by Bill Doody
While headlines fixate on Gaza and Ukraine, tens of thousands of Nigerian Christians have been massacred with barely a whisper from the West. The killings are no longer sporadic — they are systemic.
While the world’s attention is on Gaza and Ukraine, another war rages — almost unnoticed — across Nigeria’s villages and farmlands. In the country’s Middle Belt and northern states, Christians are being killed at a rate that human rights groups say now amounts to a slow-burn genocide.
According to Intersociety (International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law), 7,087 Christians were killed and nearly 7,800 abducted in just the first seven months of 2025 — roughly one killing every thirty minutes. The group estimates that since 2009, more than 52,000 Christians have been murdered and 20,000 churches or schools destroyed.
Independent monitors support the scale if not the exact figures. Open Doors’ 2025 World Watch List again ranked Nigeria as the world’s deadliest country for Christians, responsible for about 90 percent of all faith-related killings worldwide. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has urged Washington to re-designate Nigeria a “Country of Particular Concern,” citing impunity and the continued enforcement of blasphemy laws under regional Sharia codes.
Responsibility is shared among Boko Haram, ISWAP jihadists, Fulani herder militias, and criminal gangs who raid villages, torch churches, and seize hostages for ransom. The result is a shattered landscape across Plateau, Benue, Kaduna, Taraba, and Borno States, where families are driven from ancestral lands and Christian communities are disappearing.
Watch: Senior Counsel for Global Religious Freedom at ADF International, Sean Nelson, praises Donald Trump for putting pressure on Nigeria over the Christian attack, believing more needs to be done.