Tag: Copts

Sinai Christian shot after ‘confessing’ his faith

May 10, 2016 Egypt Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, Copts, Egypt, El-Arish, Islamic extremism, Sinai

A Coptic civil servant was killed in Sinai, Egypt, after his vehicle was stopped and passengers were asked if any “Christian infidels” were on board. Messak Nasralla, 58, was going about his business as a government medical supplier when he was found dead last week, south of Arish, reports in . . . Read More

Coptic teenager kidnapped for ransom in Upper Egypt

April 21, 2016 Egypt Copts, Egypt, Kidnapping, Qena

The News Earlier this month, a young Christian boy was kidnapped in Upper Egypt, before being released 12 days later after the payment of a hefty ransom. Anthonius Farag, 13, was snatched outside his school early in the morning on April 5, in the village of Mansheyyit Manbal, off Matay . . . Read More

UK Coptic bishop receives Welby’s highest award

April 4, 2016 Bishop Angaelos, Copts, Egypt, Justin Welby, Middle East, UK

The Archbishop of Canterbury has given his highest award to , for his “exceptional services to the cause of Christian unity”. Justin Welby said to Bishop Angaelos, in presenting the Lambeth Cross for Ecumenism, “My encounter with Orthodoxy through you has been a really profound experience … It has changed . . . Read More

Egypt: Copt cleared of Facebook ‘blasphemy’

April 4, 2016 Egypt Blasphemy, Copts

A Coptic Christian, Bishoy Kameel Garas, has been declared “innocent” after he served more than half his six-year sentence for charges including defamation of Islam. Garas, now in his late twenties, was jailed in September 2012 for offending the country’s dominant religion, the then-Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, and a Muslim . . . Read More

Egypt: ‘suicide’ claim for third Christian conscript in nine months

March 8, 2016 Egypt Asyut, Conscripts, Copts, Egypt

Another Egyptian Christian conscript has died in suspicious circumstances. Michael Gamal, 22, was due to finish his two-year compulsory military service this May, when his family heard the shock news of his ‘suicide’. Last time his family heard from him was Feb 15. “As often, we talked over the phone. . . . Read More

Coptic headmistress denied promotion ‘for being Christian’

March 2, 2016 Egypt Copts, Minya

An Egyptian headmistress is not being instated in her post “because she’s a Christian.” This is the claim surrounding the case of Mervat Sefein, a vocational teacher in Beni Mazar, a town of Minya, 220 km south of Cairo. Sefein was included on a Feb. 8 Egyptian Ministry of Education . . . Read More

Egypt sentences ‘anti-Islam’ teens to 5 years

February 25, 2016 Egypt Blasphemy, Copts, Egypt, Gad Younan, Islamic extremism, Islamic State, Minya

Three Egyptian Christian students accused of “offending Islam” were sentenced today (25 Feb.) to five years each, Coptic news site Watani said. Muller Atef, Albert Ashraf and Bassem Amgad were given jail terms, while a fourth, Clinton Maged, is due to be remanded in a juvenile facility for five years, according . . . Read More

How romance across Egypt’s religious divide forces women and Christians to pay a high price

February 22, 2016 Egypt Converts, Copts, Women

A street in a neighbourhood of Tamia, Egypt, where the romance began.World Watch Monitor Not for the first time in Egypt, a romance between a Muslim divorcee and a Copt eventually ended in tragedy late last year, when the woman, who had ‘converted’ to Christianity, was killed by members . . . Read More

Year since Libya, Christians move closer to unity

February 15, 2016 Egypt Bishop Angaelos, Copts, Egypt, Libya, Middle East, North Africa, Pope Tawadros II

A year ago today (15 Feb.), 20 Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian killed by Islamic jihadists in Libya were announced as martyred saints by the Coptic Pope, Tawadros III of Egypt. The head of the ancient Church, the largest in the Middle East and key within its branch of Oriental Orthodoxy, said . . . Read More

Egypt: Coptic teens tried for video ‘mimicking jihadists’

February 12, 2016 Egypt Blasphemy, Copts, Gad Younan

A year since members of the so-called Islamic State killed 20 Egyptian Copts and one Ghanaian in Libya, Egypt is set to judge four young Copts for alleged blasphemy. The four teenagers, aged 15 to 17, appeared in a 30-second video clip, mocking the militants’ show of Islamic piety in . . . Read More

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