The Vanishing: Faith, Loss, and the Twilight of Christianity in the Land of the Prophets

by Janine Di Giovanni

The Vanishing reveals the plight and possible extinction of Christian communities across Syria, Egypt, Iraq, and Palestine after 2,000 years in their historical homeland.


 

Some of the countries that first nurtured and characterized Christianity - along the North African Coast, on the Euphrates and across the Middle East and Arabia - are the ones in which it is likely to first go extinct. Christians are already vanishing. We are past the tipping point, now tilted toward the end of Christianity in its historical homeland. Christians have fled the lands where their prophets wandered, where Jesus Christ preached, where the great Doctors and hierarchs of the early church established the doctrinal norms that would last millennia.


 

From Syria to Egypt, the cities of northern Iraq to the Gaza Strip, ancient communities, the birthplaces of prophets and saints, are losing any living connection to the religion that once was such a characteristic feature of their social and cultural lives.

 

In The Vanishing , Janine di Giovanni has combined astonishing journalistic work to discover the last traces of small, hardy communities that have become wisely fearful of outsiders and where ancient rituals are quietly preserved amid 360 degree threats. Di Giovanni's riveting personal stories and her conception of faith and hope are intertwined throughout the chapters. The book is a unique act of the last chance to visit the living religion before all that will be left are the stones of the past.

 

 

Genres: Religion, History, Nonfiction, Middle East, Christian, Journalism, Christianity

272 pages, Hardcover

Published October 5, 2021

About the author

Janine di Giovanni is one of Europe's most respected and experienced reporters, with vast experience covering war and conflict. Her reporting has been called "established, accomplished brilliance" and she has been cited as "the finest foreign correspondent of our generation".

Born in the US, she began reporting by covering the first Palestinian intifada in the late 1980s and went on to report nearly every violent conflict since then. Her trademark has always been to write about the human cost of war, to attempt to give war a human face, and to work in conflict zones that the world's press has forgotten.

She continued writing about Bosnia long after most people forgot it. In 2000, she was one of the few foreign reporters to witness the fall of Grozny, Chechnya, and her depictions of the terror after the fall of city won her several major awards. She has campaigned for stories from Africa to be given better coverage, and she has worked in Somalia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Kenya, Ethiopia, Benin, Burkino Faso, Ivory Coast, Zimbabwe, Liberia, as well as Israel, Egypt, Iraq, Afghanistan, the Balkans, East Timor and Chechnya.

During the war in Kosovo, di Giovanni travelled with the Kosovo Liberation Army into occupied Kosovo and sustained a bombing raid on her unit which left many soldiers dead. Her article on that incident, and many of her other experiences during the Balkan Wars, "Madness Visible" for Vanity Fair (June 1999), won the National Magazine Award. It was later expanded into a book for Knopf/Bloomsbury, and has been called one of the best books ever written about war. Madness Visible has been optioned as a feature film by actress Julia Roberts production company, Revolution Films.

Di Giovanni has written several books: Ghosts by Daylight: A Memoir of War and Love (Bloomsbury/Knopf 2011); The Place at the End of the World: Essays from the Edge (Bloomsbury 2006); Against the Stranger (Viking/Penguin 1993) about the effect of occupations during the first intifada on both Palestinians and Israelis; The Quick and The Dead about the siege of Sarajevo, and the introduction to the best-selling Zlata's Diary about a child growing up in Sarajevo. Her work have been anthologized widely, including in The Best American Magazine Writing, 2000.

She has won four major awards, including the National Magazine Award, one of America's most prestigious prizes in journalism. She has won two Amnesty International Awards for Sierra Leone and Bosnia. And she has won Britain's Grenada Television's Foreign Correspondent of the Year for Chechnya.

She is one of the journalists featured in a documentary about women war reporters, Bearing Witness, a film by three-time Academy Award winning director Barbara Kopple, which was shown at the Tribeca film festival and on the A&E network in May, 2005.

In 1993, she was the subject of another documentary about women war reporters, "No Man's Land" which followed her working in Sarajevo. She has also made two long format documentaries for the BBC. In 2000, she returned to Bosnia to make "Lessons from History," a report on five years of peace after the Dayton Accords. The following year she went to Jamaica to report on a little-known but tragic story of police assassinations of civilians, "Dead Men Tell No Tales." Both films were critically acclaimed.


With Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega, Managua, Nicaragua, January, 1990. Photo by Marc Schlossman
Di Giovanni's book, The Place at the End of the World, a collection of her essays, was published by Bloomsbury in January, 2006. 2006 has also brought projects on Muslims in Europe, the French riots, AIDS in South Africa, September 11 anniversary features, and the current political situation in Israel among others. She is at work on another book for Knopf/Bloomsbury, Up at Tito's Villa, set in Montenegro.

Janine di Giovanni is a contributing editor to Vanity Fair, a contributing writer to the New York Times, Granta, Newsweek and many

Reviews

[Adrian David · Rating 5 out of 5]

“They have taken everything else, but they cannot take God from us”
This quote, extracted from one of the chapters, pretty much sums up this book, which is a well-written, journalistic account of the endangered yet resilient Christian community in the Middle East. War correspondent Janine di Giovanni begins by reflecting on her life, her personal losses, and how her faith helped her during the darkest of times while working in war zones.

The book focuses on war-torn regions such as Iraq, Syria, and Gaza, and the politically volatile Egypt. Being the birthplace of Christianity, the Middle East has been home to the world’s earliest adherents of the faith. Over the course of a tumultuous history, myriad invasions and religious persecutions have posed an existential threat to the Christians living in the region. Their culture was eroded, their language was wiped out, yet despite all the perils, they have clung on to their faith.

Iraq, the country where Biblical patriarch Abraham was born, has housed the world’s oldest Christian sects, including the Assyrians and the Chaldean Catholics. The author explains how President Saddam Hussain made a social contract with the Iraqi Christians by providing them protection in exchange for their loyalty. Since Saddam himself hailed from the minority Sunni community in Shia-majority Iraq, he protected the Christian minority. Under his secular Ba’athist rule, Christians attained economic prosperity and gained a secure foothold in society, with a select few even becoming part of the political elite — like Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz. Although Saddam Hussein ruled Iraq with an iron fist, Christians supported him not necessarily because “they loved what he was doing, it was in fear of the alternative.” And the alternative proved cataclysmic. The 2003 US invasion of Iraq turned their world upside down. The fall of Saddam paved the way for the rise of ISIS, forcing many Christians to flee the country. Today, it is estimated that only around 20% of the pre-war 1.4 million Christian population remains in Iraq.

In Syria, Ba’athist president Hafez al-Assad relied on the support of the Syrian Christians, since he, too, just like his Iraqi counterpart, belonged to a minority sect. So great is the impact of Syrian Christians in Syria that it has shaped the country’s politics — namely Fares al-Khoury, the godfather of modern Syrian politics, and Michel Aflaq, founder of the secular Ba’athist thought. In parts of Syria, Aramaic, the language spoken by Christ, is still spoken by Christians today. The outbreak of the Civil War was catastrophic for Syrians, especially the Christian minority, who faced increasing persecution. Moreover, the spillover of the war adversely affected the Lebanese Christian community, wherein the influx of Syrian refugees upset the demographic balance between the country’s Christians and Muslims. Also, it’s interesting to note the union between Middle East Christians and the Trump administration, wherein the latter’s policies came as a boon to the former.

The ethnic cleansing of Middle Eastern Christians predominantly in Iraq and Syria by the ISIS is disconcerting. The actions of such fundamentalist terror outfits have decimated the already-declining Christian population to the verge of extinction. Christians were given three options — convert, flee, or die. In their attempts to build a caliphate based on the Salafist doctrine, ISIS terrorists have razed down churches, taken Christian women as sex slaves, reduced Christians to dhimmis and forced them to pay the jizya tax, and destroyed Christian villages, leaving behind ghost towns. Taking all these atrocities into account, it is no wonder that Christians at large support the government of President Bashar al-Assad instead of demanding for a regime change à la Ba’athist Iraq. As one of the Syrian Christians mentioned in the book says, “Comparing two bad options, you take the least bad one.”

Next up, the author takes us to Gaza. The besieged city’s Christians are caught between a rock and a hard place — Israeli military aggression and the radical Sunni Islamist rule of Hamas. What’s worse is that they face draconian restrictions on their freedom of movement — limiting them from traveling to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and visiting their relatives in the Israeli-controlled West Bank. To add insult to injury, many Gazan Christians “believe that Hamas does not adequately protect their rights” and consider the fundamentalist group to be hostile towards them. Moreover, the Palestinian Christians, who trace their origins back to the original followers of Christ, are witnessing a demographic decline owing to “a lower birthrate among Christians compared to Muslims, and an increased rate of Christian emigration.” A prime example of this is the Christian population in the holy city of Bethlehem, which stood at 85% in 1947 but has since plummeted to 12%.

In post-Arab Spring Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood’s rise to power came as a mighty blow to the Egyptian Christians, the largest Christian population in the Middle East. The author takes us back in history to explain the Nasser-led government’s policies in the wake of the 1952 Egyptian Revolution, which “stripped away the power and influence of many affluent Egyptian Christians, resulting in a wave of emigration.” Nasser’s move toward a shared Arab identity was regarded as a move toward Islamism by Christians. The position of Christians exacerbated during the rule of Nasser’s successor, Anwar Sadat, who proposed to introduce sharia law and clashed with the erstwhile Coptic Orthodox Patriarch. As the author notes, the Islamization of Egyptian society continued under Sadat’s successor, Hosni Mubarak, who was “very cautious not to provoke the Islamists, so he turned a blind eye to the atrocities Christians were being subjected to.” Under the Mubarak regime, Christians were denied building permits to build churches and history textbooks were rewritten to erase the Christian roots of Egypt. Fast forward to the current day, Egyptian Christians have not only become pawns in the struggle between the Sisi-led government and extremist groups, but also face legal and societal discrimination.

Many Christians are leaving the Middle East because of persecution as well as a bleak economic future, and most of the Christians in exile yearn to return, but the ground reality is far more complicated. Faith and hope are all they have.

Janine di Giovanni deserves credit for the extensive research that has gone behind the making of this book. The human stories from the ground are moving and poignantly capture the plight of the beleaguered Christian community. Be it the Brazilian priest in Gaza or the oppressed Christian ‘Zabbaleen’ garbage collectors in Egypt, each story instills hope for a better future.

Even during the most turbulent of times, the Middle Eastern Christians keep persisting, sustained by their faith stretching back two millennia. To put it in the words of a Syrian bishop interviewed in the book, “The history of the church is a history of persecution. We will go on fighting.”

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

One is unlikely to find a better person than Janine Di Giovanni to author a book on the dwindling population of Christians throughout the Middle East. A reporter who has covered the region from the front lines of conflict for decades, Di Giovanni has personally witnessed this history in the making. As a practicing Roman Catholic, she has a personal consciousness of what the eradication of Christian communities from the part of the world where Christianity was born will mean – the loss and disconnection that will be felt by many. While Di Giovanni draws on the personal relationships she has developed with people in Syria, Egypt, Iraq, and Palestine over the last three decades, her reporter instincts come through in the writing. The text is imbued with a compassionate objectivity, not slanted towards any personal message or point of view Di Giovanni herself may hold. While the majority of the local people to whom readers are introduced are practicing Christians, often living in communities of Christians that have been there for generations, we meet those of Jewish and Islamic faith as well. Di Giovanni acknowledges through them, and the book, that many religions have their roots in that part of the world. Particularly with Islam, she takes care to distinguish between the militant fanatics causing so much strife in the region (and responsible for the dispersal of Christian communities there) and the everyday Islamic communities who have lived peacefully next to their Christian neighbors.

A personal challenge for me reading the book was my lack of historical knowledge of the region. I thought I had a basic understanding of the major political shifts and developments in the middle east over the last 40 years simply from being an avid consumer of the news. But the forces driving developments in the middle east, and driving Christians out of the region altogether, are so much more nuanced than the major news stories and reach much farther back than the past 50 years. There are helpful 1 page summaries at the front of the book for each area covered: Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and Iraq. I referenced these frequently to orient myself in time and give context.

The region and the topic require a lot of context, especially for the American reader, and this is where the book could have been improved at the outset. The forward by the author is extremely long. She is introducing herself as a Catholic, a reporter, a mother. She is introducing us to her and to the region. But there was a feeling of disorganization about the presentation that only made sense later in the book. I was about 20% into the book on my e-reader before the pace, storytelling, and structure all came together for me. Part of the problem is that the region is complex, the personal story of any one individual is complex, the story of a community in any given region is complex, the history of Christianity itself is complex. There’s no easy entrance and one is awash in a jumble of facts and perceptions and experiences that take awhile to get sorted.

Very interesting learning of the large number of Christian sects (religions? Practices?) which are not familiar to me as an American but which have a defined presence and importance in that part of the world. I am accustomed to hearing of Roman Catholics and Protestants and within Protestant adherents are Lutherans and Presbyterians and Methodists and Episcopalians. There is the evangelical Christian movement. But these largely emerged from the politics of Europe and the west. A whole other set of divisions exists in the middle east and even the author and the people with whom she spoke didn’t always know the history of what lead to the Christian divisions. In other words, Christianity is not a monolith in the region.

Throughout all four of the areas represented here, Christians spoke of being treated as second class citizens, as being seen as less than, dirty, unworthy, simply based on the family they were born into. The language they used to describe their treatment there echoed the language often heard from Black Americans and sometimes from those of Islamic faith in the west. Like the experiences are mirroring each other.

Disconcertingly, Christians in Iraq and Syria have fared better under the governance of harsh dictatorship than under any other form of rule. As the dictators themselves come from a minority population, the minority Christians found it beneficial to align with other minorities. When these dictators, particularly Hussein in Iraq, were in power Christians did well economically and were able to rise socially because they came under the protection of this dictator. The reversal when Hussein was removed from power has been dramatic and the repercussions waged from the new class in power (democratically elected in Iraq) has been harsh. While I had been vaguely aware that this was so, Di Giovanni explores this more deeply in talking with persons and families who lived the experience, both those who remain in the country and those who have emigrated to the west.

No hesitation in recommending this book to secular and non-secular readers alike; we’re witnessing a significant piece of history, one which probably can’t be halted as Christians leave the region or are killed. I expect it will be many generations before there is a significant reversal.

Thanks to #Netgalley for the free advanced e-copy of this book.

[Lindsey · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m sure Janine di Giovanni is a great reporter, but this topic was too ambitious for her. I was hoping for something in the vein of “Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms,” which is a deep dive into the culture, history and threats to disappearing religions. But this takes a purely journalistic approach, with some random ancient history thrown in. Also a lot of stuff about the author dealing with the COVID outbreak. Just random anecdotes that don’t add up to much, no analysis or really even a POV besides “discrimination is bad.”

[Toby · Rating 3 out of 5]

In four chapters di Giovanni covers four Middle Eastern countries (Iraq, Palestine, Syria, Egypt) all of which contain some of the very oldest Christian communities in the world, and all of which have seen Christianity decline at a perilous rate in the past 20 years. It is less a story of persecution (although this is ever present) and more one of a minority group trying to navigate its way around a difficult political landscape with dictatorship on the one side and Islamic extremism on the other. The Christians, who are mostly sympathetic to reform yet cling to autocracy as the bulwark against anarchy, are caught in the crossfire. This is also a story of human brutality and evil, not simply against Christians but against the poor and the different. It is not a cheery read.

di Giovanni has spent thirty years reporting on the Middle East for a number of well-regarded newspapers. This book covers those years, giving us an impression of life before the 2003 invasion of Iraq and before the 2011 Arab spring (or Christian winter as others have called it). She writes with knowledge and empathy and gives us a good picture of the ruined churches, tiny monasteries and despair and (sometimes) hope of the people that she meets. One thing that is missing is an analysis of what it is that secures people's faith in the midst of such hardship. Towards the end of the book she asks an Egyptian what it means to be a Christian in such circumstances and, after being told something about following rules and helping people, she receives the answer "to be free". I would have liked to have a seen a little bit more about what faith actually means to those facing ISIS, the IDF or discrimination in Egypt. I suspect that it is something quite different to what we in the West consider to be faith.

Just one correction worth pointing out. Egypt has never been above North Korea in the World Watch List of most persecuting countries. The 2022 list has Egypt at 20 (lower than when di Giovanni was writing). North Korea is at no.2, knocked off its top spot because of the horror that is Afghanistan at the present time. (Iraq is 14, Syria 15, Palestine/Israel doesn't feature)

[E.T. · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5/5 "Over the Christmas holidays, the 'secular' Sisi government insisted on wrapping Cairo’s churches in enormous Egyptian national flags, as if they were gigantic Christmas presents."
"If you have to live and pray like this, to constantly be afraid, what does it mean to you, to be a Christian ?". He looked utterly surprised by my question. He talked about following rules and caring for others. But most of all, he said simply - "It means being free." !!!
This book describes the pitiful condition of the Christian minority in 4 Muslim-majority countries of the Middle East - Iraq, Syria, Palestine and Egypt. There is racism (the behaviour of Muslims towards non-Muslims is described best by it), discrimination, persecution, apartheid, there is violence - all of it sanctioned by the society and state - no matter who rules ! Unthinkable levels. The world needs to read this and urgently de-normalise this behaviour.
Say for example, Gaza is blockaded by both Egypt and Israel. Have you ever heard of protests or violence by Gazans against Egypt ? While the history of Christians in Iraq focused mostly on ISIS and their predicament can be blamed on this Black Swan event, the history of Christians in Syria, Gaza and Egypt shows clear sign of continuous persecution since the very beginning - from becoming "dhimmis" and paying the Jaziya to massive discrimination practised legally even today.
And what does the West do ? The last bastion of freedom-of-speech, USA passed the Islamophobic bill - I wonder if it is designed to protect the above stripped of all dignity and security ? :P :(

[Roger Snell · Rating 5 out of 5]

An outstanding book about the purge, persecution and twilight of Christians in the Middle East. Most powerful is the disappearance of Christians dating back to the first generation after Jesus Christ who speak the same Aramaic language.

Surprisingly, Saddam Hussein and Syrian dictator Assad actually did more to protect Christians than any of the alternatives as Muslim extremists have burned historic documents and churches and targeted Christian residents going back centuries.

The author has great authority to document this, covering decades of war and persecution around the world and bravely going to interview both sides in extremely dangerous situations for journalists.

This book is worthy of the Pulitzer Prize and is my personal choice for best non-fiction book of 2021.

[Melody Schwarting · Rating 4 out of 5]

Conflict in the Middle East is often portrayed as intra-Muslim, or between Islam and Judaism. di Giovanni looks at a smaller people group caught in the crosshairs: Christians. Many of the villages she visited are (were) ancient, many of the people able to trace their spiritual heritage through millennia to the apostles. Building on her work as a war correspondent, di Giovanni tells the stories of Christian communities in Iraq, Gaza, Syria, and Egypt. She focuses on individuals, asking for their stories and always for their thoughts on the future of Christians in their ancestral lands. Nowhere is the prognosis good, or even hopeful. These ancient people groups are dying out, in part because they must flee and lose their cherished ways of life, their holy sites, their communities.

Most of her work spans the 2000s-2010s, though she finished this book during the early days of the pandemic, and occasionally looks back to her work from the 1990s. Similar to the experience I had with 9/11 this year (realizing that I needed to know what really happened, rather than the impressions I had from the event as a six-year-old), The Vanishing made me realize I need to learn what was really going on in the Middle East over the past few decades. Most of what I remember is limited to headlines and photographs from the front page of the newspaper (haunting images of Abu Ghraib, the faces of US leaders seeing unreleased images of bin Laden's death). I gained a better understanding of the political movements and events in this book and a more nuanced picture of political leaders Christians felt protected under Saddam Hussein, who was himself from a minority Muslim group and thus appealed to other minorities to gain power; di Giovanni carries this as a thread through other areas, where similar minority dictators protected other minority groups to collect power, but there is still much I don't know. di Giovanni has published work on the Balkans, too, which I hope to read.

The Vanishing is perfect Advent reading: a sober reminder of the world's need for divine light. Historically, the four Sundays of Advent have not stood for hope, peace, love, and joy, but for death, judgment, hell, and heaven. Good Advent reads remind me why we say, "Maranatha," why we beg the Lord's justice, minor-prophets-style, to overcome corruption. If you would like to learn about the current state of ancient Christian people groups in the Middle East, The Vanishing tells what may be told.

[Wendelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book documents the sorrowful passing of Christian communities' presence from their historical places in Middle East, due to pressures of religious persecution and emigration. According to the author, this is done mostly by extremist groups, especially empowered after turbulent regime change, or by the regime change itself; ISIS and Al-Qaeda- affiliated groups (ie Jabhat al-Nusra) have done campaigns of destruction such as church massacres, sexual slavery of women, kidnapping and torment of priests and bishops, razing and pillaging of monasteries and Christians cemeteries, book burnings and destructions of relics and libraries, looting of Christians' belongings and confiscation of their land that have marked genocide of Chaldeans, Assyrians in places like Mosul & Qaraqosh. Identically, ISIS forces in Syria have persecuted Christians and other minorities, in instances such as a verdict in Raqqa that Christians must either convert or head to exile without possessions. In Palestine, Christianity is withering away due to the situation of siege, hardship, deprivation, the lack of employment, and hardline factions, that instigate migration into other lands. The Armenian Christian population was severely reduced when 1 million Armenians perished during the genocide by Turkey during World War 1. Syrian Armenians faced threats also, according at least to one testimony: "There were a lot of anti- Armenian protests. The famous Muslim Brotherhood slogan in Arabic was 'Arman mskeen tahht el skkeen", which translates to 'Poor Armenians, we'll put them under the knife. ' "" In Egypt, Nasser's ideology led to the stripping of affluent Egyptian Christians of their property as well as their ability to ascend to certain high-ranking jobs, positions and offices. Also noteworthy are some efforts of some governments, such as Egypt, to protect Christian minorities.

[Olivia Ransom · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very sad and moving reality, a perfectly written and explained story, with a high dose of empathy as well as of knowledge, great book!

[Tony · Rating 2 out of 5]

There is shockingly little about the Christian faith in this book.

The book is remarkably well written. The author is clearly gifted and talented in writing. What this book does well is make the stories of the people she interview pop off the page and draw in the reader.

My primary issue with the book is it seemed to give the impression it was going to tell of the history of Christianity in the region and the policies and persecution that are driving Christians out. It was much less history than I expected (though I thought it was more clearly presented when addressing Syria and Egypt). Addressing the history and policies was done more through story-telling and the author's own bias, so I don't think it gave as clear of a presentation as I was expecting.

Many times, the book was much less about Christians than simply current events in the Middle East. Many times it strayed from the Christian experience and was more broadly about whoever was not in power.

From a Christian perspective, nothing about the gospel or historic Christian teaching was presented. While I wasn't expecting a theology book, some definition and explanation of Christianity seems warranted. To that extent, the book gave nearly nothing about Protestantism in the region. It makes sense that Catholics and Orthodox would be the primary focus, but more than a couple lines about a Baptist church in Gaza (she also seemed confused about Baptist doctrine) or the existence of Presbyterians in Egypt seem needed. There was far more on mysticism than any sort of relevant Christian theology or doctrine.

Additionally, several of the Christians the author spoke with in Egypt do not even seem to understand their own faith. It's not a faith, so much, as a cultural identity. There was Christine who was asked how she knew she was a Christian, and responded, "you just know." And Mary, who didn't even know she was a Christian until Sadat took power. Then the blogger, Big Pharoah, who described himself as an activist first and a Christian second. The author, who inserted herself in many situations as connecting spiritually with her surroundings, referred to herself as a "proud sinner" in the epilogue.

Politically speaking, the leftward bias is evident. Both Presidents Bush (43) and Trump are heavily criticized for their policies, which is fair. However, President Obama comes through entirely unscathed by the writer. In reality, all three have plenty to be criticized for when it comes to Middle East policy.

She was also unrelenting in attacking Israel policies, even to the point of being clearly sympathetic to Hamas. I'd be curious to see if she has any public reactions to Hamas' actions on October 7, 2023.

The book was interesting, incredibly well-written, but left a lot to be desired and didn't seem to really address the issue it was advertised to address.

[Umar Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good read for people who don't know anything about the plight of Christians in the region. Americans, who often can't see the world beyond our narrow lense and borders, I think have a hard time understanding the persecution of Christians in places like Iraq, Syria, Egypt, and Gaza. However, Christians are decreasing and suffering partly because of the popularity of violent extremist groups, the general lack of freedom for everyone, and dire economic conditions and prospects. Those who can move to the West, particularly America, are increasingly exercising that option. The plight of these Christians isn't something that will gain popularity in America due to our domestic politics- championing their cause isn't seen as woke and could be construed as Islamophobic or making common cause with the Christian Right.

Not a book for those with a prior deep understanding of the region and its politics and not a book that is that nuanced. Missing a lot of key details and generally short on information. Reccomend for those with a limited prior knowledge.

[Maureen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This audiobook was a very personal recounting of Janine DiGiovanni's war reporting in the Middle East and the impacts on the various Christian communities in Egypt, Irag, Palestine and Syria. Not many people think of these countries as having large Christian communities, and Giovanni chronicles the gradual vanishing of these peoples as a result of war, discrimination, poverty and other catastrophes. While the thread was hard to follow--it is not a chronological history--it was highly enlightening.

[Hillarywalker27 · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. It’s a very interesting, easy-to-read discussion of Christian communities in Iraq, Gaza, Syria, and Egypt. My one complaint is that I felt that at times it jumped around too much in time, especially in the Iraq section which would jump from the mid-2000s to 2014 and then back a decade. This made it confusing to follow. The other sections of the book were more linear and easier to follow the timelines.

[Oma · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a really interesting book - a bit difficult and a bit heartbreaking.

[Brenda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Throughout history Christians in several countries have been reviled and persecuted, often treated as second-class citizens with a different set of rules. In Syria, Egypt, Iraq and Palestine (and others not highlighted here) they are killed for their faith, even now. One of the many alarming statistics in this book is 128 Christians were killed in Egypt in 2017 alone. And deaths are under reported. Not only are they being forcefully torn from their homes and tortured but young girls are sold into slavery in live "markets". Beheadings and other horrors aren't unheard of, either. Others simply disappear or taken as political prisoners. Politicians aren't exactly helpful, either. Even if they do not persecute per se, they do not help them and leave the vulnerable to the wolves.

The author is no stranger to war in these zones. Her accounts are disturbing and harrowing but need to be told. I am so grateful stories such as these are captured in writing. She includes her experiences and perspectives as well as quotes from people she has spoken with who tell her Christianity is nearing extinction. Groups such as ISIS are responsible for many heinous activities and casting fear. Life is dangerous for many but especially Christians and those who do not believe/follow the regimes. Economical situations and bordering country complexities are extremely difficult.

The destruction of the Stari Most in Mostar, Bosnia is also mentioned. Mostar is one of the most incredibly beautiful and evocative cities I have ever seen. Sniper Alley gave me goosebumps. The author reminds us the level of pointless hate was incomprehensible.

This book is incredibly informative and compelling. Those who are intrigued by events in the Middle East, especially those affecting vanishing Christianity, ought to read this.

My sincere thank you to Perseus Books, PublicAffairs and NetGalley for the privilege of reading this sobering and thoughtfully-written book.

[James Harrod · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like to think that I am becoming the best-read person at least in my immediate family, although it may be some time before I surpass my paternal grandfather, the Reverend Dr. John Harrod, author of several books himself. My father as good as conceded that I am better read than him when he asked me to select a book for his father, my grandfather, for his birthday. When I suggested ‘The Vanishing’, he responded simply, ‘That book sounds rather depressing! Any other ideas?’

He is right. It is a rather depressing book at times. Surprisingly for a book about Christians written by a Christian, there is very little hope presented in it. But it is also immensely thoughtful, personal, and even a little philosophical. Okay. Maybe if Grandad had been in a festive mood for his birthday and inspected the title upon its unwrapping his face may have fallen a little. However, it is still essential reading for everyone. Christianity is the most persecuted religious minority in the world according to the Christian organisation Open Doors, largely due to the experiences of believers in the Middle East. Yet this persecution receives little coverage, especially when you consider that many of these persecuted communities are some of the faith’s oldest. Janine di Giovanni does a fantastic job in drawing attention to this little-discussed, whisper it, genocide, drawing on her experience of decades of war correspondence all over the world.

The persecution of Christians in the Middle East over the last few decades is, thankfully, the exception and not the rule. Since the Islamic Conquest of the Middle East in the 7th century AD, the region’s sizeable Christian minorities have had fluctuating second-class status until the Ottoman Tanzimat Reforms in the 17th century. Christians were deemed equal citizens under the law. The exceptions to this rule of general harmony and tolerance have come from bouts of horrific persecution, including the Armenian and Greek genocides by the Ottomans during the First World War and its aftermath. In this sense, the recent destruction of hundreds of Christian communities, buildings, and manuscripts by Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and other extremist groups is the latest spot of persecution disturbing otherwise relative peace from which these surprisingly resilient communities will recover. It is not the persecution that is causing the gradual vanishing of Christianity in the Middle East, rather, migration due to lack of economic opportunity more than persecution is driving the faith’s extinction, particularly in Iraq, Syria, and Gaza.

Di Giovanni includes many examples of Christians in these regions who vow to stay in their homeland and preserve their millennia-old rituals and traditions. But individuals cannot stem the flood of believers migrating to majority-Christian Europe, Canada, and America where they can often expect preferential treatment in migration for their faith. This serves the dual purpose of depopulating the region of Christians as well as stoking resentment among their Muslim neighbours, intensifying the persecution. The Christians of the Middle East briefly had themselves an unlikely champion in former US vice-president Mike Pence. Pence correctly recognised that the lack of economic opportunities in the Middle East was causing many Christians to leave their homeland in search of a better life. Investment was poured into Christian areas of Iraq in particular where the US held the most sway. This had the catastrophic effect of stirring resentment of the relative prosperity of Christians which is nothing new in the Middle East, intensifying the persecution and thus the migration. Not to be unfair to Pence, he was a Republican administration too late to save the Christians of Iraq and Syria where Christians cling to dictators in a support-for-protection exchange. Today, Christians refrain from opposing Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s murderous Egyptian regime although di Giovanni shows that this affords them insignificant to no protection. George W. Bush’s removal of Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Barack Obama’s half-hearted attempt to topple Bashar al-Assad in Syria meant that Christian communities fell into the hands of vengeful extremist groups in the ensuing power vacuums. Some, particularly in Iraq, di Giovanni fears, will never recover.

Janine di Giovanni produces an immensely personal, thoughtful, and heart-wrenching firsthand account of the plight of Christianity in the Middle East. Who can’t feel sorrow for the young Christian girl having rocks thrown at her and being spat on while waking to church in Egypt? I felt that di Giovanni sometimes missed the opportunity to delve a little more into the immensely rich and vitally important history of the region, although the coverage of the history of Egyptian Christianity was excellent. She includes a timeline at the start of the book but does not always build on it. I was lucky to have a reasonable grounding in Middle Eastern history to begin with. I was also a little disappointed not to find a chapter on the region’s largest (proportionally speaking) Christian minority in Lebanon. Or (maybe I am asking a little too much here due to the risks involved) focus on the tiny but ancient Christian minorities in the Arabia peninsula, modern-day Iran, and even Afghanistan? Perhaps di Giovanni intends to write a two-part series. I would most certainly read part two and would encourage everyone, Christian and non-Christian, to do the same!

[Karen Clements · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely excellent examination of the history of Christianity in Iraq, Gaza, Syria, and Egypt, and how events have conspired to endanger once peaceful and essential groups in each country. Di Giovanni has worked as a journalist for three decades in these and other war-torn areas, and her expertise is evident. This is not an easy book to read, but so important.
Thanks to Booklist and NetGalley for the arc!
Highly recommended.

[Martin Poulsen · Rating 2 out of 5]

An ancient world is disappearing. The ancient world of Christians in the Middle East is destroyed by islamists, dictators, demographic shifts and several other factors. This calls for a thorough investigation of the root causes and consequences. Sadly The Vanishing never goes very deep in explaining how the Christians fare in the Middle East. A lot of the book is spend on the authors own personal religious background.

It's a superficial book with too much emphasis on the author herself.

[Jennifer Schultz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read if you: Want a riveting, painful, and powerful account of the ancient Christian communities that are rapidly dwindling in the Middle East.

Librarians/booksellers: Purchase for a unique look at the Middle East that is often overlooked in books about this region.

Many thanks to Perseus Books/PublicAffairs and NetGalley for a digital review copy in exchange for an honest review.

[Mark Mills · Rating 3 out of 5]

Written with great wisdom and warmth. Manages an elegiac tone rather than being angry or depressing. That said it is let down by being structured essentially as a piece of travel writing, which doesn't really facilitate any sort of thematic, narrative or analytical progression

[Peg - The History Shelf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read my review at Shelf Awareness here: https://www.shelf-awareness.com/reade...

[rtxlib · Rating 2 out of 5]

Disappointing look at a complex story. The author can't seem to provide a satisfying history or memoir of her time as an embedded journalist.

[Laurent Reinhardt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Heartbreaking narrative about the decline of Middle Eastern Christian communities, a trend accelerated this century in Iraq, Gaza, Syria and Egypt. After Christians lived in a certain state of accommodation under autocratic rulers, the US invasion of Iraq and the failed Arab Spring unleashed forces that further threaten their future. Nonetheless, their plight has tended to be underreported. In the words of 1960s French radical Regis Debray, “the victims are ‘too Christian’ to excite the Left, and ‘too foreign’ to excite the Right.”
Di Giovanni is the right person to call attention to this tragedy. A devout Catholic with decades of experience as a foreign correspondent in the world's trouble spots, she has witnessed firsthand the horrors faced by victims of these conflicts, especially Middle Eastern Christians. Though striking a somber tone, she also presents inspiring portraits of individuals persevering in the face of intense adversity.
"I began this book as a way of understanding how Christians in the Middle East, he birthplace of Christianity, have survived in the most turbulent of times. In a sense, it grew into a book about how people pray to survive their own most turbulent times. . . I traveled to these places to try to record for history people whose villages, cultures, and ethos would perhaps not be standing in one hundred years' time. But I also wanted write about the people I met along the way, whose faith and resilience allowed them to survive and to pay tribute to those who had vanished - some of who had great faith, others no faith at all." pp21-22

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author studies several Christian communities in danger of dying out in the region of their birth. She interviewed Christians in Iraq, Gaza, Syria, and Egypt to record their stories of survival and immigration.
These Christian communities have decreased for centuries, sometimes through conversion to Islam, but more from immigration in recent years. Sometimes the fortunes of Christian communities changed overnight, as happened when the radical Islamic group ISIS overran parts of Iraq and created a reign of terror. Even after ISIS was defeated, many Christians, whose lineage traced back to the early days of Christianity, decided to immigrate.
Christian communities in nearby countries share other difficulties just as massive. Gaza is a tiny country crowded with inhabitants. A tiny proportion of Palestinian Christians live there. A number given in 2015 estimated that less than one percent of the population of Gaza is Christian, and it is decreasing.
Syria and Egypt have their own stories to tell of decreasing opportunities for Christians. The stories yield their own sense of desperation for the future of their communities.
What hope does the author hold out in writing such a realistic portrayal, unrelieved by any real hope as far as the communities themselves are concerned?
She concludes with her reason for chronicling these stories.
“So in many ways, this a book about dying communities, but it is also about faith. I wrote it so that the people I documented would never disappear. They are here on these pages, and therefore they live forever. But I also wrote it as a way of acknowledging that their faith, in many ways, is more powerful than any of the armies I have seen trying to destroy them.”
As I read the book, I thought of the gifts these people bring as they immigrate into mostly western countries. The countries that accept them will be blessed by these gifts, earned in a harsh environment.

[Kathleen]

The bookstore, Hearts & Minds, recently highlighted this book in their newsletter. I had the ebook (published in 2021) (where did I read about this book that I decided to buy it? Maybe the NYTimes, a go-to resource for my book interests!), so I started to read it. (Another book by the author, Dispatches from Syria: The Morning They Came for Us, was available from our library district, so I also downloaded/borrowed this book too. Published in 2015.

This is one of those little known books that has gotten extraordinary acclaim. Aidan Hartley of the Daily Telegraph says she is “One of our generation’s finest foreign correspondents.” While a write for the Financial Times says, commenting on how crucial it is to real the human stories behind the news, that “Janine Di Giovanni does this with heartbreaking eloquence” Michiko Kakutani wrote in the New York Times that Ms di Giovanni “writes here with urgency and anguish — determined to testify to what she has witnessed because she wants “people to never forget.”

Even the for the first five hundred years of its existence, the Christian church hardly left the Middle East — it spread to Egypt, Iraq, Palestine, and Syria. The Vanishing is, in a way, a study of how the story since then “is of a slow-moving catastrophe, a gradual but seemingly inexorable erasing of the Christian faith from the land its origins.”

[Keith Currie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Endgame

The position of Christians in the Moslem world has been precarious for decades, even centuries. Yet it might have been possible to say some thirty years ago that an equilibrium had been achieved, that an element of stability had emerged. The greatest danger to middle eastern Christians then was emigration not persecution. Not so anymore; not since the Arab Spring, the rise of Islamic fundamentalism, the jihadi mentality, the fracture of long established state systems in Iraq, Syria and elsewhere.

The author juxtaposes the death throes of the Christian faith in Iraq, Gaza and Syria with the strictures of the Covid pandemic. Her account is all the more convincing given her solid credentials as a war correspondent from some of the most dangerous countries and conflicts on Earth. Her account is all the more poignant given her own religious faith and inside knowledge of the countries and the people. Her experience of the Assyrian Plain churches both before and after ISIS is a revelation of desolation, an exposition of evil. Only in Egypt does there remain hope, but even there the future of millions of Coptic Christians remains on a knife edge.

A powerful piece of writing; a countdown to extinction.

[Michael G · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not what I expected and not as good as I expected. Also shorter than expected. It is more a collection of articles and interviews about modern day Christians in the Middle East, detailing their struggles, than a more factual study of their pressures and subsequent emigration. Perhaps the kind of book I was looking for does not exist.

Still, some genuinely interesting characters and stories, and what is happening to ME Christians is genuinely sad. The interventions by the USA and other Western countries appear to have only served to hurt Christians. They seem to suffer significantly less under dictators. Perhaps the worst thing the ME and its Christians could get is democracy: unleashing popular but vile Islamic fanaticism, kept down by dictators, upon them.

The book details these opinions and they appear sound and well grounded. These are ordinary people who want to worship Jesus and just get on with their lives without fuss or bother.

Worth a read!

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

After a trip to the Holy Lands five years ago, this is my third read attempting to better understand the plight of the Christian Palestinians in Gaza. The author read this version with the detachment of a historian recording facts,yet the heart of someone who understands the persecution of Christians in places like Iraq, Syria, Egypt, and Gaza too. She emphasizes Christians are decreasing and suffering partly because of the popularity of violent extremist groups, the general lack of freedom for everyone, and dire economic conditions and prospects. Those who can move elsewhere, are are choosing to do so. The plight of those Christians who remain is dire. Helping more of us to understand this situation creates options for assistance, so I applaud Janine Di Giovanni for her persistence, her eloquence and her honesty in educating us.

[Diane · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book, written by a former war correspondent, looks at dwindling Christian communities in several Middle Eastern countries. The writer is herself a Catholic, and after growing up a somewhat rebellious Catholic in the US, is now living a more devout life in southern France. Overall, the book mostly covered material with which I was already familiar, although I thought the section on Gaza was interesting. I didn't realize that there was a significant Christian community there before Israel's War of Independence, nor what happened to it later. The book is well-written overall, but aside from the chapter on Gaza, probably won't provide much new information to those already knowledgeable about Middle Eastern Christianity.

[John Sagherian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read Janine Di Giovanni’s “The Vanishing: Faith, Loss, and the Twilight of Christianity in the Land of the Prophets.” Even though the author has done extensive research and includes many first-hand encounters, and even though she has not included Lebanon, which I would have thought would have been a prime example of what she’s saying, I recommend this book to anyone interested in what’s happening with the Christian presence in the Middle East. It’s depressing reading. However, the author does not take into account the spiritual power in the presence of God and His witnesses in the Middle East.