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Unlikely. Whereas in Lebanon, Christians and Muslims are more or less equal in number (ideal conditions for civil war) in Egypt, the Copts are estimated to be approximately 10% of the otherwise Muslim population (ideal conditions for genocide). “Egypt Faces Rising Risk of Lebanon-Like Muslim-Christian Strife,” by Daniel Williams for Bloomberg, July 16:
Increasing violence between Egypt's Muslims and Coptic Christians is raising alarms that the sectarian hostility besetting Lebanon and Iraq may take root in the Middle East's most populous country.Recent? The Egyptian constitution was amended in 1980 (you know, when Islamic fundamentalism was becoming the latest rage) to include sharia law as "the principal source of legislation."Egypt's reputation for a live-and-let-live ethos is under assault following recent murders of Copts in Cairo, street fighting in cities including Alexandria and a pitched battle between Muslims and Coptic monks at an ancient desert monastery.
“The divisions are deepening,” Hala Mustafa, editor of the political journal Democracy Review, said in a telephone interview. “There's a growing Islamization of Egypt, and the Copts respond by turning inward in a defensive stance.”
Muslims and Copts -- who make up about 10 percent of Egypt's 78 million citizens and are the country's most-populous minority -- increasingly identify themselves primarily by religion, Mustafa said.
Copts view with distress a trend toward adoption of Muslim mores exemplified by the growing prevalence of veiled women in the streets; the increasing national clout of the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamic opposition organization; and the government's recent decision to declare Islamic law as a source of civil legislation, Mustafa said. Muslims complain that Christians are claiming discrimination to win political advantages, she added.
[…]Glad to see someone describe Islam’s takeover of Egypt accurately. Compare to the Washington Post’s nonsense about how, after St. Mark brought Christianity to Egypt, Muslims also “brought” Islam.The Coptic Orthodox Church was founded in Alexandria during the first century by Mark, one of the apostles of Jesus. After an Arab army conquered Egypt in the seventh century, Islam gradually became the country's dominant religion.
Tensions, reported in the government-controlled and independent press, have been building for several years. In 2004, Christians in Cairo claimed that the wife of a Coptic priest was forced to convert to Islam; after a riot in which 50 people were injured, the government ordered her returned to her Coptic family. In 2005, Muslims in Alexandria demonstrated against a church DVD version of a play in which a Coptic youth converts to Islam and then changes his mind.Or, more graphically, they were beaten to a pulp while tied and suspended from a tree, ordered to spit on the cross and convert to Islam.In 2006, a Muslim man stabbed Coptic worshippers in two Alexandria churches, killing one person and injuring five. Some attacks appear specifically aimed to terrorize: Targets of April 2006 bombings by suspected Islamic extremists in the Red Sea resort of Dahab included a pair of shops owned by Copts.
Muslims have tried to stop Copts from building or expanding churches in several towns, including Behma, 40 miles south of Cairo, where Muslim mobs set fire to Christian homes and shops last year.
On May 28 of this year, gunmen fired machine guns at a Coptic-owned jewelry store in Cairo, killing four Christians. The assailants haven't been captured. Three days later, dozens of Muslims [approximately 70] attacked the 1,700-year-old Abu Fana monastery 300 miles south of Cairo.
[…]
“This happened because we are Christian,” said Father Antonius, 35, one of 18 monks who reside at the complex. “The Muslims want this monastery erased from the earth.” Three monks were held captive and forced to pledge allegiance to Islam before being released, he said.
Samir Lulu, a Muslim resident from Hur, an adjacent village, said the monks are “fanatics” who pressure the government into granting them land denied to villagers. “They are trying to spread the belief that Egypt is actually a Coptic nation and Muslims just visitors,” Lulu said.
Read your history books, Lulu: Egypt is a Coptic nation—though Muslims are not “visitors”; they’re more like invaders, occupiers.
Posted by Raymond at July 16, 2008 7:36 AM
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Give them (the Copts) the Sinai. It's a nice self-contained unit, with access to fisheries. Desalination, solar power, a few nice oases, the pilgrim trade to St Catherine's monastery, the tourist trade (Europeans and Israelis). I'm sure they'd do well.
And arm them to the teeth.
Posted by: dumbledoresarmy![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jihadwatch.org/nav-commenters.gif)
at July 16, 2008 9:27 AM
Egypt doesn't deserve to be compared to Lebanon, which once had power-sharing between Christians and Muslims. When have Egyptian Muslims shared power with anyone?
The "live-and-let-live ethos" in Egypt, as in most Muslim-dominated countries, exists only as long as Muslims want it to. Apparently, Copts paying the jizyah is no longer good enough for Egyptian Muslims.
at July 16, 2008 9:36 AM
Correction-Mark was not an Apostle. Mark was a disciple of Peter the Apostle, sent to Egypt and transcribed Peter's Gospel. This is why Alexandria, along with Antioch and Rome was considered a Petrine See in the early church.
Sadly, Mark was martyrd by the Egyptian pagan priests by being torn limb from limb in mob violence against the Christians since they were causing a decline in the revenue of the pagan temples in Egypt. Not much has changed.
Posted by: American_Palamite at July 16, 2008 9:44 AM
In typical muslim fashion, the victims are being blamed for the violence against them.
Posted by: walterc at July 16, 2008 11:08 AM
The sad thing is when the Egyptian Muslims do decide to start slaughtering Copts there won't be a single high profile Christian in the west that will raise his or her voice.
The Pope is scared.
The Greek Orthodox Church is scared as well.
The Anglicans have a lunatic and Christian hating Druid as a leader.
Oh and the western secular leaders couldn't care less.
American protestants in general won't say a thing. The Baptists wouldn't care because they're not Baptists, and the more liberal denominations will just turn a blind eye because they don't want to offend their Muslim friends.
Posted by: waltc at July 16, 2008 1:12 PM
Just helps prove that one of the more dangerous things to be in this world is a Christian in a largely Muslim country. Again I write shame on Islam and its intolerant tenets and believers for crap like this. Deep shame. This is, in part, why non-Muslims worldwide are coming to despise Islam more and more with each passing year. I certainly am.
Posted by: Wellington at July 16, 2008 2:05 PM
. . . in Egypt, the Copts are estimated to be approximately 10% of the otherwise Muslim population (ideal conditions for genocide).
.......................................
Yet, demographics are not all--in Muslim-majority Egypt, a Christian population of 10% is under threat of being wiped out, whereas, in Infidel-majority Europe, a Muslim population ranging from just 2%-8%, far from being under threat, is more violent and demanding than ever as it grows.
from above:
“The divisions are deepening,” Hala Mustafa, editor of the political journal Democracy Review, said in a telephone interview. “There's a growing Islamization of Egypt, and the Copts respond by turning inward in a defensive stance.”
................................
More insane moral equivalence--see, both sides have their negative aspects--Muslims assault, rob, torture and murders Copts, and Copts "respond by turning inward in a defensive stance"--instead of embracing their hostile Muslim neighbors--how unfriendly!
at July 16, 2008 3:35 PM
I didn't even read the whole article, my stomach starting turning at the mere utterance,"Increasing violence between Egypt's Muslims and Coptic Christians is raising alarms that the sectarian hostility besetting Lebanon and Iraq may take root in the Middle East's most populous country. " The sickening part is where it says "between". It should say increasing violence AGAINST Christians perpetrated by thugs calling themselves adherrents to a religion. The MSM is so blind they can't see their hand in front of their face, or should I say so biased they don't want to. Either way I'm ill from the stench of their ignorance and lack of ethics. Maybe thats why most of the people in my demographic are ignorant regarding jihad and related issues, they can't find a source for real"fair and honest" reporting, unless the know of JW. Sorry for the OT run-on-rant, I'm just sick of the MSM. Anyone else?
Posted by: SeifulKaffir at July 16, 2008 11:46 PM
I didn't even read the whole article, my stomach starting turning at the mere utterance,"Increasing violence between Egypt's Muslims and Coptic Christians is raising alarms that the sectarian hostility besetting Lebanon and Iraq may take root in the Middle East's most populous country. " The sickening part is where it says "between". It should say increasing violence AGAINST Christians perpetrated by thugs calling themselves adherrents to a religion. The MSM is so blind they can't see their hand in front of their face, or should I say so biased they don't want to. Either way I'm ill from the stench of their ignorance and lack of ethics. Maybe thats why most of the people in my demographic are ignorant regarding jihad and related issues, they can't find a source for real"fair and honest" reporting, unless the know of JW. Sorry for the OT run-on-rant, I'm just sick of the MSM. Anyone else?
Posted by: SeifulKaffir at July 16, 2008 11:46 PM
I agree with dumbledoresarmy, arm them to the teeth.
Posted by: SeifulKaffir at July 16, 2008 11:48 PM
And where is the United States of America in all this? Squarely in the jihad corner. When Israel came to the Lebanese Christians' aid in 1982 during the civil war that killed 100,000, the US immediatelly turned on Israel, stopped all weapons deliveries, joined the global hate campaign against Israel, ruined its victory, expelled it from Beirut - all that to win the Muslims' good graces. The jihadists rewarded Reagan by blowing up 3 US embassies and 241 US Marines, by hijacking TWA 847, by holding Americans hostage for 7 years, executing 2 of them and torturing 2 others to death. And at the very end of Reagan's disgraceful presidency, the jihadists concluded with the spectacular over Lockerbie, Scotland.
And in 1999, the Clinton-Albright clique sank even lower than Reagan by murdering Serb Christians and brutally eradicating Christianity from Kosovo - also "for the love of the Muslims". We all felt their love on 9/11.
Cowardeezza keeps decrying "daily humiliations of Palestinians" at Israeli checkpoints, and even comparing the "Palestinians' plight" with that of the blacks during the Jim Crow. But don't expect from her any sympathy toward the Coptic Christians or a word of criticism of their persecutors, abusers and murderers.
The United States and other Western dhimmocracies are displaying the degree of cowardice without a precedent in the entire human history.
Ruslan Tokhchukov, EnragedSince1999.
Posted by: Enragedsince1999 at July 17, 2008 6:08 PM
The Pope is scared?
The same Pope who gave the Regensburg lecture?
The same Pope who baptized a Muslim on live TV from the Vatican on Easter?
The same Pope who has drawn the beleagured Eastern Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople closer to him?
The same Pope who ordained a Chaldean priest from Iraq after not one but 5 chaldean clerics (3 subdeacons, a priest and a bishop) where murdered by jihadists just months before?
If that is fear, one wonders what ardent valor looks like!
As to the ridiculous notion that there is "violence between Copts and Muslims"... Are Muslims tattoing their children now? (see: Why Copts Still Get Christian Tattoos On Their Children) Are Christian mobs killing Muslims?
Ridiculous.
Posted by: A Simple Sinner at July 17, 2008 10:55 PM
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