Source: Congressman Frank Wolf WOLF ISSUES REPORT FOLLOWING VISIT TO MIDDLE EAST DURING TUMULTUOUS TIME OF CHANGE IN THE REGION Renews Call for Special Envoy to Advocate for Beleaguered Minority Faith Communities, Which are Increasingly Under Assault Washington, D.C. (March 7, 2013) – Rep. Frank Wolf today made a series of policy recommendations – including his continued push for the creation of a Special Envoy for Religious Minorities in the Middle East and South Central Asia – following a recent trip to Lebanon and Egypt, where he met with high-ranking government officials, religious leaders, humanitarian aid organizations and refugees who…
Browsing: Egypt
Source: The Telegraph Egyptian troops foiled a bomb attack on a church in the frontier town of Rafah timed to coincide with Coptic Orthodox Christmas, the authorities said on Monday. By Richard Spencer, Cairo Army units received a tip-off about the attack, and in the early hours of Monday morning, Coptic Christmas Day, discovered a Toyota car packed with explosives and weapons near the church, according to the state news agency. Another car driven by masked men then sped off. A second report said the intended target was a nearby military base that has been attacked by Islamist militants before,…
Source: Ahram online Pope Tawadros II says Egypt’s Coptic Church will not push its congregants to vote either ‘yes’ or ‘no’ in upcoming referendum on draft constitution At a Thursday meeting with the Council of Catholic Churches in Egypt, Pope Tawadros II, head of Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox Church, said that Christians in Egypt enjoyed “complete freedom” to participate in the upcoming constitutional referendum, stressing that Copts should “go and vote.” Tawadros II also stressed at the meeting that the Orthodox Church would not push Christians to vote either ‘yes’ or ‘no’ in the upcoming poll. The Orthodox Church sent a…
Source: Agenzia Fides Cairo (Agenzia Fides) – The meeting announced by the new Coptic Orthodox Patriarch Tawadros II with a qualified Egyptian delegation of the Catholic Churches – which would have also provided the opportunity to agree on a common position before the emergency which the Country is crossing – has been postponed to December 11. A reason for postponing is due to the tension that reigns throughout Egypt and especially in the capital, after the constitutional decrees with which President Morsi has expanded his powers and have sparked violent protests against the government and also the headquarters of the…
Source: Catholic World News With police looking on, a crowd of 100 Muslim extremists occupied land belonging to a Coptic Orthodox diocese after Pope Tawadros II, the church’s new head, announced his opposition to the imposition of Islamic law in Egypt. The occupation lasted for over a day. “By seizing land that belongs to the Diocese of Shubra al-Kheima, Salafists are sending a warning to the new Coptic patriarch, Tawadros II,” said Father Rafic Greiche, spokesman for the Catholic Church in Egypt. “Such an action is nothing new in Egypt, but this is the first time that extremists directly go…
Source: Examiner.com BY: MICHAEL FLETCHER Christians make up less than ten percent of Egypt’s population of 82 million. They have long been the target of sectarian attacks. These attacks have increased since the ousting of President Hosni Mubarak and the coming to power of the Muslim Brotherhood under Islamist president Mohammed Morsi. After receiving death threats from Islamic militants a local priest said and an Egyptian intelligence official confirmed that Coptic Christian families are fleeing their homes in the Sinai Peninsula. The Holy Family Church in Rafah is built on the site where it is believed that Joseph and Mary…
Source: Reuters By Edmund Blair Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox Church will choose a new pope on December 2, after Pope Shenouda who led the church for four decades died in March and left many Christians worrying about their rights under an Islamist-led government. Many Christians, who make up about tenth of Egypt’s 83 million people, are concerned by the rise of Islamists who swept to power in parliamentary and presidential elections. President Mohamed Mursi has insisted he will be a leader for the whole nation, but some Christians fear a creeping imposition of conservative religious codes on society. Egypt’s state news…
Source: Egypt Independent purred by what they see as an increasing tide of Islamization lead by the Muslim Brotherhood, 13 Coptic civil society and political activist groups decided to band together and create a coordinating body unattached to the church. Inaugurated last week, the Coptic Consultative Council is meant to work as a “unifying entity for all Christian groups, unions and institutions … aimed at reaching a common political and intellectual perspective on the big issues,” their mission statement reads. The council, which includes representatives from groups such as the Maspero Youth Union, Copts for Egypt, the Kalimah Center for…
Source: Commentary Magazine | David Aikman From Egypt to North Korea, an unlikely minority suffers a plague of persecution IN OCTOBER 2011, when the so-called Arab Spring took a dark turn in Cairo, Egypt, the social media and smartphone technologies that had aided protesters in their fight for freedom captured new and dangerous developments. On video-hosting websites such as YouTube, one can see footage of the Muslim mobs that began throwing rocks at Coptic Christians on October 8. These young Copts had been protesting the burning of a Coptic church in Aswan and the failure of the Egyptian authorities to…
Source: BBC News Egypt’s Coptic Christian Pope Shenouda III has died at the age of 88, state television has announced. The leader of the Middle East’s largest Christian minority was reported to suffer from cancer that had spread to several organs. Coptic Christians make up 10% of Egypt’s population of 80 million. After attacks on Coptic Christians in recent years, Pope Shenouda urged officials to do more to address the community’s concerns. Pope Shenouda led the church, one of the oldest Christian communities in the world, for four decades. His political adviser Hany Aziz told Reuters news agency that Shenouda…
Source: Commentary Magazine | David Aikman February 2012 Abstract On October 2011, when the so-called Arab Spring took a dark turn in Cairo, Egypt, the social media and smartphone technologies that had aided protesters in their fight for freedom captured new and dangerous developments. On video-hosting websites such as YouTube, one can see footage of the Muslim mobs that began throwing rocks at Coptic Christians on October 8. These young Copts had been protesting the burning of a Coptic church in Aswan and the failure of the Egyptian authorities to respond satisfactorily. Frustrated with the traditional Coptic adoption of a…
Source: The Wall Street Journal | Lucette Lagnado Kirolos Andraws had every reason to be excited about the January uprising in his native Egypt, figuring democracy would bring hope for young people like him. Then one day in February, says Mr. Andraws, a gang of thugs beat him and told him, “you deserve to die.” His offense, he says: refusing to convert to Islam. In late March, Mr. Andraws, a 23-year- old engineer, used a tourist visa to board an Egyptair flight for New York City. He let a room in a friend’s apartment, hired an immigration lawyer and applied…