Instances of intolerance and jihadi-fuelled religious fanaticism continued to be reported around Europe this year.
In April, caretakers at a local cemetery and Catholic chapel in a small Italian small city covered crucifixes, ostensibly in an attempt to “…not offend” people of other faiths, the newspaper Il Giornale reported.
The result was political outrage in a southern European country increasingly swamped by third country nationals trying to illegally reach its shores.
Residents in the town of Pieve di Cento, located just north of Bologna, were surprised when someone at the local cemetery erected black sheets to hide crucifixes on the graves.
The sheets went up as part of renovations at the Chapel, in case any workers of different faiths were possibly offended. Inside the chapel itself, blackout curtains on motorized rails obscured the Crosses when work was being carried out.
Moreover, numerous videos have surfaced over the past few years showing jihadists and Muslim extremists, including ISIS terrorists, desecrating and destroying Christian cemeteries, including military grave sites – in Libya, to Gaza, elsewhere around the Middle East and even as far as Senegal, Malaysia and Indonesia.
