Tag: Egypt

Africa rises on World Watch List of worst persecutors

January 8, 2013 Global News -- No Particular Country Africa, Al-Qaeda, Arab Spring, Bashar al-Assad, Boko Haram, Egypt, Eritrea, Hindu nationalism, Islamic extremism, Kenya, Mali, Mao Zedong, Niger, Nigeria, Sharia, Somalia, Syria, Tanzania, Uganda

Africa, where Christianity spread fastest during the past century, now is the region where oppression of Christians is spreading fastest, a new report says. The two-year-old Arab Spring has toppled autocrats across Northern Africa, but it also has energized militant Islamist movements that have killed hundreds of Christians and endanger . . . Read More

Book review: ‘Christianophobia: A Faith Under Attack’

December 21, 2012 Global News -- No Particular Country Al-Qaeda, Arab Spring, China, Egypt, Iraq, Islamic extremism, Mao Zedong, Middle East, Mohamed Morsi, Muslim Brotherhood, Nigeria, Prophet Muhammad, Turkey

Jesus warned his followers that they would experience persecution, a prediction that was already coming true before the books of the New Testament were completed. Today, Rupert Shortt, author of Christianophobia: A Faith Under Attack, argues, “the greatest curbs on religious freedoms take place in Muslim majority countries.” Take Egypt, . . . Read More

From Africa to Asia, offended Muslims vent anger on Christian churches

September 26, 2012 Global News -- No Particular Country Africa, Algeria, Asia, Bauchi, Benghazi, Boko Haram, Cairo, Egypt, Iraq, Libya, Mardan, Mosul, Nigeria, Pakistan, Prophet Muhammad, Zinder

Across much of the Muslim world, more than two weeks of backlash to the internet video “Innocence of the Muslims” has occasionally been directed at Christians, from computer hacks to church burnings. It can be difficult to sort deliberate acts of persecution from simple undirected anger sparked by the video, . . . Read More

Pope Benedict urges peace as radical Islamists target Western interests

September 14, 2012 Andrea Zaki, Asia, Benghazi, Copts, Egypt, Libya, Middle East, USA

Pope Benedict started a visit to Lebanon in the Middle East on Friday, as angry demonstrations and attacks on Western interests continued to spread across the region and into Asia. They came in the wake of the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya’s second city, which killed American . . . Read More

Christians hail dissolution of Egyptian parliament

June 14, 2012 Egypt Copts, Egypt, Elections, Hosni Mubarak, Islamic extremism, Muslim Brotherhood

Christians in Egypt welcomed today’s court decision to dissolve the Islamist-controlled parliament due to election irregularities. The decision offered hope for Christians, many of whom were convinced the country was about to be handed over to Islamists who would stifle religious freedom and persecute non-Muslims. “Christians are happy, because they . . . Read More

Gutted church building leaves Egyptian Copts with debt

June 14, 2012 Egypt Cairo, Copts, Egypt

A hasty, inadequate renovation of a church building that Salafi Muslims largely gutted a year ago has left the congregation with staggering debt from additional repairs, church members said. Waiting inside the main hall of the Virgin Mary Church in Imbaba, Cairo on Sunday (June 10), a woman looked at . . . Read More

Court rulings mirror fears, hopes in Egyptian vote

May 30, 2012 Egypt Copts, Egypt, Elections, Minya, Mohamed Morsi, Muslim Brotherhood, Sharia

In the lead-up to the country’s first democratic presidential election, a court ruling confirmed fears that justice will continue to elude the Christian minority in post-revolutionary Egypt, while another verdict offered some hope. On May 21 a judge sentenced 12 Coptic Christians to life in prison for their alleged part . . . Read More

Egyptian judge frees attackers who knifed Christian

May 9, 2012 Egypt Egypt, Qena, Salafism

A judge in Upper Egypt has dismissed all charges against a group of Salafi Muslims who cut off the ear of a Christian in a knife attack and tried to force him to convert. The Salafists, who say they base their religion on the practices of the first three generations . . . Read More

Christian’s six-year sentence upheld

April 27, 2012 Egypt Asyut, Blasphemy, Copts, Egypt, Islamic extremism, Prophet Muhammad

A judge in Upper Egypt has upheld a six-year prison sentence for a Coptic Christian wrongly convicted of “blasphemy” against Islam and inciting sectarian strife, his lawyer said. The judge in Assuit on April 5 refused to strike down a Feb. 29 sentence delivered to Makarem Diab, 49, of the . . . Read More

Muslim assailants in Egypt escape prosecution

April 20, 2012 Egypt Aswan, Education, Egypt, Hosni Mubarak

A recent “reconciliation meeting” between members of a Muslim mob that attacked a Christian-owned school in Egypt and school administrators was nothing less than an attempt at legalized extortion, the director of the school said. In exchange for peace, members of the sword-wielding mob that stormed the school last month . . . Read More

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