The Commentator (UK)
Sunday 08 May 2011
Breaking News: Islamists torch church in Cairo – 10 dead, hundreds injured
The toll of dead and injured continues to rise as yet another anti-Christian “pogrom” raises fears over direction of post-Mubarak Egypt.
At least 10 people are dead and 185 are injured, some seriously, after Islamists burned down two churches in a Cairo suburb overnight in a bloody rampage against Coptic Christians. It was the second assault on Egyptian Christians in less than a month.
Hundreds of Salafist radicals massed outside the Saint Mina Church on Saturday night firing guns, and throwing Molotov cocktails, bottles and rocks amid rumours swirling through the country’s Muslim community that a Coptic Christian’s wife had converted secretly to Islam and was being held in the church against her will. The woman in question has appeared on television to deny the rumours but Salafists and their supporters refuse to believe her.
Police and soldiers intervened at the scene but the mob then moved on to another church, Saint Mary’s, and torched it too. The Egyptian cabinet met in emergency session on Sunday to address the matter. On March 9, another church was burned down on the same pretext, leaving 13 dead.
Christians represent around 10 percent of Egypt’s population and complain of systematic discrimination by the Muslim majority.
The country is also gripped by mass anti-Semitism. A 2006 survey by Pew showed 97 percent of Egyptians admitting to having an unfavourable opinion of Jews, 82 percent describing their views as “very unfavourable”.
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Meanwhile, back in Syria, the Arab Spring is open season on unarmed protestors, and at the White House it’s a good time of year for another round of “sanctions” – and golf.
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