ISIS Blows Up Historic Clock Church in Mosul

Jim Hoft by Jim Hoft April 26, 2016

Islamic State fighters blew up the historic Clock Tower Latin Church in Mosul this week.
ISIS removed the church steeple last year.
Foreign Desk News reported:

Islamic State militants in Iraq have blown up the remnants of the prestigious Latin Church, dubbed the “Clock Church” for its prominent clock tower in central Mosul, according to the Patriarch of the Chaldeans, Louis Raphael Sacco.

Militants cordoned off areas surrounding the church and looted the building for profitable artifacts and antiquities before destroying the remaining parts with explosives, an Iraqi Christian community leader confirmed to The Foreign Desk.

The Clock Church, which had its clock tower gifted in 1873 to Iraqi Christians by Napoleon III’s wife, French Empress Eugénie, became a target of ISIS attacks in February 2015, when its cross was removed in an attack, according to Iraqi blog Niqash.

In a city that was once home to about 45 churches, most of Mosul’s churches have either been destroyed or turned into courts or jailhouses since the Islamic State takeover in June 2014.

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