A CHURCH LEADER known as the ‘Mother Teresa of Israel’ has been beaten up and the disabled children and orphans under her care poisoned with gas by extremists linked to radical Islam.
Karen Dunham, the founder of Living Bread International Church, was attacked by a stranger in East Jerusalem on September 21. She said: “The man ran up from behind me and hit me with both fists as hard as he could in the back.”
She suffered a fractured arm, smashed teeth, a damaged knee and countless bruises.
Children living under her care at the ministry headquarters house were poisoned two months ago when a man using a substance in a black plastic bag pumped toxic gas into the home.
“I can’t breathe,” Karen recalled the children screaming as they ran outside. “We ran inside the church next door and they had filled it with gas through a couple of open windows.”
One of the orphans recognised the man, who motioned with his hand as though he intended to slit her throat.
The persecution against the ministry got worse when Karen returned from a trip home to the USA this summer. Islamic radicals had taken her parking lot and said they wanted the property. The front gate and door were later ripped off along with the metal security fence surrounding the offices. A repairman called out to fix the fencing was also attacked when he arrived and fled for his life.
Radical Islamists threaten to bomb the property unless Karen and her colleagues leave. Police in East Jerusalem have not offered the missionary any help and it is outside the army’s jurisdiction. She has been offered office space in a safer quarter of West Jerusalem if she can get funding.
Karen has built churches among the Palestinians and ministered the Gospel at refugee camps in Gaza and Jericho.
She said: “This is a war with Islamic extremists. But we keep praying for our enemies, worshipping, blowing the shofar, and declaring Jesus Christ as Lord.”