by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent
(Worthy News) - Seven evangelical Christians were murdered by heavily armed gang members in Caradeux, Haiti on Saturday after their pastor told them to pray for the “anointing of David” to confront the “Goliath” bandits with only sticks and machetes, the Christian Post reports. The murders took place as Haiti continues its descent into lawlessness and gang rule since the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse two years ago.
The seven members of the Evangelical Church of the Pool of Bethesda were executed while several congregants were injured or kidnapped as they acted on church leader Marcorel Zidor’s instructions to march in protest against the powerful gang in a squatter community outside Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, known as Canaan, CP said.
A translated video clip from one of the church’s services shows Zidor leading the congregation in praying for the anointing of the biblical King David to go up against the gang, CP reports. One church member told a local reporter she was not scared to go up against the bandits: “What’s on us won’t get hit by bullets! What’s on us won’t get hit by the clip!” she said. “We've suffered too much and we’re saying we can’t take it anymore!” she added.
However, the protest became a massacre as the gang members opened machine gun fire on the Christians, CP reports. A video posted on X/Twitter shows the dead bodies of a man and woman lying in the street as the gang members continue to fire relentlessly on protestors at the end of the street.
In a statement to the Miami Herald, Marie Yolène Gilles of the human rights group Eyes Wide Open Foundation said Zidor, who escaped the scene on a motorbike, should be prosecuted for encouraging violence. “Bringing citizens to arm themselves against each other, provoking violence in pastoral speeches, are criminal acts provided for and punished by the Haitian penal code,” Gilles said.