Dina el-Gowhary’s father, Peter Athanasius, is a convert also. Our religious freedom bus ads in Miami, pictured above, were pulled by Miami-Dade Transit for being “offensive to Islam.” CAIR’s Muhammed Malik said: “Islam guarantees freedom to and freedom from religion.” Will he then issue a public statement in support of Dina el-Gowhary and Peter Athanasius? Don’t hold your breath — but this case yet again shows that our ad is entirely accurate, warranted, and justified. That’s why we have filed suit against Miami-Dade Transit.
By the way, Dina el-Gowhary appealed to Obama for help last year. No help, of course, was forthcoming.
“Muslim Egyptian Girl Who Converted to Christianity Subjected to Acid Attack,” by Mary Abdelmassih for AINA, April 17 (thanks to Pamela Geller):
(AINA) — Dina el-Gowhary, the 15-year-old Egyptian Muslim-born girl who converted to Christianity, was subjected to an acid attack, the latest in a string of failed attempts by Muslim fanatics against her and her father, 57-year-old Peter Athanasius (Maher el-Gowhary), who converted to Christianity 35 years ago. Several Fatwa’s [sic] were issued calling for the “spilling of his blood,” which makes their lives in constant danger in the face of the reactionaries and advocates for the enforcement of Islamic apostasy laws, which call for the death of a convert.
Dina said that three weeks ago as she ventured out from their hiding place in Alexandria with her father to get some bottled water, her jacket was set on fire due to acid being thrown at her. “My father quickly took my jacket off before the fire reached my arms. Ever since then I am terrorized to go out in the street, with or without my father.”
Through an aired interview with Freecopts advocacy Dina addressed an open letter to President Mubarak of Egypt begging him to save her and her father and allow them to leave Egypt.
She said that she had written previously to President Obama, who got her message and responded to it (AINA 11-17-2009). It was reported that the el-Gowharys met with the US Committee on International Religious Freedom on their last visit to Egypt in January 2010, and that they have asked for asylum in the United States (Fox News video).
Dina wonders whether she will get the same attention from President Mubarak as she did from President Obama. “Will he listen and lend us a helping hand, if, as they claim, he truly does not differentiate between Muslim and Christian citizens?” She asked the Egyptian President, who newly became grandfather to a baby girl “Do you accept that your granddaughter would live under the same conditions like mine? I have no home, I am always afraid when I go to church or even go out in the street, I have no friends and no education.”
In her letter to President Mubarak, Dina expressed her deep distress at the mistreatment and continuous troubles she finds everywhere she goes, including being beaten and humiliated. She tells of how “because of her love for Jesus” she left her Muslim mother and went to live with her Christian father, abandoning school where she was persecuted by teachers and students. “I was threatened many times before. Once coming back from school, a bearded young man stepped out of a car, lifted me through my clothes from the ground and warned me that if my father and myself do not go back to Islam, both of us will be killed.”…
“Once coming back from school, a bearded young man stepped out of a car, lifted me through my clothes from the ground and warned me that if my father and myself do not go back to Islam, both of us will be killed.”
“Islam guarantees freedom to and freedom from religion.” — Muhammed Malik
Why doesn’t Muhammed Malik fly over to Cairo and set these people straight about Islam?