JOHANNESBURG: Millions of Christians in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) — who are spending Christmas amid reported threats of persecution, kidnapping, sexual violence and, in some cases, death at the hands of Islamist militants — view Friday’s U.S. strikes targeting Islamic State fighters in Nigeria as a genuine indication that President Trump is committed to halting the killing of Africa’s Christian communities.
An estimated 16 million Christians across the region have been displaced and torn from their homes. The purported release of 130 abducted schoolchildren in Nigeria this week has done little to ease anxieties as many across the continent attempt to worship during Christmas.
This year, however, Digital has highlighted Africa’s crisis multiple times. The situation prompted senior congressional members — including Sen. , R-Texas, Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., and ultimately a leader who threatened to deploy U.S. troops ‘guns-a-blazing’ to Nigeria (the hardest-hit nation) to end the killing of Christians — to bring attention to the violence.
This Christmas in Africa, there are reportedly few signs of improvement so far. “The militant Islamist offensive across SSA is a global-scale catastrophe playing out right in front of us,” Henrietta Blyth, CEO of Open Doors UK & Ireland, told Digital this week.
Open Doors is a global Christian organization that supports Christians persecuted for their beliefs.
Blyth added, “The past year has brought a relentless stream of reports from sub-Saharan Africa — including accounts of , among other things, attacks on defenseless Christian communities.”
“At Open Doors, we’ve been sounding the alarm via our Arise Africa campaign. We’ve prayed time and again that this campaign of terror would gain public attention.”
Speaking about Nigeria — where thousands of Christians are reported killed annually — and the speeches, articles and posts condemning the violence, Open Doors’ Blyth noted, “There is no indication that this violence has slowed in 2025.”
“The absence of global outrage and action on this issue is a moral failure,” South Africa’s Chief Rabbi Dr. Warren Goldstein told Digital. He added, “It appears that black lives don’t matter when they’re killed by Islamists in Africa. The persecution of Christians in Africa must be viewed in its global context: it’s part of a multi-continental jihadist war against ‘infidels’ — Jews and Christians — and against Western values.”
He went on, “This is a world war, with Israel at the center of the jihadist firestorm involving Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah and others. The Islamist war on Christians in Africa is another front in this global conflict, spanning from Sudan in the north to Mozambique in the south.”
Digital has highlighted the regions where persecution has been most severe in Africa in 2025:
Per Open Doors, Africa’s most populous country (Nigeria) experienced the worst persecution on the continent in 2025, with “endless accounts of deadly attacks and kidnappings” across its northern and Middle Belt regions — including villages burned, civilians raped, abducted, shot and beheaded.
spoke out this year against killings blamed on Muslim Fulani tribespeople in Nigeria’s Benue State in June, stating, “Around 200 people were murdered with extreme cruelty.”
Bishop Wilfred Anagbe’s Makurdi Diocese in north-central Nigeria is nearly entirely Christian. However, the persistent and escalating violence prompted him to testify at a congressional hearing in Washington in March. Upon returning to Nigeria, he received threats, and approximately 20 of his parishioners were killed.
This war-ravaged nation is 95% Christian, yet its faithful are being targeted by jihadists. In February, terrorists affiliated with the Islamic State-linked ADF group — which seeks to establish a Muslim caliphate in the country’s east — rounded up 70 Christians and allegedly beheaded them inside a church. In September, at least 89 Christians were reportedly massacred by jihadists at a funeral and in nearby fields.
Sudan’s estimated 2 million Christians account for roughly 4% of the country’s population,
Like other Sudanese citizens, they confront chronic food shortages and the horrors of a years-long war. However, Christians are also purportedly targeted for discrimination and persecution by both parties to the conflict.
A senior Sudanese church leader told Digital that in the Darfur city of El Fasher, “Now Christians are eating animal feed and grass. No wheat, no rice — nothing can get in.”
Open Doors reports that civil conflict and weak governance have created a lawlessness vacuum that armed militants have exploited. In the far north, Boko Haram and the Islamic State West Africa Province frequently launch overnight raids on villages, killing, abducting and destroying property. Thousands have fled their homes to seek refuge in displacement camps.
Ali, a villager, stated, “It never stops. I want it to end, but it doesn’t. We have to sleep in the mountains to stay safe.”
Located in the continent’s southwest, Mozambique has a 55% Christian population. Islamic State Mozambique is wreaking havoc in the far north, targeting Christian communities, burning their churches and destroying homes. Killings have surged this year, and thousands more are fleeing, joining the over 1.3 million already displaced.
In a mass attack on the village of Napala in October, Open Doors reported that militants killed 20 Christians and displaced approximately 2,000 people. A local pastor recounted how four elderly sisters were tied up and burned alive inside a house.
Regarding the Nigerian airstrikes, Open Doors’ Henrietta Blyth told Digital, “A military operation like this won’t offer a quick solution to decades of violence. The Nigerian government must pursue long-term solutions that guarantee peace, protect civilians and uphold religious freedom for all.”
Chief Rabbi Goldstein concluded, “The West can only win this war if it finds the moral clarity to name it for what it is and recognize all theaters of conflict as part of the same struggle.”