State Department lawyers remove references to ISIS 'genocide' of Christians from official documents

A cross is seen on the damaged altar of the Grand Immaculate Church after it was recaptured from Islamic State in Qaraqosh, near Mosul. | Reuters/Ahmed Jadallah

Top lawyers at the U.S. State Department are reportedly removing the word "genocide" from official documents and speeches to describe the Islamic State's persecution of Christians, Yazidis and other ethnic minorities in Iraq and Syria.

According to international human rights lawyer Nina Shea, the decision to remove the word "genocide" from official documents was made by Richard Visek, who was appointed by President Barack Obama as head the State Department's Office of Legal Adviser in October 2016.

"I don't think for a minute it's a bureaucratic decision — it's ideological," said Shea, who previously served as a commissioner on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) from 1999 to 2012.

Additionally, the confirmation of Mark Green, who was picked by President Donald Trump to head the U.S. Agency for International Development, is reportedly being delayed by Democratic senators.

Activists contended that these efforts guarantee that Obama-era policies that worked to exclude Iraq's Christian and other religious minorities from key U.S. aid programs are kept in place.

In March 2016, then-Secretary of State John Kerry declared publicly that ISIS was carrying out a "genocide" against Yazidis, Christians and Shia Muslims. The declaration, which was reportedly at odds with others in the Obama administration, came after human rights advocacy groups released detailed documentation highlighting the persecution faced by religious minorities at the hands of the terror group.

Activists and a bipartisan group of Capitol Hill lawmakers are hoping that the designation would help direct U.S. relief funds to Christian, Yazidi and other persecuted religious minority communities.

In early May, Congress allocated more than $1.3 billion in funds for refugee assistance and added a specific language in a legislation in an attempt to ensure that some of the money will go to persecuted minorities, including Christians, Yazidis and Shia Muslims. However, only $10 million was specifically earmarked for the religious minorities that are deemed victims of genocide by the U.S. State Department in 2016.

"There is congressional legislation ... that calls for the U.S. government to stop excluding the genocide-targeted minorities in Iraq. This has been a pervasive problem that this aid has not been getting to them," said Shea, according to The Washington Free Beacon.

The Trump administration has until the end of September this year, when the stopgap funding bill runs out, to ensure that the funds are distributed in the most effective way.

"Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama made catastrophic mistakes that left these communities on the brink of extinction, but it's going to be on President Trump's watch as to whether they survive or become extinct—it's going to be his policies that make or break the situation," Shea added.