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Christians Should "Convert, Pay Tribute, or Leave," Says Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood Candidate by Raymond Ibrahim May 30, 2012 at 4:00 am "They need to know that conquest is coming, that Egypt will be Islamic, and that they must pay jizya or emigrate," Morsi reportedly said.

CBS News video: Egypt's Christians fear the worst is yet to come - Thirteen candidates from all over the...

Egypt Islamist Candidate Reassures Women, Copts CAIRO May 29, 2012 (AP) ...Islamist group's Mohammed Morsi.

A large number of Egypt’s Coptic Christian minority are backing presidential front-runner Ahmed Shafiq. The 70-year-old former prime minister represents their best hope for a secular presidency, something Copts worry will not happen if an Islamist candidate wins. “People see what happened with the Islamists in the parliament and Shura Council. People won’t make the same mistake twice,” said one man in Cairo waiting to vote. Another woman said she felt it was time for someone other than an Islamist: “Frankly from what I see, the Copts fear the current Islamists. I think because they won control of the parliament...

Sharia justice in Arab Spring Egypt. Islamo-Christian violence in Minya: life imprisonment for 12 Copts, eight Muslims acquitted," from Asia News, May 22 (thanks to C. Cantoni): Cairo (AsiaNews/Agencies) - An Egyptian court has sentenced 12 Coptic Christians to life imprisonment and acquitted eight Muslims, in a trial heavily criticized by human rights activists and legal experts. The ruling came yesterday, at the end of a trial called to shed light on the sectarian violence last year in the province of Minya, in the southern part of the country, about 220 km from Cairo. Ishak Ibrahim, a researcher and expert...

A year after an attack by ultraconservative Muslims raised the spectre of a wave of religious strife in Egypt, the Christian churches in Cairo’s Imbaba district have been repaired, with sturdy wooden rafters, fresh paint and portraits of the Virgin Mary and Jesus ready to be hung anew. But the deep wounds from those attacks and ensuing clashes, which left 12 dead, cannot be painted over. Coptic Christians, whose forefathers lived in Egypt before the arrival of Islam, had hoped that the 2011 uprising that ousted authoritarian President Hosni Mubarak would give them equal rights. Instead, things have worsened. Egypt’s...

(Full Title) Egyptian Cleric Wagdi Ghoneim Praises Allah for the Death of Coptic Pope Shenouda III: "May Allah Exact Revenge from Him in the Hellfire" Tolerance! Peace! Interfaith dialogue! Bridges! Building bridges (to Islam)! Obama say, "respect it!" The Islamc spring -- this is Obama's legacy and what future generations will curse him for. Egyptian Cleric Wagdi Ghoneim Praises Allah for the Death of Pope Shenouda III: "May Allah Exact Revenge from Him in the Hellfire" Following are excerpts from a statement by Egyptian cleric Wagdi Ghoneim, which was posted on the Internet on March 18, 2012 : Praise be...

Egyptian Court Sentences Priest from Attacked Church Building Assailants uncharged, but clergyman gets six months in jail for building violation. CAIRO, Egypt, March 7 (CDN) — A priest in Egypt was sentenced this week to six months in jail for a minor construction violation at his church building, while no one in a mob that burned the same structure down has been arrested.  The Rev. Makarious Bolous of the Mar Gerges Church in Aswan was sentenced on Sunday (March 4), but neither the imams who called for the attack nor the Muslim villagers who destroyed the church building last September...

From one end of the muslim world to the other, Christians are being murdered for their faith. (Page 1 of 3) We hear so often about Muslims as victims of abuse in the West and combatants in the Arab Spring’s fight against tyranny. But, in fact, a wholly different kind of war is underway—an unrecognized battle costing thousands of lives. Christians are being killed in the Islamic world because of their religion. It is a rising genocide that ought to provoke global alarm. The portrayal of Muslims as victims or heroes is at best partially accurate. In recent years the...

An angry mob of Muslim zealots, led by members of the Salafist sect, set fire to a Coptic Christian church in a village northeast of Cairo, in the latest attack on the Christian minority in the wake of Egypt’s January elections. The mob violence in the village of Meet Bashar, which continued through the past weekend, ended only when leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood succeeded in persuading the Salafists to leave the scene. The Muslim Brotherhood was the main victor in Egypt’s recent elections.

Copts in the village of Kobry-el-Sharbat (El-Ameriya), Alexandria, were attacked on January 27 by a mob of 3000 Muslims led by Salafi leaders, who looted and torched homes and shops belonging to Copts. The violence was prompted by allegations made by a Muslim barber named Toemah that a 34-year-old Coptic tailor, Mourad Samy Guirgis, had on his mobile phone illicit photos of a Muslim woman. Mourad denied the accusation and surrendered to the police for fear for his life.... Three "reconciliation meetings" were held at the El-Ameriya village police headquarters. They were attended by Salafi and Muslim Brotherhood representatives from...

... And nowhere is religious intolerance more present than in Iran. Baha'i's and Christians are consistently threatened with death and torture simply for believing. Simply for their beliefs. In September of this past year, a Christian Pastor was threatened with death if he refused to renounce his beliefs. And he is not alone in this. In Egypt, we have been witness to gruesome attacks against Coptic Christians. Attacks in the very places they hold to be sacred... Egyptians recognize that they will not have any freedoms, if they cannot be free to simply believe. Taken from the famous words of...

There they go again. The story is so old already. Arab militia or Arab army or Arab terrorist attacks non-Arab. Or was that Muslim fanatic attacks non-Muslim? This time, it's happening in Sudan. While we're sitting and talking, probably a few hundred more black Africans in Sudan have starved to death, or been brutally killed, raped, enslaved, or simply pushed off their land by 7th century Arab imperialist invaders, or more rightly "Arab settlers". Oh yes, that's right. "Arab settlers". Like the ones Saddam Hussein brought into Kurdistan - i.e., the Kurdish areas of northern Iraq - in the 1970s...

Unknown assailants shot dead two Coptic Christians in a village of southern Egypt prompting an angry protest by more than 1,500 of their co-religionists, police said. A police official on Friday said Muwad Hassaad and his son Hassaad Muwad Hassaad were gunned down as they were seated in front of their shop in the village of Bahgura, 600 km from Cairo. The assailants fled the scene. More than 1,500 Copts later gathered in the nearby town of Nagaa Hammadi to protest the killings. ... In October 2011, 25 people, most of them Copts, died in clashes with soldiers outside the...

(MEMRI) — Yassir Al-Burhami: Appointing infidels to positions of authority over Muslims is prohibited. Allah said: “Never will Allah grant the infidels a way [to triumph] over the Believers.” We are not afraid of losing the elections or of not getting votes. We are not trying to ingratiate ourselves before the people. Can the Christians of Egypt be compared to the Jews of Al-Medina? The case of the Jews of Al-Medina is one example of the relations between the Muslims and the infidels. The Muslims can implement any form of conduct used by the Prophet Muhammad. When the Prophet Muhammad...

Jimmy Carter meets with Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo - National Law Enforcement | Examiner.com http://www.examiner.com/law-enforcement-in-national/jimmy-carter-meets-with-muslim-brotherhood-cairo

Egypt:Coptic businessman on trial over cartoon: bearded Mickey Mouse and veiled Minnie Mouse Coptic businessman on trial over cartoon Egypt Independent Mon, 09/01/2012 - 12:27 http://www.almasryalyoum.com/en/node/591651 The Central Cairo Prosecution has referred Coptic businessman Naguib Sawiris to trial over charges of defamation of religion. In June, Sawiris posted a picture depicting Mickey Mouse wearing a beard and Minnie Mouse wearing a face veil on his Twitter account, a cartoon that many Muslims considered offensive. Sawiris later apologized for posting the cartoon, however, his apology did not manage to calm the anger of Salafis who filed a report accusing him of...

What is your first thought when you see something offensive? It's probably not to get together with a few dozen of your closest friends and burn stuff. As has been the case in similar incidents, the ease of the transition to violence here all but suggests a rampage waiting for an excuse. Then comes the collective punishment. "Muslim villagers burn houses of Christian family Upper Egypt," from Al Masry Al Youm, December 30: Dozens of residents of the village of Baheeg in Assiut, Upper Egypt, burnt three houses owned by a Christian family after a Christian villager allegedly published cartoons...

(AINA) -- Thousands of Muslims attacked and besieged Copts in elGhorayzat village, population 80,000, killing two Copts and severely wounding others, as well as looting and torching homes and businesses. A quarrel between a Copt, John Hosni, and Mahmoud Abdel-Nazeer, who later died in hospital, turned into collective punishment of all Copts in the majority Christian village of elGhorayzat, in the Maragha district of Sohag province. Muslims vowed not to bury Abdel-Nazeer until John Hosni is punished. Mr. Hosni fled from the village with his family, "fearing a wholesale massacre of Copts," reported activist Mariam Ragy. The events started on...

The world stands silent. The individual must rise up and defeat this evil. It's just that simple. More from the new Egypt that big media adores and boot licks. Coptic Christian Student Murdered By Classmates for Wearing a Cross AINA In mid-October Egyptian media published news of an altercation between Muslim and Christian students over a classroom seat at a school in Mallawi, Minya province. The altercation lead to the murder of a Christian student. The media portrayed the incident as non-sectarian. However, Copts Without Borders, a Coptic news website, refuted this version and was first to report that the...

Bishop Anba Stephanos (Orthodox Coptic) of Beba and Elfashn Christians in Egypt are currently experiencing their worst time in recent centuries. This statement was made by the Coptic Orthodox Bishop Stephanos of Beba and Elfashn to the international Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN). Christians are being violently killed under the eyes of the international media. Also, for the first time in many years, churches are being systematically burned and destroyed. The police are taking no action and nobody is punished for it. In the Egyptian media, “the facts are systematically covered up in order to...

From a Middle East correspondent: Beirut Arab news agency al Nashra reported on Saturday November 22, that [White House Muslim envoy] Dalia Mogahed has succeeded in canceling a meeting between the Maronite Patriarch of Lebanon and President Barack Obama. Writing in al Nashra, the reporter said “an unnamed US source told the news agency, that those who sought canceling a visit of (the spiritual head of the Maronite Church) Patriarch Beshara Rahi to the White House are Dalia Mujahid (Mogahed), the highest adviser on Arab and Islamic Affairs in the State Department, who is from Egyptian origins. And that,” according...

'Arab Spring': The chilly cruel winter reality of Arab racism and Islamic bigotry Not that ethnic racism and religious bigotry weren't rampant before the so-called "Arab spring" sprung about. But the intolerance tide seems to be only worsening, and without an Arab dictator to "hold" various factions together, vulnerability expand, risks rise. --- RELIGIOUS BIGOTRY: As the D.B. puts it: "Violence Against Egypt's Copts in an Intolerant Arab Spring.. The elephant in the room of the Arab Spring is now the mistreatment of minority communities—Christians and others—across the Arab world." FPM asks: Hillary Clinton Promises to Save Egypt's Christians? ......

President Obama has responded to the Egyptian military’s massacre of Coptic Christian protestors in Cairo Sunday with a pointedly even-handed statement that calls equally on Christians and the military to show restraint. “The President is deeply concerned about the violence in Egypt that has led to a tragic loss of life among demonstrators and security forces,” Obama said in a statement released this week. ”Now is a time for restraint on all sides so that Egyptians can move forward together to forge a strong and united Egypt.”

Sunday, the Egyptian military opened fire on thousands of Christians protesting in Maspero, Cairo. In the words of one Christian eyewitness, armored vehicles "came at great speed and drove into the crowds, going backwards and forwards, mowing people under their wheels. The most horrible scene was when one of the vehicles ran over a Copt's [Christian's] head, causing his brain to explode and blood was all over the place. We got a clear message today that we are no first class citizens." Various numbers of casualties have been given; AINA asserts that at least 35 Christians were massacred, many beyond...

John Bolton says: ‘This will come as news to the Coptic Christians that they’re supposed to exercise restraint. They’re being attacked, they’re the ones being victimized both by mobs of fellow Egyptian citizens who are Muslims and by the government.

On Sunday, the Blaze reported on violent clashes between Egypt’s military and Coptic Christians (the largest minority in the Middle Eastern nation). What purportedly started out as a peaceful protest against a recent church attack ended in extreme violence that drew thousands into the streets. Below, see the startling video that has emerged showcasing Egypt’s military running down what appear to be protesters: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=vBxMG1e8oLw

Egyptian state television says at least one soldier has been killed in riots that erupted in Cairo as Coptic Christians protesting a recent destruction of a church came under attack. The Coptic Christians were demonstrating outside the state television building in central Cairo on Sunday when they clashed with locals. A number of military vehicles were set on fire and thick black smoke rose along the Nile outside the state television building. During the protest, led by several bishops, the demonstrators burnt photos of Mustafa al-Sayed, the governor of Aswan who had said that the church in the village of...

Egyptian Coptic Christians hold a protest in front of the state TV building in downtown Cairo, Egypt, Oct. 4, 2011. Hundreds of Egyptian Christian Copts staged a sit-in on the road in front of the state TV building in downtown Cairo on Tuesday evening, demanding Aswan provincial governor Moustafa el-Sayed step down and a church be rebuilt at Marinap village in Aswan province. (Xinhua/Qin Haishi) CAIRO, Oct. 4 (Xinhua) -- Hundreds of Egyptian Christian Copts staged a sit-in on the road in front of the state TV building in downtown Cairo on Tuesday evening, demanding Aswan provincial governor Moustafa el-Sayed...

The Arab Spring and Christian Persecution | U.S. Copts Association Sep 9, 2011 – Throughout the region, Christians have been targeted by Muslim mobs ... that the Arab Spring is posing a threat to Christian minorities throughout the Middle East. ... Signs of crisis between Brotherhood and Egypt's military ...

The church was named after Saint Samaan the Tanner whom the Lord used in the miracle of moving the Mokkatam mountain on Nov. 27, 979 A.D from the boundaries of the Elephant Lake (now known as the New Helmeia) to its present location; during the time of the 62nd Patriarch, Bishop Abram Ibn Zaraa the Syrian in the reign of Al Muiz Ledin Illah the Fatimid , the first ruler of the Fatimid dynasty in Egypt. Ministry in this church started by Divine Providence in April 1974 with a small children’s meeting, then a general women and men’s meeting...

Islamofascism: Obama wants to reward "democratic Egypt" with $1 billion in debt relief. Only, "democratic" Egypt is torching churches and slaughtering Christians left and right. There's a howling disconnect between the president's Pollyannaish ...

Those who camped out in Tahrir Square side by side with Muslims to call for national renewal now fear their struggle is being hijacked by ultra-conservative Salafist Islamists with no one to stop them. "We did not risk our lives to bring Mubarak down in order to have him replaced by Salafists,"... Sectarian tensions are not new to Egypt, where Christians make up around 10 percent of the population of 80 million. But the frequency and intensity of clashes have increased since Mubarak's overthrow. ... Christians say no one has been tried yet for the burning of a church in...

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Christian communities across Syria have been attacked by anti-government protesters in recent weeks. International Christian Concern says that protesters are being led by hard-line Islamists and that Christians have come under pressure to either join in protests demanding the resignation of President Bashir Assad, or else leave the country

Coptic Christians chant slogans as they protest the recent attacks on Christians and churches in Egypt.Two families, two bereavements, two narrow streets apart. In the northern Cairo suburb of Imbaba, the Christian Malek family and the Muslim Ramadan family followed near-identical rituals of mourning this week. The menfolk sat separately, holding back tears, showing a family photograph, each of a cheerful young man with a slapstick sense of humour, and receiving the neighbours' visits of condolence. At the Malek family's narrow, brick-and-concrete house, a priest with long black robe, black cap and flowing beard arrived to offer support. A hundred...

Even as he renews his outreach to Muslims, President Obama should seek to stem the growing tide of violence against Coptic Christians in Egypt by condemning last weekend’s attacks that left a dozen people dead and scores injured. The attacks, about which Obama has been silent, also resulted in the burning of Coptic Orthodox churches and the destruction of Christian homes and businesses. The president needs to say more to stem religious violence that creates opportunities for Islamic extremists who want to seize power in Egypt, our most important Arab ally. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper Monday “strongly” condemned the...

Attacks on churches, communal divisions -- Cairo has recently seen conflicts between some Muslims and Coptic Christians. But who exactly are the Copts and how did they come to be in Egypt? Part of the answer lies in Coptic art... in the 19th and 20th centuries excavators such as William Flinders Petrie developed truly scientific archaeological techniques and looked beyond the tombs of the kings into the buried worlds of Egypt's past. Petrie, who excavated at Fayoum, looked not just for treasures but pottery and cloth. Egypt's climate preserves materials that usually perish, including wood, papyrus, and cloth. Even shoes...

... [Fadel Soliman's] new Arabic book, Copts: Muslims Before Muhammad, which he has been promoting all over the media, including al-Jazeera, asserts that, at the time of the Muslim conquest of Egypt (c. 640), the vast majority of Egyptians were not, as history has long taught, Christians, but rather prototypical Muslims, or muwahidin, who were actually being oppressed by Christians: hence, the Muslim conquest of Egypt was really about "liberating" fellow Muslims. Soliman's evidence is that the Arian sect, which rejected the claim that Jesus was coequal with God, was present in 4th century Egypt. Therefore, according to Soliman, the...

On March 5, Muslims attacked, plundered, and set ablaze an ancient Coptic church in Sool, a village near Cairo, Egypt. Afterwards, throngs of Muslims gathered around the scorched building and pounded its walls down with sledge hammers -- to cries of "Allahu Akbar!" Adding insult to injury, the attackers played "soccer" with the relic-remains of the church's saints and martyrs and transformed the desecrated church into a mosque (a live example of history, which witnessed countless churches seized and transformed into mosques). As a result of Christian girls being abducted and raped and overall terrorization of the Coptic community, thousands...

After all, nothing says "Religion of Peace and Tolerance" like claiming someone else's sacred ground as a spoil of war and sticking a mosque on it. It is intended as a permanent exercise in supremacist gloating. This act would only uphold a long tradition of building mosques on sacred sites seized in Islamic conquests, just like the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, and the Hagia Sophia, along with innumerable other churches, synagogues, and temples from Spain to India and beyond. Despite the vague headline about "wars of religion," what follows is a refreshingly complete report. "After the Egyptian Revolution: The Wars...

Clashes between Muslims and Coptic Christians kill 13 in Egypt By EJP • on March 9, 2011 • Filed under: Religion CAIRO, March 09, 2011 – (RIA Novosti) At least 13 people were killed in clashes between Coptic Christians and Muslims in Cairo, the Egyptian Health Ministry said on Wednesday. Clashes between Muslims, Coptic Christians kill 13 in Egypt Some 140 people are listed as injured in the clashes which began last Friday in a village near Cairo and spread to the capital over the weekend. A church in the Helwan governorate south of Cairo was set on fire in...

(AINA) -- According to Father Abram Fahmy, pastor of St. Simon the Tanner Monastery in Mokatam Hills, on the outskirts of Cairo, Copts were killed and injured today in a fresh attack by Muslims. It was reported the Egyptian army fired live ammunition on Copts. The attack has claimed until now the lives of 9 Copts and injured 150, 45 seriously. Muslims threw fire balls at the Monastery from the top of the hills. Coptic youth have arrested five of them, who are now being held within the Monastery grounds, waiting to be handed over to the authorities. [Snip] The...

(AINA) -- A mob of nearly four thousand Muslims has attacked Coptic homes this evening in the village of Soul, Atfif in Helwan Governorate, 30 kilometers from Cairo, and torched the Church of St. Mina and St. George. There are conflicting reports about the whereabouts of the Church pastor Father Yosha and three deacons who were at church; some say they died in the fire and some say they are being held captive by the Muslims inside the church. Witnesses report the mob prevented the fire brigade from entering the village. The army, which has been stationed for the last...

Egyptian military makes permit laws highest priority after government collapses. Military is claiming the fences were put up without a permit. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kspc8BGmgT8

KNOXVILLE, TN (Catholic Online) - According to an article from the Assyrian International News Agency dated February 5, 2011, President Mubarak's new government has "called on all parties to join in a dialogue for the future." But the Copts have not been invited to join in these talks. This unfortunate turn of events could undo hopes for greater unity and peace between Muslims and Christians. Dr. Naguib Gabriel, head of the Egyptian Federation of Human Rights Organization, and a Copt, requested that the new Vice-President, Major Omar Suleiman, include the Copts in the dialogue with government authorities. Dr. Gabriel's request...

Nadia Guirguis left Egypt 15 years ago for the same reasons her countrymen are protesting today: She wanted a chance at better jobs, more freedoms and a better life. But as tumultuous demonstrations raged in her homeland, the Coptic Christian has become a reluctant supporter of the country’s widely disliked dictator, President Hosni Mubarak. While much of the world — from those taking to the streets Egypt to rallies in South Florida — roots for democracy and the immediate ouster of Mubarak, the Copts, a persecuted minority in Egypt that make up a majority of its immigrant population in the...

Let My People Go  Christians versus Muslims in Modern Egypt: The Century-Long Struggle for Coptic EqualityBy S. S. HasanOxford University Press. 320 pp. $49.95.Reviewed by Robert W. ShaffernSana Hasan, an Egyptian scholar best known for her Enemy in the Promised Land, has written another important book in Christians versus Muslims in Modern Egypt—a book in which she honestly confronts the sorry condition of Christians in Egypt, where the “problems faced by the Christian minority are for many . . . a taboo subject.” Hasan courageously describes the discrimination and harm often visited upon one of Christianity’s oldest communions—the Coptic...

I don’t know about you, but the following paragraph from an Atlantic Monthly blog post by White House correspondent Marc Ambinder left me amazed, confused and then ticked off: A number of White House officials were given an Encyclopedia Britannica-like briefing about the basics: how many U.S. citizens were inside the country and contingency plans to get them out; reminders that Egypt wasn’t a Muslim country; Hosni Mubarak was a Coptic Christian of a certain sect; the Muslim Brotherhood was at once an opposition political party and a co-opted part of the social system. …Mubarak is a WHAT?!?!?! Needless to...

CAIRO, Feb 1 (Reuters) - For Rafik, a member of Egypt's Coptic Christian minority, the myth that President Hosni Mubarak is the community's best defence against Islamist militants was shattered by an Alexandria church bombing on New Year's Day. He and other Copts continued to demonstrate alongside at least 1 million Egyptians on Tuesday, saying their desire to end Mubarak's three-decade rule was for now more pressing than any fears that a change of power might empower Islamist groups. "After (the Alexandria) bombing the Copts for the first time started to demonstrate against Mubarak. He was telling us that 'When...