News / Thoughts

Muslim dies after trying to save Christians

A Muslim man has died one month after he was hit by a bullet trying to save Christians’ lives. Salah Farah passed away during surgery to treat his injury in Nairobi earlier this week.

Mr Farah stood alongside a group of Muslims who had refused to be separated from Christians when al-Shabaab militants attacked a bus in Mandera, north-eastern Kenya, in December.

“They [the attackers] told us if you are a Muslim, we are safe. There were some people who were not Muslim. They hid their heads,” he told the BBC. The Islamist group has frequently attacked buses near the border between Kenya and Somalia, tactically separating the Christians and Muslims before executing the Christians.

Open Doors partners in Kenya said, “We are mourning the passing of Mr. Salah Sabdow Farah, who was the Deputy Head Teacher of Mandera Primary School. We pray for his loved ones, that they will receive the comfort of Christ at this trying time. He is survived by his wife and five children.

“The action he and the other Muslim passengers took on that fateful day did more than just save Christian lives, it also served to restore the trust that had been broken due to other attacks.”

Persecution of Christians in Kenya

Kenya is in the top 20 countries in the world in which it is most difficult for Christians to live, according to the 2016 Open Doors World Watch List. Despite being a Christian-majority country, Islamic extremism has been spreading from neighbouring Somalia into north-eastern Kenya. The militant group, al-Shabaab, have singled out Christians in numerous attacks, including the attack last Easter on a university in Garissa in which over 140 Christian students were killed.

Source: Open Doors; BBC

Pray now…

• For God to comfort the family and friends of Salah Farah, and for Him to comfort others who have lost family to the violence by al-Shabaab
• For the members of al-Shabaab, that they will come to know God and end the violence.