A pastor and dozens of Christians were killed in an overnight attack on a Nigerian village, the latest massacre in a region where targeted violence, land conflict, and terrorism have increasingly converged around Christian communities.
The assault began around 2 a.m. on June 22 in Kawel village in Bokkos County, Plateau State, where Fulani herdsmen killed 28 Christians, including Rev. Markus Nyam, pastor of the Church of Christ in Nations, according to Christian Daily International.
Resident Jesse Peter Dukut said villagers were trapped inside their homes as gunmen moved through the community.
“We were inside our houses when the Fulani herdsmen invaded our village,” Dukut said. “If anyone came out of their houses, they were shot at sight. And a sound from any of the houses in the village attracts shooting from the terrorists.”
Dukut said phone and telecom services had been cut, preventing residents from calling security agencies for help. He also said the attackers spoke in Fulani and Hausa and called out the names of Christian leaders, leading him to believe they were being guided during the attack.
“They killed my uncle and brothers,” he said. “I narrowly escaped being shot.”
Nyam was killed alongside members of his congregation. Church leaders in Bokkos later confirmed his death, saying they received the news “with deep sadness” and offering prayers for his family, friends, and community.
Premier Christian News reported that the attack was part of a documented pattern of escalating anti-Christian violence across Nigeria’s Middle Belt. According to Open Doors’ 2026 World Watch List, 3,490 of the 4,849 Christians killed globally for their faith between October 2024 and September 2025 were Nigerian, representing 72% of the worldwide total.
Christian leaders in the region say Fulani herdsmen attacks are driven by efforts to seize fertile farmland as desertification pushes herders south, while also being shaped by radical Islamist ideology.
The distinction matters. Most Fulani people do not hold extremist views, but a radical faction has adopted tactics comparable to Boko Haram and Islamic State West Africa Province, according to a 2020 report from the United Kingdom’s All-Party Parliamentary Group for International Freedom or Belief.
“They adopt a comparable strategy to Boko Haram and ISWAP and demonstrate a clear intent to target Christians and potent symbols of Christian identity,” the report states.
Open Doors U.K. reported that at least 20 people were killed in the Kawel attack, including a church leader and a pregnant woman, and said police arrived only after daylight despite the attack beginning around 2 am. Bishop Ayuba Matawal, a church leader in Bokkos, said the late arrival of police “left the defenseless community entirely at the mercy of their assailants for the duration of the raid,” according to Open Doors U.K.
The attack also comes as violence has spread beyond Nigeria’s north. Christian Daily reported that a new jihadist terror group, Lakurawa, has emerged in the northwest with advanced weaponry and a radical Islamist agenda. The group is affiliated with Jama’a Nusrat ul-Islam wa al-Muslimin, or JNIM, an Al-Qaeda-linked insurgency originating in Mali.
The massacre shows the brutality of Nigeria’s Middle Belt crisis, where religiously targeted violence and terrorism are no longer separate stories, and where Christian communities continue to bear a devastating share of the bloodshed.
