Iran targets Christians in wave of arrests, accusing them of spying for Israel

Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence confirmed it has arrested more than 50 Christians since the country’s recent conflict with Israel, accusing them of espionage and anti-security activity. 

Officials with the Ministry of Intelligence claimed those detained had been trained abroad by churches in the US and Israel and had acted “under the guise of the Zionist Christian evangelical movement,” Asia News reported Aug. 13.

At least 11 of the Christians have since been released on bail, but over 40 remain in prison. They join more than 60 believers already serving sentences prior to the conflict.

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Advocacy group Article18, which tracks cases of religious persecution in Iran, disputes the government’s characterization. Director Mansour Borji said many of those arrested had attended a Christian gathering in a neighboring country because converts are barred from attending recognized churches in Iran. 

Borji described the government’s accusations as “the absurd claim” that Christians were trained for anti-security purposes, insisting they had simply received spiritual instruction unavailable to them at home.

According to Asia News, Iran permits limited activity for its historic Armenian and Assyrian Christian communities, but converts from Islam — who make up the majority of the country’s estimated 800,000 Christians — are denied official recognition. They cannot worship publicly in the Persian language, and churches that once held services in that language have been shut down.

The arrests of Christians were part of a wider campaign, described by the outlet as “a crescendo of internal repression,” that also targeted Bahá’ís, Kurds, Baluchis, monarchists, and journalists. Police reported detaining tens of thousands during the conflict with Israel.

Human rights lawyer Hossein Ahmadiniaz warned that those facing charges of political or religious offenses have little hope of due process. 

“There is no independent or fair judicial system in the Islamic Republic of Iran,” he said, according to Asia News. “Therefore, all those arrested on charges of security, political, ideological or ‘espionage’ offences are denied a fair trial, subjected to severe torture and do not even have access to an independent lawyer.”

International observers say the crackdown reflects a further decline in religious freedom. CatholicVote reported that the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom recently recommended that Iran be designated a “country of particular concern” for what it calls “systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom.”

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