US Federal investigators are looking into arson fires at six churches with predominantly African-American congregations in the past week.  Each occurred since state governments and local agencies in America’s south started moves to remove the confederate flag from government buildings.

The circumstances around six fires in five states differ in each case.  But they occur after a racist with a gun murdered nine people at the historic black church Emanuel AME in Charleston South Carolina.  The shock that generated prompted officials to begin removing confederate flags, long seen as a symbol of racism and oppression. 

“It’s entirely possible, perhaps even likely, that some of these churches were attacked because of all that's happened in the past three weeks,” said Mark Potok, a senior fellow at the South Poverty Law Center which tracks racists and racist violence in the United States.

Attacks on black churches are nothing new in America’s south.  From the end of the Civil War, through the days of Jim Crow, to the Civil Rights movement and beyond, white supremacists have targeted black churches because of their status in the community.  They’ve functioned for decades as the heart of African-American life; as the center for leadership and institution building, education, social and political development, and organizing to fight oppression.

A rise in arson at black churches in the 1990s prompted then-President Bill Clinton to push congress to pass the Church Arson Prevention Act in 1996.  He also ordered the Justice Department to create a special task force – but that was suspended when conservative republican George W. Bush became president.