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It all began with an innocuous video shared by Seattle resident Kiana Hall on Instagram.

Historic Buffalo Church Torches Twice In Four Days Following Sale To Islamic Group

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity News,

A 140-year-old Catholic church in Buffalo has been deliberately set on fire for the second time in four days, the third blaze to hit the site this year. Investigators confirmed arson.

The property was sold years earlier by the Diocese of Buffalo to a company affiliated with the Downtown Islamic Center, which planned to turn the historic complex into a mosque.

Christian heritage keeps vanishing while officials scramble over "securing" the site they already allowed to fall into the wrong hands.

The former St. Ann's Church and Shrine at 651 Broadway, built in 1886, suffered a fire around 5:45pm on Tuesday, July 21. Buffalo Fire Department crews contained it. Officials ruled the cause arson. It came just four days after a three-alarm blaze on Friday, July 17, that began in the rear of the structure.

In January, a four-alarm fire had already gutted the adjacent former school building, causing an estimated $600,000 in damage.

Here we go again...a 140-year-old church in Buffalo, New York has been torched twice in 4 days by arson. It's almost like they're erasing Christian culture, one historic flame at a time... pic.twitter.com/Y1QIadijvZ

— Liz Churchill (@liz_churchill10) July 23, 2026

The central fact is straightforward. In November 2022 the Diocese of Buffalo sold the entire complex - church, school, and convent - for $250,000 to Buffalo Crescent Holdings, Inc. The buyer is affiliated with the Downtown Islamic Center.

The stated plan was to convert the property into a downtown Islamic center. The building had stood vacant and deteriorating for years after parish activities ended in 2013. Investigations continue. At this time, no public link to the owners has been reported.

The former St. Ann's Church complex (651 Broadway, Buffalo) was sold in Nov 2022 by the Diocese of Buffalo to Buffalo Crescent Holdings, Inc. for $250,000. The buyer, affiliated with the Downtown Islamic Center, planned to convert it into an Islamic center.

The 1886 building has...

— Grok (@grok) July 22, 2026

Local officials are now expressing frustration at the predictable result. Buffalo Common Council Member and Majority Leader Leah Halton-Pope said she had spoken with the administration that same afternoon about securing the site.

"I literally just had a conversation this afternoon with a member of the administration asking what are we going to do about it and stressing that something has to be done over there to secure it, and then said it's probably going to be set on fire again, but I just didn't think it would happen today," she stated.

She called the repeated fires "disheartening" for nearby homeowners already dealing with smoke and instability. "I know it's been said that it was arson, which is to be expected."

Bernice Radle, executive director at Preservation Buffalo Niagara, was blunt: "The St. Ann's property owners are unresponsive and refuse to secure the building. Preservation Buffalo Niagara calls on the City of Buffalo to pull out all the stops to wrestle this landmark church from its negligent absentee owner. Enough is enough!"

Mayor Sean Ryan's office said the administration is "actively exploring legal options to compel the owner to fulfill the responsibility to properly maintain and secure the building."

The Department of Permits and Inspections will continue visits. Earlier this year, after the school fire, the mayor had already stated that taxpayers would not cover demolition costs estimated at $2 million. The owners have indicated they lack funds for upkeep while still aiming to develop the property as a community center for Buffalo's Bengali community.

This fits a sustained pattern of historic Christian churches burning across the West, often with causes left vague, suspects uncaught, and preservation efforts blocked.

In New York City itself, the 1863 South Bushwick Reformed Church in Brooklyn was gutted by confirmed arson in June. The FDNY ruled it intentional, and a person of interest was seen fleeing.

Pastor James E. Steward II said the loss struck generations: "It was more than just a building. It's lives and generations of lives that have been touched."

The congregation put forward a restoration plan based on an independent engineer's assessment. The New York City Department of Buildings rejected it. Demolition was ordered.

Just months earlier, a 138-year-old church in Astoria, Queens, suffered a five-alarm blaze whose cause was listed as "unknown." Rebuild proposals were rejected. The structure was demolished within weeks.

The same template appears across the border and overseas. In Canada, arsons against churches more than doubled after 2021. A Macdonald-Laurier Institute report found fewer than 4 percent of cases resulted in charges. Over 100 churches have been burned or vandalized since then, including the 1893 church in Saint-Romain, Quebec, confirmed as arson in April. Officials treat most as isolated or unresolved.

In France, nearly 50 fires or arson attempts struck churches and Christian sites in a single recent year - a sharp rise. A Christian religious building disappears every two weeks through fire, collapse, or deliberate damage.

In June a 17th-century chapel in Brittany lost most of its roof. The same day a historic cloister attached to a cathedral in Condom suffered heavy damage to its roofing and archives.

Earlier the Église Saint-Cyriaque in Montenach was gutted. Authorities routinely cite vegetation, wind, or accident. The cumulative effect is the steady erasure of Christian landmarks.

In the United Kingdom the contrast is sharper. A historic London church, the Kings Hall Methodist Church in Southall, burned to the ground in February amid near-total government silence.

Churches face more than ten crimes every day. Figures show hundreds of attacks, including arson, over recent years.

Yet when a security incident occurred at a Manchester mosque during Ramadan, Prime Minister Keir Starmer expressed outrage, thanked emergency services, and announced tens of millions in taxpayer funding for mosque and Muslim community security. No equivalent urgency followed the church fires.

The pattern is consistent from Brooklyn to Buffalo to Quebec to Brittany to London. Historic churches burn. Causes are ruled arson or left "under investigation." Suspects are rarely identified. Preservation plans are rejected. Demolition follows.

Selective official outrage appears only when other sites are involved. Christian heritage is treated as expendable while demographic and cultural shifts accelerate under open-border policies that prioritize new arrivals over the continuity of the civilization that built these landmarks.

The 1886 structure in Buffalo still stands, damaged but not yet leveled. Investigations continue. The owners remain unresponsive on security. Local residents live with the repeated smoke and uncertainty. Across the West the same quiet attrition continues - one historic flame at a time.

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Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 10:20

US New Home Sales Rise For First Time In 3 Months As Prices Near 5-Year Lows

With Case-Shiller reporting existing home price declines in half of America's largest cities, and despite a weaker homebuilder confidence print, New Home Sales were expected to rebound from April and May's ugly declines... and they did, but only very modestly.

New home sales rose 1.6% MoM (+4.8% MoM exp) marking the first rise in three months, but May's 7.3% MoM decline was revised up to a mere 4.3% MoM decline.

However, this bounce was not enough to get annual sales positive (still down 5.6% YoY)...

Overall, new home sales have really gone nowhere for four years (but on the bright side, they are not as bad as existing- and pending-home-sales)...

It seems lower mortgage rates (admittedly having risen for the last month) did nothing to help move new home sales, and now they are on the rise again...

Median new home prices dropped for the second month in a row, back near their lowest levels since 2021...

The decline in homebuilder confidence still has a long way to go to catch down to homebuyer confidence...

Unfortunately, the decline in price is more than offset by the recent reacceleration in mortgage rates, leaving Trump's affordability push dead in the water.

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 10:13

Move over Knicks, there is a new "Wemby Stopper."

Vega said that she was “scared to be talking” about her experience but felt compelled to speak publicly.

US PMIs Mixed But Still Signal Accelerating Economic Growth In Q3

With 'hard data' trending weaker, today's preliminary July PMIs offer the first glimpse at whether the reignition of the Iran War is weighing on 'soft' survey sentiment in the US economy.

The data was mixed (as always) with Manufacturing disappointing while Services accelerated more than expected:

• Flash US Manufacturing PMI: 53.8 (June: 53.9). 4-month low.

• Flash US Services PMI Business Activity Index: 53.6 (June: 51.2). 8-month high.

“US businesses reported a good start to the third quarter," said Chris Williamson, Chief Business Economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence, adding that "the ‘flash’ PMI survey data broadly consistent with GDP growing at an annualized 2.0% against a 1.2% pace signalled for the second quarter."

The month saw an encouraging return to hiring by companies, with employment rising for the first time in three months.

“However, some of this improvement may prove shortlived as July saw hospitality spend boosted by the FIFA World Cup and USA 250 anniversary activities," warned Williamson.

It was also worrying – though not unexpected – to see manufacturing growth weaken as some of the stock building seen in prior months showed signs of fading.

Instead, July saw a concerning intensification of supply chain delays and accompanying renewed upturn in price pressures, constraining growth and subduing demand.

But Williamson concludes on a more worrisome note, saying that “events over recent days in the Middle East will have only further exacerbated these supply chain and price worries" raising downside risks to the near-term outlook for the economy, "hinting that July’s upturn may not be the start of an improving trend.”

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 09:53

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Yet Another Wildberries Facility - Russia's Amazon - Goes Up In Flames After Ukraine Drone Strike

Another large warehouse and logistics hub for major online Russian retailer Wildberries has been targeted and struck by Ukrainian drones.

This is the third time in a week the company widely considered to be the 'Russian Amazon' has seen its warehouses go up in flames. At least eight of its shipping facilities have been attacked overall this month. Wildberries co-founder Tatyana Kim confirmed the fresh attack on company facilities Friday morning:

Kim, Russia's wealthiest woman, said Wildberries facilities in St. Petersburg and the surrounding Leningrad region, as well as in annexed Crimea, were hit overnight. Fires broke out at several locations, though Kim said "parts" of the warehouses were saved.

While Kim said none of the company's employees were injured, Leningrad region Governor Alexander Drozdenko wrote in a post on Telegram earlier in the morning that three people were hurt during the attack in his region.

Moscow Times via Telegram

Operations at these facilities have been halted, while all personnel a the impacted warehouse in Crimea have been evacuated.

The St. Petersburg attack resulted in especially dramatic scenes of a huge smoke plume stretching high into the atmosphere, and even visible from space, NASA satellite imagery showed.

It was just last week that the company's warehouses in central Russia were struck, which killed eight people. In the face of the Kremlin calling the attacks acts of terrorism and war crimes, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has claimed that the hubs were "involved in providing the Russian army with drone components, navigation equipment and other gear."

The Wildberries facilities have been increasingly targeted amid broader nightly drone waves out of Ukraine, with a separate Friday attack in the Kirov region killing at least six people.

Anadolu/Getty Images

NBC News has noted, "Wildberries, whose banking arm had sanctions imposed on it by the European Union this week over its financial contribution to the Russian budget, plays a central role in Russia’s consumer economy."

"Its targeting by Ukraine appears to be part of Kyiv’s attempts to ensure ordinary Russians feel the impact of the war which has raged on Ukrainian territory for more than four years," the report adds.

The company says it is working around the clock to restore service to areas impacted by the warehouse attacks. 

Stunning footage of Wildberries hub fully on fire from earlier this week in Krasnodar:

Clear view of the entire Wildberries hub in Krasnodar fully engulfed in fire. https://t.co/PcQN5uFauU pic.twitter.com/I8jn0BAtAM

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) July 22, 2026

Reuters has reviewed that "Together with smaller rivals, Wildberries and Ozon sell goods and services worth the equivalent of 8.5% of Russia's gross domestic product. They provide jobs for 4 million people, or more than 5% of the country's workforce."

Tyler Durden Fri, 07/24/2026 - 09:40

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