Strategic Threat Assessment

The Strategic Threat Assessment is designed to help the ROAM community identify and understand emerging or long-term risks to Christians, churches, missionaries, or faith-based operations. Unlike time-sensitive alerts, this report provides a broader analysis of trends, actors, and warning signs that may lead to persecution, displacement, or operational disruption. It enables members to anticipate threats, prepare responses, and protect those carrying out the Great Commission in high-risk areas.

Russian Occupation Authorities Escalate Enforcement Against Unregistered Christian Worship in Eastern Ukraine

Since mid-2025, reporting indicates a sustained campaign using police/military presence, “anti-extremism” units, and Russia’s “anti-missionary” provisions to reclassify routine worship as an actionable offense when conducted outside state authorization.

Strategic Threat Assessment

West Bank Settler Violence and Risk to Palestinian Christian Communities

A Palestinian governmental church-affairs body issued a global appeal urging churches to take “immediate and visible” steps to protect Palestinian civilians—explicitly including Christians and church sites—amid a reported surge in settler attacks across multiple West Bank localities.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Grand Blanc Township Church Attack Diversion Tactics

Newly released incident reporting and 911 audio indicate Thomas Jacob Sanford used a deliberate pre-attack “shaping” tactic ahead of the Sept. 28 mass-casualty assault at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Grand Blanc Township.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Staten Island Catholic Church Disruptions & NYPD Security Posture Shift

Staten Island Catholic churches experienced a short cluster of incidents spanning burglary/theft, an apparent desecration, and an in-service altar disruption that escalated into an assault on responding officers.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Pastor Texting Scam Targeting Churchgoers

A pastor-impersonation “texting scam” is actively targeting church attendees in Eugene, Oregon, with reporting that Eugene Police assess “several churches” are being targeted.

Strategic Threat Assessment

New Years ISIS-Linked Plot Disruptions in Syria, Turkey, and the United States

The Syrian interior ministry said it had information that the Jihadist group planned "suicide operations and attacks ... by targeting churches and civilian gathering spots," prompting security to be tightened.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Rwanda’s Mass Closure of Evangelical Churches

Rwanda has executed a large-scale enforcement wave under its 2018 regulatory regime, closing roughly 10,000 evangelical churches for noncompliance with requirements spanning health/fire safety, financial disclosure and controlled donation channels, and mandatory theological training for preachers.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Christmas-Period Threats to Catholic Institutions in Dhaka, Bangladesh

Bangladesh’s Catholic community faces an elevated, time-bound threat environment ahead of Christmas following multiple crude explosive incidents at prominent Dhaka-area Catholic sites.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Sudan Nuba Mountains Drone Strike on School/Clinic

Christian communities in the Nuba Mountains face elevated mass-casualty risk as aerial/drone violence expands into a region identified as Sudan’s largest Christian population center.

Strategic Threat Assessment

UN Human Rights Friction over Legislative and Administrative Measures Targeting the Estonian Orthodox Christian Church

UN Special Rapporteurs issued a non-binding warning regarding Estonia’s legislative amendments and administrative actions affecting the EOCC, including changes to the Churches and Congregations Act, withdrawal of public funding, and property-lease terminations.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Religion Field on Egyptian National ID Cards Enabling Targeting of Christians

Egypt’s continued inclusion of religion on national ID cards acts as a structural “targeting enabler” that lowers the effort required to identify Christians at routine administrative touch-points and increases the probability of discriminatory outcomes.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Potential Christmas-Period Mass Attacks in Nigeria’s Middle Belt

Reporting indicates heightened concern about imminent, coordinated violence targeting Christian communities in Nigeria’s Middle Belt during the Christmas period, with named at-risk localities in Plateau, Benue, and Kaduna states highlighted as potential objectives.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Owo Church Bombing Testimony and Al-Shabaab TTPs

A protected DSS witness testified in Abuja that the 5 June 2022 attack on St. Francis Catholic Church in Owo involved initial small‐arms fire followed by three explosive devices, with the third blast causing major structural damage and contributing to the killing of more than 40 worshippers during Mass.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Escalating Vandalism and Theft Targeting Churches in Baden‐Württemberg

Theft and vandalism against churches and chapels in Baden‐Württemberg over the past year indicate a sustained and increasingly permissive operating environment for offenders.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Sentencing of 400 Mawozo Leader Joly Germine

The U.S. federal life sentence for alleged 400 Mawozo founder Joly Germine, convicted for orchestrating the 2021 kidnapping of 17 missionaries, is a significant legal victory but only marginally affects Haiti’s gang‐driven security crisis.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Targeting of Orthodox Religious Sites in Greece

Orthodox Christian sites in Greece remained the overwhelmingly dominant targets of attacks on religious property in 2024, accounting for 399 of 412 recorded incidents (96.84%) despite an overall decline from 608 incidents in 2023, according to official data summarized by the General Secretariat for Religions.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Renewed Armed Herdsmen Attacks in Southern Taraba

Renewed armed herdsmen attacks across Southern Taraba have escalated into a sustained campaign of village destruction, mass displacement, and targeted killings in Wukari, Takum, and surrounding areas, with church leaders reporting abandoned parishes, occupied Christian settlements, and systematic assaults.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Recapture and Confessions of Ansaru/IS‐Linked Commander Abdulazeez “Bomboy” Obadaki

The recapture of Ansaru/ISWAP‐linked commander Abdulazeez Obadaki validates long‐standing assessments that Ansaru retained covert capability and cross‐regional networks despite years of perceived degradation.

Strategic Threat Assessment

Strategic Threat Assessment

Russian Occupation Authorities Escalate Enforcement Against Unregistered Christian Worship in Eastern Ukraine

West Bank Settler Violence and Risk to Palestinian Christian Communities

Grand Blanc Township Church Attack Diversion Tactics

Staten Island Catholic Church Disruptions & NYPD Security Posture Shift

Pastor Texting Scam Targeting Churchgoers

New Years ISIS-Linked Plot Disruptions in Syria, Turkey, and the United States

Rwanda’s Mass Closure of Evangelical Churches

Christmas-Period Threats to Catholic Institutions in Dhaka, Bangladesh

Sudan Nuba Mountains Drone Strike on School/Clinic

UN Human Rights Friction over Legislative and Administrative Measures Targeting the Estonian Orthodox Christian Church

Religion Field on Egyptian National ID Cards Enabling Targeting of Christians

Potential Christmas-Period Mass Attacks in Nigeria’s Middle Belt

Owo Church Bombing Testimony and Al-Shabaab TTPs

Escalating Vandalism and Theft Targeting Churches in Baden‐Württemberg

Sentencing of 400 Mawozo Leader Joly Germine

Targeting of Orthodox Religious Sites in Greece

Renewed Armed Herdsmen Attacks in Southern Taraba

Recapture and Confessions of Ansaru/IS‐Linked Commander Abdulazeez “Bomboy” Obadaki

FIELD OPS FOR THE FAITHFUL