They are tired of being pushed around and are taking their security in their own hands:

In the five years since the Anglo-American invasion of 2003, murders and abductions have driven about half of the 800,000 Christians who once lived in Iraq to flee the country.
Checkpoints manned by civilians armed with heavy machine guns and assault rifles have received official backing in Christian villages on the Ninevah plain in northern Iraq, where their presence dates back to the missions of St Thomas the apostle.
Father Yusuf Yohannes combines the duties of parish priest with overseeing security from a converted post office in the village of Karamlis, 10 miles east of the local capital, Mosul. Informal patrols by his parishioners started last year but the effort is now a fully-fledged operation, with 250 employees and official approval from the US army base in Mosul.
“We are facing the threat of wipe-out,” he said. “I have not left this town in three years because of the danger. The situation here was like a bowl without a base for Christians, we were just tossed around. By establishing our own security we have the chance to stand steady again.”

Now, my question to those of you who don’t think American Christians should keep a handgun for protection, should Iraqi Christians be forming militias or should they have this attitude:

“What do the supreme court ruling on guns and the martyrdom of missionaries have to do with each other?
Noël and I watched Beyond Gates of Splendor, the documentary version of End of the Spear, the story of the martyrdom of Jim Elliot, Peter Fleming, Ed McCully, Roger Youderian, and Nate Saint in Ecuador in 1956. That same day we heard that the Supreme Court decided in favor of the right of Americans to keep firearms at home for self-defense.
Here’s the connection. The missionaries had guns when they were speared to death. One of them shot the gun into the air, it appears, as he was killed, rather than shooting the natives. They had agreed to do this. The reason was simple and staggeringly Christlike:
The natives are not ready for heaven. We are.
I suspect the same could be said for almost anyone who breaks into my house. There are other reasons why I have never owned a firearm and do not have one in my house. But that reason moves me deeply. I hope you don’t use your economic stimulus check to buy a gun. Better to find some missionaries like this and support them.”

That’s a quote from John Piper left by a commenter on my post on Christianity and Guns. So, I guess the question is: should Christians be able to protect themselves?