Tag: Alexandria

Egypt: Coptic church reopens 8 months after Palm Sunday bombing

December 4, 2017 Egypt Alexandria, Catholics, Churches, Copts, Egypt, Gharbia, Palm Sunday, Protestants, Tanta

A Coptic cathedral has been restored and reopened eight months after a suicide bombing there on Palm Sunday killed 28 and injured 74 others. St. George’s Cathedral in Tanta, the capital of the Gharbia governorate north of Cairo, has been renamed the Cathedral of St. George and the Martyrs, and . . . Read More

Egypt: Coptic woman stabbed after leaving Alexandria church

August 25, 2017 Egypt Alexandria, Copts, Egypt, Tanta

Bishop Pavli visited Amal Awad at Beit El-Neama Hospital where she was recovering from multiple stabbing wounds. (Photo: World Watch Monitor)

A 46-year-old Coptic woman in Egypt’s port city of Alexandria was attacked and stabbed multiple times by an unknown man after attending a church service on the evening of 21 August, reports Coptic news site Watani. When Amal Awad left the church of the Holy Virgin and Archangel Raphael, in . . . Read More

Security guard stabbed at church in Egypt’s Alexandria

July 19, 2017 Egypt Alexandria, Copts, Egypt, Islamic State

The front of the Al-Qiddisain (Saints) Church in Alexandria, Egypt. (Photo: Open Doors International)

A security guard was wounded on Saturday (15 July) at a Coptic church in the Egyptian port city of Alexandria, after an Egyptian Muslim stabbed him in the neck, a senior police official told AFP. The 24-year-old male perpetrator, an unemployed law-school graduate, attacked the 47-year-old guard with a knife after . . . Read More

Terrorist threat forces Egyptian Christians to cancel summer activities

July 13, 2017 Egypt Alexandria, Andrea Zaki, Asyut, Cairo, Copts, Egypt, Islamic State, Ismailia, Minya, Suez, Tanta, Terrorism

The churches of Egypt are temporarily shutting down their summer activities. “I asked all our churches and conference centres to cancel their trips and events for the next three weeks,” Dr. Andrea Zaki, president of the Protestant Churches of Egypt, told World Watch Monitor. “There is news they could be . . . Read More

Al-Azhar says Islam ‘totally incompatible’ with violence, as IS shifts focus to Upper Egypt

June 29, 2017 Egypt Al-Azhar, Alexandria, Anba Macarius, Copts, Islamic extremism, Islamic State, Minya, Mohamed Morsi, Sinai, Upper Egypt

Scholars at Cairo’s Al-Azhar University, the pre-eminent seat of Sunni Islamic learning, have submitted a bill to the Egyptian government, which “aims to reaffirm the total incompatibility between the violence justified by religious arguments and Islamic law”. As World Watch Monitor reported on 21 June, Al-Azhar has distanced itself from . . . Read More

Copt’s forgiveness of husband’s killer stuns broadcaster

April 25, 2017 Egypt Alexandria, Copts, Palm Sunday

A woman whose husband died intercepting one of the suicide bombers who attacked churches in Egypt on Palm Sunday has told Egyptian TV she completely forgives his killer, causing the news anchor to exclaim that Copts “are made from a different substance”. Naseem Faheem, the guard at St. Mark’s Cathedral . . . Read More

Easter for Egypt’s Copts: mourning loved ones amid tight security

April 18, 2017 Egypt Alexandria, Beheira, Cairo, Copts, Kom El-Loufy, Tanta

During Easter Mass in St. Mark’s Cathedral in Alexandria deacons carried pictures of the seven people killed in the Palm Sunday attack. Photo: Open Doors International

Christians in Egypt celebrated Easter amid tight security and in a sombre mood. While worshippers gathered in both Alexandria and Tanta, in the churches that were attacked last Sunday, authorities made a number of arrests in connection with other possible planned attacks. However, violence continued in Kom El-Loufy, in the . . . Read More

Killer of Coptic alcohol vendor sentenced to death

March 10, 2017 Egypt Alexandria, Copts

UPDATE (10 March) The murderer of a Coptic man killed “for selling alcohol” has been sentenced to death. Adel Soliman, 48, confessed to the murder of Youssef Lamei and said he would kill everyone who sold alcohol if he could, according to Egypt Independent. Lamei was killed as he sat . . . Read More

Egypt couple’s murder marks second attack on Christians during Copt Christmas

January 11, 2017 Egypt Alexandria, Copts, Egypt, Tala

Two Egyptian Coptic Christians found dead in their bed on 6 January – the traditional Christmas celebration for Copts – were murdered because of their faith, according to the brother of the dead woman. Police said robbery was the motivation for the deaths of Gamal Sami, 60 and his wife, Nadia, 48, . . . Read More

Coptic priests in Gulf meet to discuss challenges

August 13, 2016 Alexandria, Arabian Peninsula, Bahrain, Cairo, Copts, Egypt, Islamic extremism, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates

Egyptian priests serving in the Arab Gulf region have held their first conference to discuss challenges faced in the heartland of Islam: “Challenges facing Gulf priests and their wives”. The head of the largest group of Christians in the Middle East, Coptic Orthodox Pope Tawadros II led bishops and priests . . . Read More

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