeri, who disclosed this in Abuja, said the suspects were arrested in a Honda CRV car when they were asked to disembark for security checks.

Hadiza was discovered to have been strapped with an explosives belt and immediately, Iliya and Zainab made attempt to escape with the car but were blocked by concerned Nigerians, Omeri said.

“It is on this note that we appeal to parents to consciously observe and watch their children’s activities to prevent them from participating in unwholesome activities, particularly acts of terrorism,” he said.

He also warned parents against engaging private Koran teachers for their wards, advising rather that they be taught in selected regular Islamic schools. (Continue Reading.)

Four Suicide Bombings by Muslim Women in One Week in Kano, Nigeria (American Feminists Still Silent)

Boko Haram has sent four female suicide bombers to their deaths in Kano in the past week. These women are often raped and then told that they can only regain their honor by carrying out a suicide attack for Allah. Where's the outrage?

(Reuters) - A female suicide bomber blew herself up in a college in northern Nigeria's biggest city of Kano on Wednesday, killing six people and critically wounding another six in the fourth such attack by a woman in Kano in less than a week, a security source said.

The bomber targeted youths who were looking at a notice board for national youth service in Kano Polytechnic, the source said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, although militant group Boko Haram, which is fighting for an Islamic state in religiously-mixed Nigeria, has repeatedly bombed Kano as it radiates attacks outwards from its northeast heartlands.

Using female suicide bombers in the city appears to be a new tactic of Boko Haram, although they have used them on occasion for years in the northeast.

Two female suicide bombers blew themselves up at a trade show and a petrol station in Kano on Monday, killing one other person and injuring at least six others.

On Sunday, a female suicide bomber killed herself but no one else while trying to target police officers. (Continue Reading.)

Nigeria: Six Jihadists Arrested for Planting Bombs in a Church

How many churches must be destroyed in the name of Allah before we can have an open, honest discussion about what Allah commands?

Nigeria—Six suspected Boko Haram members were arrested in Imo State in the early hours of Sunday inside the Winners Chapel Owerri, along Port Harcourt road, by the Imo State police command, while planting bombs in the church premises.

According to an eye witness account, the security personnel attached to the church noticed strange movements within the church premises and monitored their movements.

The security men alerted the senior pastor of the church, Moses Oyedele who instructed them to alert the police which they did and the Police immediately rushed to the scene with soldiers and other security agents.

In the process, it was discovered that about six suicide bombers have taken over the church perpetrating their nefarious activities.

The source said that the police immediately cordoned off the church premises in search of the suspects leading to the arrest of the suspects. It was discovered that the suspects had planted a bomb at the entrance gate of the church and had taken position round the premises of the church so as to plant more bombs. The police anti-bomb squad which detonated the bombs, conducted a thorough check round the premises so as to detect any hidden bomb within the premises.

When interrogated the suspects confessed to be suicide bombers who had stormed the state with the intention of bombing five churches within the state. (Continue Reading.)

Ten Nigerian Generals Found Guilty of Aiding Boko Haram

Here in the West, we're constantly told that groups like Boko Haram (whose full name is "The Congregation of the People of the Sunnah for Dawah and Jihad") have nothing to do with Islam. And yet we find high level military officials in Nigeria actively supporting the group. Why? Because Islam commands its adherents to establish Sharia, and Boko Haram is working to establish Sharia in Nigeria.

But if we keep telling ourselves that these groups have nothing to do with Islam, maybe the problem will go away by itself.

KADUNA, Nigeria (AP) — Ten generals and five other senior military officers were found guilty in courts-martial of providing arms and information to Boko Haram extremists, a leading Nigerian newspaper reported Tuesday.

The news follows months of allegations from politicians and soldiers who have told The Associated Press that some senior officers were helping the Islamic extremists and that some rank-and-file soldiers even fight alongside the insurgents and then return to army camps. They have said that information provided by army officers has helped insurgents in ambushing military convoys and in attacks on army barracks and outposts in their northeastern stronghold.

Leadership newspaper quoted one officer saying that four other officers, in addition to the 15, were found guilty of "being disloyal and for working for the members of the sect." (Source)

Boko Haram Survivor Deborah Peter Describes Execution of Her Father and Brother for Refusing to Convert to Islam

How many Christians must be slaughtered in the name of Allah before we are finally allowed to discuss Muhammad's teachings about Christians?

Boko Haram Survivor Deborah Peter

International Business Times—Her father and brother were martyrs for the Christian faith, a Nigerian girl who survived the Boko Haram slaughter of her family told members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee Wednesday. Deborah Peter, 15, recounted surviving a 2011 attack on her hometown by Boko Haram terrorists.

Peter is from Chibok, the northeast Nigerian town where close to 300 schoolgirls were taken captive in April by Boko Haram. She told U.S. House lawmakers how her brother and father were shot in front of her and the attackers put her between their dead bodies, threatening to kill her if she did not keep quiet.

In her statement, Peter recalled how her brother and father were killed on the night of Dec. 22, 2011, when their home was invaded by Boko Haram. She said her brother had told their father not to come home because they had heard gunshots outside the house. But the father had told him not to worry since because "it was not the first time he had come home when people were fighting."

"At 7:30 p.m., three men knocked on the door. My brother answered the door because he recognized one of the men as a Muslim in our community. The men asked where my dad was and I told them that he was in the shower. The men waited. After three minutes, they went into the bathroom and dragged my dad into the main room. They said that my dad was wasting their time and that they did not have time to wait on him. The men told my dad that he should deny his Christian faith. My dad told them that he would not deny his faith. They said that if he did not deny his faith they were going to kill him. My dad refused, saying that Jesus said whoever acknowledges Him in front of man, He will acknowledge in front of God; and whoever denies Him in front of man, He will deny in front of God in heaven. My dad said that he would rather die than go to hellfire. After he told the men that, the men shot him three times in his chest.

"My brother was in shock. He started demanding, 'What did my dad do to you? Why did you shoot him?' The men told him to be quiet or else they were going to shoot him too. Then, the men discussed whether they should kill my brother. One of the Boko Harams said they should kill Caleb, my brother. The second man said that he was just a boy and that he was too young to kill. But the third man said that they should make an exception in this case because Caleb will only grow up to be a Christian pastor. Caleb asked me to plead with them for his life but they told me to shut up or they would kill me too. The leader agreed that they should kill him and shot my brother two times. My dad had still been breathing but when he saw them shoot Caleb, he died.

"I was traumatized. A nearby pastor paid for me to get out of town when he discovered that Boko Haram said they made a mistake by not also killing me. Boko Haram decided later that they should have killed me because I am the daughter of an apostate Muslim mother who converted to Christianity. So the pastor paid for me to get out of that region.

"I fled and Jubilee Campaign helped me come to a 9/11 child survivors of terrorism camp in America. On May 15, 2013, that pastor, Rev. Faye Pama, was killed by Boko Haram in front of his kids." (Continue Reading.)

Two Boko Haram Kidnapping Victims Found Bleeding, Raped, Nearly Dead

The world recently saw video footage of dozens of Boko Haram kidnapping victims professing their new "faith" in Islam. Why would these girls convert to Islam, the religion that allows men to take female captives and rape them? They converted to Islam hoping that their Muslim captors would stop raping and torturing them. Those who refused to convert were raped and beaten nearly to death, then left for dead in the Nigerian sun.

Welcome to the version of Islam that we read about in Islam's most trusted sources.

Daily Mail—Their faces scratched and bleeding, the pitiful remains of their once-smart school uniforms ripped and filthy, the two teenage girls were tethered to trees, wrists bound with rope and left in a clearing in the Nigerian bush to die by Islamist terror group Boko Haram.

Despite having been raped and dragged through the bush, they were alive – but only just – in the sweltering tropical heat and humidity.

This grim scene was discovered by 15-year-old Baba Goni. ‘They were seated on the ground at the base of the trees, their legs stretched out in front of them – they were hardly conscious,’ says Baba, who acted as a guide for one of the many vigilante teams searching for the Nigerian schoolgirls abducted from their school last month by Boko Haram – and now at the centre of a concerted international campaign for their freedom.

The horrific scene he and his comrades encountered, a week after the kidnap early on April 15, was in thorny scrubland near the village of Ba’ale, an hour’s drive from Chibok, where 276 girls aged 16 to 18 were taken from their boarding school dormitories – with 223 still missing. It was still two weeks before social media campaigns and protests would prick the Western world’s conscience over the abduction.

In the days following their disappearance, rag-tag groups such as Baba’s, scouring the forests in a convoy of Toyota pick-up trucks, were the girls’ only hope. But hope had already run out for some of the hostages, according to Baba, when his group spoke to the terrified inhabitants of the village where Boko Haram had pitched camp with their captives for three days following the kidnap.

The chilling account he received from the villagers, though unconfirmed by official sources, represents the very worst fears of the families of those 223 girls still missing.

Four were dead, they told him, shot by their captors for being ‘stubborn and unco-operative’. They had been hastily buried before the brutish kidnappers moved on.

‘Everyone we spoke to was full of fear,’ said Baba. ‘They didn’t want to come out of their homes. They didn’t want to show us the graves. They just pointed up a track.’

The tiny rural village, halfway between Chibok and Damboa in the besieged state of Borno in Nigeria’s north-east, had been helpless to stop the Boko Haram gang as it swept through on trucks loaded with schoolgirls they had taken at gunpoint before torching their school.

Venturing further up the track, Baba and his fellow vigilantes found the two girls. Baba, the youngest of the group, stayed back as his friends took charge.‘They used my knife to cut through the ropes,’ he said. ‘I heard the girls crying and telling the others that they had been raped, then just left there. They had been with the other girls from Chibok, all taken from the school in the middle of the night by armed men in soldiers’ uniforms.

‘We couldn’t do much for them. They didn’t want to talk to any men. All we could do was to get them into a vehicle and drive them to the security police at Damboa. They didn’t talk, they just held on to each other and cried.’ (Continue Reading.)

Boko Haram Leader Declares: "We Would Marry Them Out at the Age of Nine"

For years, we've been pointing out what the Qur'an says about Muslims taking female captives. When we tell people what the Qur'an says, however, we're called "racists" and "bigots." So what happens when the leader of a Muslim group says exactly what we've been saying? Is the leader of Boko Haram an anti-Muslim bigot for telling people what Islam teaches about female captives?

Oddly enough, when we point out that groups like Boko Haram are openly proclaiming Muhammad's teachings about jihad, female captives, sex with prepubescent girls, etc., politicians and the media condemn us for calling them Muslims. According to Western leaders, the only true Muslims are Muslims who completely reject Muhmammad's teachings about jihad, female captives, sex with prepubescent girls, etc. It seems, then, that Islam is defined by the West, and not by Muhammad.

Now the U.S. is sending a team to help the Nigerian government rescue the kidnapped girls. But how long will we continue to defend and promote the ideology that leads to such kidnappings?

Abubakar Shekau of Boko Haram

FoxNews—The White House said Tuesday the U.S. is preparing to send a team to Nigeria to help the government search for nearly 300 schoolgirls abducted more than three weeks ago by Islamic militants.

The team would likely include military personnel, law enforcement personnel and others with experience in intelligence, investigations, hostage negotiation and victims' assistance, White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters.

"Time is of the essence," he said, stressing that the kidnappings happened 22 days ago. "Appropriate action must be taken to locate and to free these young women before they are trafficked or killed."

Carney said that Secretary of State John Kerry spoke earlier Tuesday with Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan, who "welcomed" the secretary's offer to send a team to discuss assistance. . . .

The development comes as Boko Haram, the group of militants responsible for last month's mass kidnapping, seized eight more girls on Monday.

In a video message apparently made by the leader of Boko Haram, Abubakar Shekau claimed responsibility for the schoolgirl kidnappings three weeks ago. In the video, he called the girls slaves and threatened to "sell them in the market, by Allah."

In the 57-minute video, Shekau said "western education should end." He also said he threatened to "give their hands in marriage because they are our slaves. We would marry them out at the age of 9. We would marry them out at the age of 12." (Continue Reading.)

Nigeria: Kidnapped Girls Being Sold for as Little as $12

When we point out that the Qur'an allows Muslim men to capture and rape girls and women, we're called "racists" and "Islamophobes," even though we're quoting Muslim sources to prove what we're saying. Truth, however, doesn't seem to mean much nowadays, so the response to our claims really amounts to: "We don't care what the Qur'an says, as long as you don't hurt the feelings of Westernized Muslims who just want to feel good about their religion."

The problem with this response is that, like it or not, some Muslims take the Qur'an seriously. As long as we continue to ignore what the Qur'an says (in the name of "tolerance"), Muslim groups like Boko Haram will continue to capture and rape girls. Do the feelings of the girls and their families matter, too? If so, we need to speak the truth, no matter what kind of abuse is hurled at us by groups like CAIR.

NBC News—Mothers marched Wednesday in Nigeria to protest government inaction more than two weeks after 200 school girls were kidnapped by Boko Haram, a terror group operating with near impunity in the region — and which has reportedly sold many of the girls into slavery or marriage for as little as $12.

The rally came on the same day that the U.S. State Department released its annual global terrorism report, which names Boko Haram as one of the most dangerous groups in the world — ranking next to the Taliban in Afghanistan and al-Qaeda factions in Iraq and the Arabian Peninsula — and said they the group was responsible for at least 1,000 deaths in 2013.

"Boko Haram" translates to "Western Education is Sinful," so it has been attacking Nigerian schools since its founding in the early 2000s. But the April 14 attack at the Government Girls Secondary School in the Nigerian town of Chibok sent shocks around the world: More than 200 girls were taken, and weeks later it's still unclear where they are.

"There are still at least 230 girls being held," Mausi Segun, Nigeria researcher for Human Rights Watch, told NBC News from Nigeria. "Some of them have been taken across the border to Cameroon. Some of them have been taken to Chad. A few of them are still in the country, but their whereabouts [are] difficult to ascertain at this time."

The girls' identities have been withheld by the Nigerian government, which cites security concerns.

"We know little about the girls except they were in the highest class of secondary school in Nigeria," said Segun. "Most of them are between the ages of 16 and 18 years old."

According to community leaders in Nigeria, the young women are being forced to marry the Islamic extremists who kidnapped them.

The students are being sold for 2,000 naira — about $12 — to marry the fighters, Halite Aliyu of the Borno-Yobe People's Forum told The Associated Press in Lagos.

She said reports of mass weddings are coming from villagers in the Sambisa Forest, on Nigeria's border with Cameroon, where Boko Haram is known to have hideouts.

"The latest reports are that they have been taken across the borders, some to Cameroon and Chad," Aliyu said.

Pogu Bitrus, a community elder in Chibok, the town where the girls were abducted, told the BBC that some of the girls "have been married off to insurgents [in] a medieval kind of slavery."

"You go and capture women and then sell them off," he said. (Continue Reading.)

Nigeria: Muslims Abduct 100 Female Students

Muhammad allowed his followers to use female captives as sex slaves. Nearly fourteen centuries later, Muhammad's followers are still using female captives as sex slaves. Yet I'm condemned as a "racist" and an "Islamophobe" for objecting. Strange world we live in.

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria (Associated Press) — Suspected Islamic extremists abducted about 100 female students from a school in northeast Nigeria before dawn Tuesday, but some of the teens managed to escape from the back of an open truck, officials said.

The girls were abducted after midnight from a school in Chibok, on the edge of the Sambisa Forest that is an insurgent hideout, said Borno state police commissioner Tanko Lawan.

Gunmen killed a soldier and police officer guarding the school, then took off with at least 100 students, a State Security Service official said.

A local government official said he did not know how many of the girls have escaped but that “many” have walked through the bushes and back to Chibok. The girls were piled into the back of an open truck and, as it was traveling, some grabbed at low-hanging branches to swing off while others jumped off the slow-moving vehicle, he said. The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to give information to reporters.

All schools in Borno state were closed three weeks ago because of an increasing number of attacks by militants, who have killed hundreds of students in the past year. But the young women — between 16 and 18 years old — were recalled to take their final exams, the local government official explained.

Islamic extremists have been abducting girls to use as cooks and sex slaves. (Continue Reading.)

Nigeria: At Least 71 Killed in Bus Station Blast

No words.

ABUJA, Nigeria – A massive explosion ripped through a bus station during the morning rush hour in Nigeria's capital, killing at least 71 people and wounding 124 in a bombing that marked the bloodiest terrorist attack ever in Abuja.

President Goodluck Jonathan visited the scene and blamed Boko Haram, an Islamic extremist group which operates in the northeast of Nigeria and which has been threatening to attack Nigeria's capital. One official said he believed the bomb buried in the earth while the emergency management agency said the explosives were apparently hidden in a vehicle.

The blast destroyed 16 luxury buses and 24 minibuses and cars, said police spokesman Frank Mba, who gave the death toll.

Survivors screamed in anguish and the stench of burning fuel and flesh hung over the site where billows of black smoke rose as firefighters worked to put out the fires. Reporters saw rescue workers and police gathering body parts as ambulances rushed the wounded to the hospitals. State television has broadcast calls for blood donations.

Security personnel battled to belatedly cordon off the area as a bomb detonation team was combing it for secondary explosives, a common occurrence here. Thousands of bystanders gathered, ignoring warnings to stay away. While violence has torn the northeast where Boko Haram has killed thousands, the capital in the middle of Africa's most populous country has been relatively peaceful.

Two notable exceptions occurred when Boko Haram members rammed two explosives-laden cars into the lobby of the United Nations office building in 2011, killing at least 21 people and wounded 60 and when militants from the southern oil-producing Niger Delta in October 2010 exploded two car bombs at Independence Day celebration, leaving at least 12 people dead and 17 injured. The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta which carried out that attack has been largely dormant since then, except for some sabotage of oil pipelines.

There was no immediate claim for Monday's bombing though bus stations are a favored Boko Haram target. In March 2013, the extremists drove a car bomb into the main bus station in Kano, Nigeria's second biggest city, killing at least 25 people.

Boko Haram's campaign to make Nigeria an Islamic state with Sharia, or Islamic law, enforced throughout the country poses the greatest threat to its cohesion and security and threatens nearby countries where the fighters have gone to train and fight. (Continue Reading.)

Nigerian Child Bride Wasila Umaru Murders Husband and Others

According to the Qur'an, Muhammad is the pattern of conduct for Muslims (33:21). Muhammad married a child bride named Aisha when she was only six years old, and he had sex with her when she was nine years old. The result is that child marriage is rampant in Muslim countries.

Child brides, however, often aren't psychologically prepared for marriage.

Daily Mail—A child bride forced into marriage in Nigeria killed her husband and three of his friends by lacing a meal with rat poison, police said.

Wasila Umaru, 14, was married last week to 35-year-old Umaru Sani, according to assistant superintendent Musa Magaji Majia.

But when Umaru invited a dozen friends to celebrate in northern Ungwar Yansoro village, near the city of Kano, the teenager slipped the deadly chemical into a rice dish.

Umaru died the same day along with friends Nasiru Mohammed and Alhassan Alhassan, while another female victim, Indo Ibrahim, died in hospital hospital while receiving treatment.

Wasila admitted buying the poison at a local market and putting it into the food.

'The suspect confessed to committing the crime and said she did it because she was forced to marry a man she did not love,' Majia said.

Umaru is cooperating with police and likely will be charged with culpable homicide, according to Majia.

Child marriage is common in Nigeria and especially in the mainly Muslim and impoverished north, where the numbers increase in times of drought because a bride price is paid and it means one less mouth to feed.

Fifty percent of Nigerian girls living in rural areas are married before they turn 18, according to the U.N. children's agency. (Continue Reading.)

Easter Bombing Kills at Least 38 in Nigeria

If Westernized Muslims spent as much time telling their non-Westernized Muslim brothers that Islam is peaceful as they do complaining about Islamophobia, perhaps we wouldn't read about terrorist attacks on a daily basis. Of course, we all know it would be a waste of time trying to convince non-Westernized Muslims that Islam is peaceful, since the Qur'an clearly indicates otherwise.

LAGOS, Nigeria – A car bomb exploded along a busy roadway Sunday morning in a central Nigeria city, killing at least 38 people in the latest attack on a region beset by religious, ethnic and political violence, an official said.

The blast struck Kaduna, the capital of Kaduna state, leaving charred motorcycles and debris strewn across a major road in the city where many gather to eat at informal restaurants and buy black market gasoline. Nearby hotels had their windows blown out of by the force of the powerful explosion, which engulfed a group of motorcycle taximen.

At least 38 people were killed in the blast, said Abubakar Zakari Adamu, a spokesman for the Kaduna state Emergency Management Agency. Others suffered serious injuries and were receiving treatment at local hospitals, Adamu said.

The explosion badly damaged the nearby All Nations Christian Assembly Church as churchgoers worshipped at an Easter service, the possible target of the bomber. Witnesses said it appeared the explosive-laden car attempted to go into the compound of that church before it detonated.

"We were in the holy communion service and I was exhorting my people and all of a sudden, we heard a loud noise that shattered all our windows and doors, destroyed our fans and some of our equipment in the church," Pastor Joshua Raji said.

Another witness, Augustine Vincent, said he was riding a motorcycle just behind the car when it exploded.

"God saw our heart and saved us," he said.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, though suspicion immediately fell on a radical Islamist sect known as Boko Haram.

Boko Haram, whose name means "Western education is sacrilege" in the Hausa language of Nigeria's north, is waging an increasingly bloody fight with security agencies and the public. More than 380 people have been killed in violence blamed on the sect this year alone, according to an Associated Press count.

The sect, employing suicide bombers and assault-rifle shootouts, has attacked both Christians and Muslims, as well as the United Nations' headquarters in Nigeria.

The sect has rejected efforts to begin indirect peace talks with Nigeria's government. Its demands include the introduction of strict Shariah law across the country, even in Christian areas, and the release of all imprisoned followers.

The blast also comes as the United Kingdom and the United States had warned its citizens living in the oil-rich nation that violence was likely over the Easter holiday. (Read more.)

Nigerian Christians Gunned Down as They Mourned for other Christians Who Had Been Gunned Down

Muslims in the West, however, are too busy complaining about imaginary persecution here to do anything about actual persecution there.

NIGERIA--Gunmen in Nigeria on Friday opened fire on friends and relatives gathered to mourn the deaths of three Christians killed on Thursday, leaving up to 20 more people dead.

It was the latest in a series of attacks blamed on radical Islamists who have vowed to wage a religious war on Nigeria's Christians and drive them from the country's majority-Muslim north.

Several dozen Christians had come together for a meeting in a town hall in Mubi, in Adamawa state, to mark the deaths the day before of several people killed in the town.

Up to four gunmen surrounded the building and opened fire with Kalashnikov rifles, killing up to 20 people and leaving another 15 badly injured.

"We started hearing many gunshots through the windows," said Okey Raymond, 48, who was at the meeting.

"Everyone scampered for safety, but the gunmen chanted: 'God is great God is great' while shooting at us." (Read more.)

Three Nigerian Churches Bombed on Christmas Day

Meanwhile, in America, Muslims are complaining about "Islamophobia," because Lowe's Home Improvement isn't funding "All-American Muslim."

(CNN)--Bomb blasts struck at least three churches in Nigeria on Sunday as worshippers were attending Christmas Day services, stirring memories of strikes against Nigerian churches during last year's Christmas season.

The first explosion struck near a Catholic church in Madala, west of Abuja, Nigeria's capital, the National Emergency Management Agency said.

The agency said there were at least 17 bodies in the morgue at the National Hospital, and officials were still trying to confirm the total number of dead, local journalist Alkasim Abdulkadir said from Abuja.

A second attack struck the Mountain of Fire Ministries church in the city of Jos, northeast of the capital, said journalist Hassan John, who witnessed the aftermath of the two blasts that targeted the church.

No one was killed in the bombing, which John called a "miracle," but a policeman who engaged the attackers in a gun battle died of his wounds later, the journalist said, citing officials.

Another wave of bombings hit the northern town of Damaturu in Yobe state, an aid worker said, asking not to be named for security reasons.

A church, a police station and a state security building were also bombed, the aid worker said, saying there were injuries but it was not clear how many. (Read more.)

Sharia Favors the Rich

Muslims assure us that Sharia would make our countries better. Yet, wherever we see Sharia in practice, we see nothing but problems.

NIGERIA--Boko Haram’s deadly insurgency is fuelled by their desire to see stricter Islamic law, or Sharia, in northern Nigeria. Civil rights activists have voiced their concerns that poor people would bear the brunt of a more severe form of Sharia.

Sharia has been practised to varying degrees for as long as Islam has been in Nigeria. But in 1999, the then-governor of Zamfara State, Ahmed Sani, called for criminal cases to be tried in Sharia courts.

Civil rights activists in Nigeria complain that Sharia hands down harsh sentences to poor Muslims, while the rich use it to their advantage.

Ahmed Sani, the architect of Sharia in modern Nigeria, is a case in point. He married a child bride from Egypt last year and condoned his actions citing Sharia, which permits men to marry wives as young as 13.

Civil rights activist, Shehu Sani stood up to Ahmed Sani, who is no relation, “for those of us who were human rights activists and Muslims we had a duty to our conscience and to our people to stand up to Ahmed Sani. Because we were concerned that Sharia would be used against the poor and to hunt down political enemies.”

Several Sharia cases have brought condemnation from the international community. Most of them have involved poor women accused of adultery who face being stoned to death.

But some argue that it is Nigerian legal system that is at fault.

“Sharia has afforded women so many rights," says Remi Atunwa, a barrister and practising Muslim. "For example it stipulates that if a woman doesn’t want to cook, then her husband is obligated to get her a maid.”

But “people manipulate the system for political and religious reasons," she adds. "And the average person either doesn’t understand the system or doesn’t have the means [financial], required to navigate it.”

Nigeria’s 70 million Muslims already have the choice of having civil cases heard in a Sharia law court. Twelve northern states also allow the resort to Sharia in criminal cases. What Boko Haram is demanding is for Sharia to replace common and customary law in the 19 states that make up northern Nigeria.

The group also wants to see a stricter form of Sharia implemented, as in Saudi Arabia or Iran where stoning and amputations are not uncommon. The problem is that there are several million non-Muslims living in these states. And that wealthy Nigerians tend to be able to escape justice more than the rest of the population. (Source)