The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia—and How It Died

by Philip Jenkins

In the Christian-majority region of Lebanon, the Turkish military deliberately induced a famine that left a weakened population unable to withstand the ensuing epidemics: a hundred thousand Maronite Christians died. All told, including Armenians, Maronites, and Assyrians, perhaps 1.5 million Christians perished in the region.35