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| Today: | 13 |
| Yesterday: | 47 |
| Last Week: | 397 |
| This Month: | 899 |
| Last Month: | 675 |
| Total: | 2034 |
Egyptian Cleric Safwat Higazi Launches MB Candidate Muhammad Mursi's Campaign: Mursi Will Restore the "United States of the Arabs" with Jerusalem as Its Capital
Egypt's Coptic Christians complained of discrimination under Hosni Mubarak but fear it may get worse if an Islamist takes his place in next week's presidential election.
Long-suppressed Islamists already dominate parliament. Islamist contenders for the presidency say Christians, who form about a tenth of Egypt's 82 million mostly Muslim people, will not be sidelined, but mistrustful Copts will not vote for them.
The single biggest Coptic grievance and the source of most sectarian violence in Egypt is legislation that makes it easy to build a mosque but hard to construct or even repair a church.
An Egyptian court in Minya sentenced, on May 14, a Muslim man to death for the killing and wounding of six Christians. Judge Mahmoud Salama pronounced the sentenced against 29-year-old policeman Amer Ashour Abdel-Zaher. During its previous session, the court had referred the case to the Egyptian Grand Mufti, as is usual with a death penalty verdict, who supported the court's decision. Yesterday's court session was to pronounce the verdict.
In December, 2010 Abdel-Zaher, who worked as a policeman at the Bani Mazar police investigations unit, went on a train bound for Cairo from Assiut in the upper Egyptian town of Samalut and fired his gun at six Copts after chanting "Allahu Akbar".
The Egyptian filmmaker Yousry Nasrallah’s “After the Battle” is set in the heart of Cairo, his home ground. The story is about a clash between men on horseback and camels and young demonstrators in Tahrir Square on Feb. 2, 2011, during Egypt’s rebellion. The Battle of the Camels was a set-up by President Hosni Mubarak’s regime, a paid provocation to quell the revolution.
Near the rock-strewn scene of a bloody anti-army protest, Islamist, liberal and other politicians sat with ruling generals this month to haggle over Egypt's future after its first presidential vote since Hosni Mubarak's fall.
At stake in the Defense Ministry meeting, held just hours after 11 people were killed in another flare-up marring Egypt's transition to democracy, was who would write a new constitution and what powers would Mubarak's successor have.
No clarity has emerged.
When voting starts on May 23 and 24 in a presidential race that broadly pits Islamists against men who at one time or another served under Mubarak, Egyptians still won't know the next head of state's permanent job description.
PR Newswire – for immediate release
Policy Education Day July 8 & 9, 2011
WASHINGTON, July 15, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- In an important show of support to the Copts as they, and Egypt, go through difficult times, eight U.S. Congressmen addressed a Policy Education Day organized by Coptic Solidarity on July 8. Altogether, some thirty five speakers took part in the two-day event, including policy experts, human rights and legal experts and representatives of several Middle Eastern minorities and indigenous communities. The conference, held under the theme of "Will Religious and Ethnic Minorities Pay the Price of the 'Arab Spring'?", discussed such issues as the geopolitics of the Copts in Egypt; democracy prospects in Egypt; respect of human and minority rights; persecution before and after the Arab Spring; Muslim Brotherhood, Salafists and the Copts; aid to Egypt; building alliances; role of the media; and the Coptic Youth in the Revolt and in the diaspora.
Key among the conference's resolutions:
Work in close alliance and coordination with genuine democratic, liberal and secular civil society forces in Egypt in order to save the country from the drastic consequences of falling under the control of a regime based on totalitarian religious ideologies;
Help the international community understand the strategic, long-term, negative impact of misunderstanding the nature of, or flirting with, the forces of religious fascism trying to dominate Egypt and the region;
Call upon the international community to tie any aid to Egypt to the country's abiding, constitutionally and legally, by its commitment to international human rights conventions and treaties; and to ear mark part of the aid to compensate victims of religious hate crimes.
Join hands with other N.E. religious minorities and indigenous communities to form a new regional organization that upholds values of secularism and human rights in the area;
Actively support the passage of resolutions H.R. 440 and S. 1245, on the appointment of a special envoy on religious freedom of N.E. religious minorities.
The Christian Copts are the native religious community of Egypt, descended from ancient Egyptians. They number around 15 million, including a large diaspora with more than half a million strong community of American Copts.
The Copts have been subjected to aggression and discrimination in Egypt at the hands of extremists and colluding authorities. Since the fall of Mubarak's authoritarian regime, the Coptic and other minority communities face an uncertain future shadowed by the prospect of a Muslim Brotherhood dominated government in the near future.
Coptic Solidarity is an INGO seeking to support of the Coptic community in Egypt and the protection of the fundamental human rights of all Egyptians.
For further information please contact:
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This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. - 202-725-3091
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SOURCE Coptic Solidarity
Coptic Solidarity is a U.S. public charity organization under section 501 (C) (3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Contributions are deductible under Section 170 of the Code.
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Coptic Solidarity Annual Conference
The next Annual Conference will be held in Washington, D.C. on June 28-30, 2012.
Please register as soon as possible register now
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