A U.S.-based humanitarian organization has issued a bone-chilling warning to the world: terrorists and bandits are actively planning a “Christmas Day massacre” in Nigeria’s central Plateau State, specifically targeting Christian communities on a day of sacred celebration.
The founder of “Equipping the Persecuted,” Judd Saul, delivered the dire alert during a high-level meeting in Washington, D.C., stating he has “very reliable information” that attackers are “weaponising” to hit the rural councils of Riyom, Bokkos, and Barkin Ladi. His plea was stark: “I am imploring the Nigerian government and President Donald Trump to do something so we don’t have a bunch of dead Christians in Nigeria.”
The warning carries the horrifying weight of recent history. Saul’s alert explicitly references the simultaneous attacks between December 23 and 25, 2023, when invaders stormed 17 villages in the same region, slaughtering over 400 people. The threat suggests a deliberate, cruel repetition—turning a holiday of peace into an annual ritual of bloodshed.
“They are gathering forces around the Plateau and Nasarawa border, along the Nasarawa-Benue border, and along the Nasarawa-Kaduna border,” Saul said, describing a multi-pronged mobilization designed to overwhelm local defenses. The goal, he warned, is to “kill as many people as possible on Christmas Day.”
Saul’s transatlantic alarm is not isolated. Barely a week earlier, Reverend Ezekiel Dachomo, a local church leader in Barkin Ladi, issued his own desperate plea. He reported that terrorists were pooling money to buy weapons for “imminent attacks” and called on the state’s youths to “rise up and defend their lands and people”—a sign that local authorities feel abandoned and are preparing for a grassroots, last-ditch defense.
The confluence of a U.S. NGO and a local pastor sounding identical alarms paints a picture of a catastrophe foretold, with communities trapped in a countdown to violence.
Appeals to Abuja and Washington: Will Anyone Act?
Saul stated he has officially notified the U.S. government through Congressman Riley Moore, who led a fact-finding delegation to Nigeria investigating allegations of Christian genocide in the Middle Belt. Moore is expected to file a direct report to President Donald Trump.
The question now hangs over both capitals: Will the Nigerian military, often stretched thin across multiple insurgencies, proactively deploy to protect these vulnerable villages? And will the Trump administration, which has prioritized religious freedom as a foreign policy issue, apply decisive pressure or offer material support to avert the slaughter?
For the communities of Plateau State, Christmas is no longer a date on the calendar; it is a deadline. They have been warned by voices from their own pulpits and from an office in Washington, D.C. The world now knows the attack is coming. The only thing left unknown is whether anyone with the power to stop it will choose to act.
