Ongoing Persecution of Coptic Christians

Over a time period of two weeks, a string of fires struck 11 churches across Egypt and claimed the lives of dozens of Coptic Christians.  A fire at the Abu Sefein Church in Cairo claimed the lives of 41 worshippers, including 18 children.  Most of the victims died of asphyxiation when 5,000 worshippers tried to escape the blaze in a church that lacked adequate emergency exits.  Amir Magdi, a senior researcher with the Human Rights Watch Middle East & North African Division, lay the blame for the church fires on the ongoing systematic persecution that the Coptic Christians are continually enduring in Europe.  

Until the year 2016, Coptic Christians required direct Presidential approval to build new churches or renovate existing ones, a permit that was next to impossible to obtain.  This forced many Christians to hold covert services in commercial or industrial buildings.  After 2016, the Egyptian government permitted local governors to make the decision to issue a permit instead of the President, but the law only applies to Christian houses of worship, not Islamic ones.  In addition, of the governor refuses to grant the permit, there is no appeal.  Amir Magdi believes that the only way to mitigate this ongoing trend is for "Egyptian authorities to amend the church building law of 2016 to remove all discriminatory restrictions and raft a common law for all houses of worship."  This appeal is not unreasonable considering that Egypt has over 500,000 registered mosques, but only 3,000 registered churches.  


However, while the Egyptian authorities are blaming the church fires on "natural" or "accidental" causes, others are not so sure about this.  Some Christians suspect that some of the fires are being caused by arsonists.  This is not an illogical conclusion.  In 2013, Muslim Brotherhood sympathizers burned down 62 Coptic churches.  One also must consider the fact that Christians are reluctant to report arson attacks to Egyptian authorities out of fear of inviting more reprisals from Muslim Brotherhood supporters.  



As churches are continually burning across Egypt, Coptic Christians are also enduring vicious physical attacks across the country.  In the Sinai, two Coptic Christian men, Salama Waheeb and his son, Hany, were murdered by ISIS militants.  These two men are the latest victims of a vicious ethnic cleansing campaign that ISIS militants have been waging in to clear the region of Coptic Christians ever since the Egyptian military drove them into the Sinai mountains in 2013.  Though some activists are now saying that things aren't as bad as they were prior to 2016, persecution is still a way of life for the Coptic Christians of Egypt, and there is no signs of it ending anytime soon.  


Sources:

Habib, Jacky.  "Egypt's Copts Want Changes to Law After Deadly Church Fire."  AlJazeera.  Aug. 20, 2022.  Accessed from https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/20/egypts-copts-want-changes-to-law-after-deadly-church-fire.

Ibrahim, Raymond.  "Eleven Coptic Churches 'Catch Fire' Over Two Weeks."  Coptic Solidarity.  Aug. 31, 2022.  Accessed from https://www.copticsolidarity.org/2022/08/31/eleven-coptic-churches-catch-fire-over-two-weeks/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=faab2203-b61e-41a0-944c-389ebe31f1eb.

Watani.  "Two Copts Shot Dead by Islamic Jihadists."  Coptic Solidarity.  Aug. 30, 2022.  Accessed from https://www.copticsolidarity.org/2022/08/30/two-copts-shot-dead-in-sinai-by-islamist-jihadis/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=faab2203-b61e-41a0-944c-389ebe31f1eb.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Hamas Invasion of Israel

Image
The brutal invasion of Israel by Hamas caught the entire world by surprise.  Over the last few years Israel has become accustomed to turning back rocket attacks and occasional cross-border raids by Hamas terrorists, but nobody anticipated this brutal full-out invasion.  Already being dubbed as "Israel's 9/11," militants stormed across the Gaza border and attacked towns across southern Israel.  Already over 900 Israelis are confirmed dead, thousands more wounded, and over 100 hostages, including women & children, have been taken back to Gaza ( Video Footage of Massacres ).   Israeli Woman Taken Hostage by Hamas The deadliest massacre so far took place at the Nova Music Festival in the Negev Desert close to Urim, a Jewish community that lives close to the Gaza Strip.  At 6am on Oct. 7th, the attack on the festival began as rockets rained down and Hamas gunmen appeared and opened fire.  As of now over 260 Israelis are confirmed dead from this attack alone with a number o
Read more

Jihadists World-Wide Celebrate Massacres in Israel

Image
The Plague of Jihad is all over the world.  The past few days has witnessed Israel suffer the most horrific attack that it has endured since the October War of 1973, yet for all of the senseless death, for all of the footage that we see of Hamas militants murdering Israelis in cold blood, many in the world are in fact celebrating this atrocity.   Hamas Supporters in Canada In Iran, crowds of Hamas supporters took to the streets to celebrate the slaughter of Israelis by Hamas while their government leaders lavished praise on the terrorists ( Link to Article ).  In the nation of Turkey, Hamas supporters crowded the streets of Istanbul chanting "Allahu Akbar" & "Khaybar Khaybar Ya Yahud" ( Link to Video ).  "Khaybar Khaybar ya yahud, jaish Muhammad soufa ya'oud" is the full version of the chant.  It translates to "Khaybar Khaybar or Jews, the Army of Muhammad will return."  For those unfamiliar with the context of this chant, Khaybar was the
Read more

Hamas and Their Child Soldier Training Camps

Image
For years the world has known that Hamas deliberately targets children for indoctrination and training to carry out terrorist missions.  They have camps throughout Gaza and other areas of the Middle East where children are taught to hate, & trained to kill.  These camps are often referred to as "Summer Youth Camps."  The titles sound harmless enough, but unlike the summer youth camps in the U.S. and other Western nations where children play games, do crafts, and in general, have fun, the Hamas "Summer Youth Camps" are nothing like this.  They're training camps, where children are trained in weapons handling, military drills, and are indoctrinated to "hate the Infidel," particularly Jews.   Link to Video On videos that have circulated across the online world, these children have openly confessed that they have come here for the purpose of learning to fight.  One such video surfaced on MEMRI with a child openly stating "We did not come here to e
Read more