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Late Wednesday night, US Senator Ted Cruz was booed off the stage at a conference for Middle East Christians, causing an interruption at a gala dinner for the In Defense of Christians summit in the capital city of Washington, D.C.
“Tonight, we are all united in defense of Christians… Tonight, we are all united in defense of Jews. Tonight, we are all united in defense of people of good faith, who are standing together against those who would persecute and murder those who dare disagree with their religious teachings”, Crz said.
He enraged the attendees of the conference when he said that “Christians have no greater ally than Israel”, and slammed religious extremism as “cancer”.
Cruz said that groups like Hamas, Hezbollah and the Islamic State (IS) are all carrying out “genocidal campaigns”, equating the vastly different three groups to each other.
Antoine Chedid, Lebanon’s Ambassador to the United States, and Melkite Greek Catholic Patriarch Gregorios III Laham were deeply infuriated by Cruz’s remarks. Laham in particular was determined to leave the gala unless Senator Cruz left.
“Who kicked off Jews from Lebanon, Syria and Iraq?” Laham said bewildered, refusing to hear Cruz’s statement.
Once the audience started booing him off stage, Cruz responded by saying, “Those who hate Israel hate America. Those who hate Jews hate Christians. If those in this room will not recognize that, then my heart weeps”.
“If you hate the Jewish people you are not reflecting the teachings of Christ. And the very same people who persecute and murder Christians right now, who crucify Christians, who behead children, are the very same people who target Jews for their faith, for the same reason. If you will not stand with Israel and the Jews, then I will not stand with you”, he said.
Beshara al-Rahi called on everyone attending the conference not to “reply to the Senator as the work of the conference is far more important than individual statements”.
Toufic Baaklini, the President of In Defense of Christians, lauded al Rafi, saying, “At every wedding, there are a few wedding crashers”.
“In this case, a few politically motivated opportunists chose to divide a room that for more than 48 hours sought unity in opposing the shared threat of genocide, faced not only by our Christian brothers and sisters, but our Jewish brothers and sisters and people of other all other faiths and all people of good will”, he said.
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