The Islamic State is “crucifying Christians and demolishing ancient churches” in a “war on Christianity” in the Middle East, according to an opinion piece on the US-based website, Foreign Policy.

Why, the title asks, is this being met with silence from the halls of Congress to Sunday sermons?

In-house writers Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian and Yochi Dreazen accuse the US government of “passivity in the face of an ongoing wave of atrocities against the Assyrian, Chaldean, and other Christian communities of Iraq and Syria”.

They also accuse the Church in the US of a conspicuous ‘silence’ in the face of a group “well on its way” to charges of genocide.