Islamic Mob Burns Down Church in Egypt

‘Kill all the Christians,’ local imam tells villagers.

CAIRO, March 8 (CDN) — A Muslim mob in a village south of Cairo last weekend attacked a church building and burned it down, almost killing the parish priest after an imam issued a call to “Kill all the Christians,”  according to local sources.

The attack started on Friday evening (March 4) in the village of Sool, located in the city of Helwan 35 kilometers (22 miles) from Cairo, and lasted through most of Saturday. A local imam, Sheik Ahmed Abu Al-Dahab, issued the call during Friday afternoon prayers, telling area Muslims to kill the Christians because they had “no right” to live in the village. The attack started several hours later.

The Rev. Hoshea Abd Al-Missieh, a parish priest who narrowly escaped death in the fire, said the clamor of the church being torn apart sounded like “hatred.”

“I was in the attack, but I can’t describe it,” he said. “The sound of the church being destroyed that I heard – I can’t describe it, how horrible it was.”

According to villagers, the mob broke into the Church of the Two Martyrs St. George and St. Mina, and as they chanted “Allahu Akbar [God is greater],” looted it, demolished the walls with sledgehammers and set a fire that burned itself out the next morning. Looters removed anything valuable, including several containers holding the remains of venerated Copts – most of whom were killed in other waves of persecution – then stomped and kicked the containers like soccer balls, witnesses said.

After the fire went out, the mob tore down what little remained of the church structure. The group of Muslims then held prayers at the site and began collecting money to build a mosque where the church building once stood, said the assistant bishop of Giza the Rev. Balamoun Youaqeem.

“They destroyed the church completely,” he said. “All that was left is a few columns and things like that. As a building, it’s all gone.”

During the fire, Al-Missieh was trapped in a house near the church building that was filling up with smoke. He faced a difficult dilemma – choke or burn to death in the house, or face an angry mob of thousands screaming for blood.

“When the smoke was too much, I told myself, ‘I am dying anyway,’ so I decided I would go out and whatever happened, happened,” Al-Missieh said.

When he went outside, a man with a rifle told the priest to follow him. At first Al-Missieh was reluctant, he said, but the man fired off two rounds from the rifle and told the crowd to step away.

“No one will touch this man, he is with me,” the priest remembered the man yelling at the mob. Al-Missieh was taken to a house where he met three other workers who were at the church when it was attacked. The men all relayed stories similar to the priest’s.

Friday’s attack was another in a long list of disproportionate responses in Egypt to a rumor of an affair between a Muslim and a Copt. Earlier this month, Sool villagers accused a Muslim woman in her 30s and a Coptic man in his 40s, both of them married, of being involved with each other. On Wednesday (March 2) a village council of Coptic and Muslim leaders convened and agreed that the man should leave the village in order to avoid sectarian violence.

The next day, the woman’s cousin killed the woman’s father in a fight about the honor of the family. The same day, the cousin died of wounds he sustained in the fight. By Friday, Al-Dahab, the local imam, had blamed the entire incident on Christians in the village and called on all Muslims in Sool to kill them.

Because of the attack, Copts in Sool fled to adjacent villages. The women who remained in the village are now being sexually assaulted, according to Youaqeem, who added that he is receiving phone calls from women in the village begging for help. Those reports have not yet been independently confirmed.

“Everybody tried to find a way to get out,” Youaqeem said.

Groups of Muslims have set up blockades around Sool, declaring they intend to turn it into an “Islamic village,” Youaqeem said.

On Sunday (March 6), roughly 2,000 people gathered outside the Radio and Television Building in Cairo to protest the attack and what Copts see as a long-standing government refusal to address or even acknowledge the persecution of Christians in Egypt. Protestors also accused the government of not sending enough troops to the village to control the situation. Holding up crosses and signs, the protestors shouted the name of Jesus and chanted, “We need our church.”

Soldiers armed with AK-47s with fixed-sheathed bayonets held the crowd back from the building as several priests took turns addressing the crowd. When the Giza parish priest, Bishop Anba Theodosius, said the army had pledged to rebuild the church but would not give a written guarantee of the promise, the crowd became enraged and pushed through the line of soldiers.

No one was injured in the push. More protests about the attack continued Tuesday in Cairo.

Youaqeem said the attack has devastated and enraged the Coptic community, but he sees hope.

“As they say – ‘All things work to the good of those who love the Lord,’” he said.

Report from Compass Direct News

Christian Assaulted in Orissa State, India

Extremists in Kandhamal vowed to kill a Christian around date of Hindu leader’s death.

NEW DELHI, September 9 (CDN) — Suspected Hindu nationalists in an area of Orissa state still tense from 2008 anti-Christian violence beat a Catholic father of seven until he fell unconscious on Aug. 20, the 47-year-old victim said.

Subhash Nayak told Compass that four unidentified men assaulted him as he made his way home to Laburi village from the hamlet of Kapingia in Kandhamal district. Hindu extremists in Kandhamal district killed more than 100 people in several weeks of attacks following the murder of Hindu extremist leader Swami Laxamananda Saraswati.

An 80-year-old monk who for decades spearheaded the anti-conversion movement in Orissa’s tribal-dominated areas, Saraswati was shot dead on Aug. 23, 2008. Area church leaders such as Biswajit Pani of Khurda told Compass that villagers in Laburi have planned to attack at least one Christian around that date every year.

Nayak said the assailants left him for dead.

“I could not see their faces as it was very dark, and they tried to poke my eyes with their sticks,” said Nayak, still in pain. “They stomped on my chest with their feet and hit me relentlessly till I fell unconscious. They left me thinking I was dead.”

Nayak said that he was returning from work at a construction site in Kapingia when, about a kilometer from his home in Laburi, a stone hit him. Four men appeared and began beating him.

The stone struck him in the forehead between 7 and 8 in the evening as he was riding his bicycle, he said.

“As I fell on the road with sharp pain, figuring out who hit me, four people came and started to hit me with wooden sticks,” Nayak said.

Asserting that no one had any personal enmity toward him, Nayak said that Hindu extremists in Kandhamal district have been telling people, “We destroyed and burned their houses and churches, which they have rebuilt, but now we will attack their lives, which they cannot rebuild.”

Pani and another area Christian, retired school teacher Tarsish Nayak, said they also had heard Hindu nationalists spreading this message.

Nayak recalled that a year ago, while returning to his village at night around the anniversary of Saraswati’s murder, he heard someone whispering, “Here he comes … He is coming near,” at which point he fled.

“There were people hiding, seeking to attack me,” he said.

Saraswati, a leader of the Hindu extremist Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council), was assassinated by a Maoist group, but Christians were falsely blamed for it. The ensuing anti-Christian attacks killed more than 100 people and burned 4,640 houses, 252 churches and 13 educational institutions. Violence also erupted in Kandhamal district during Christmas week of 2007, killing at least four Christians and burning 730 houses and 95 churches.

The area where Nayak lives and works was one of the worst-hit in the anti-Christian attacks that took place after Saraswati’s assassination.

After regaining consciousness, Nayak strained to stand up and felt blood dripping down his cheeks, he said. His bicycle was lying at a distance, its front light broken.

Nayak said he was not sure how long he lay unconscious on the road, but it was 11 p.m. by the time he managed to walk home. He said it was only by God’s grace that he “slowly, slowly reached home.”

“‘I am dying,’ were my words as I entered home and fell unconscious again,” Nayak said.

His wife Mamta Nayak, two of his children, his parents and eight villagers carried the unconscious Nayak on a cot three kilometers before getting him into an auto-rickshaw and on to Raikia Government Hospital at 1 a.m.

A doctor was summoned from his home to attend to Nayak, who required stitches on the right side of his forehead. He sustained injuries to his right knee, face, an area near the ribs and chest, and he still has difficulty chewing food, Nayak said.

“I feel nausea and pain in my head as I move my jaw,” he said.

Feeling weak from blood loss, Nayak received a saline solution intravenously for eight days in the hospital. He said he earns very little and had to sacrifice some of his valuables to pay the medical expenses. The doctor advised him to undergo a head scan, which he has eschewed as he cannot afford it, he said.

Pani told Compass that Nayak has refused to file any complaints with police out of fear of retaliation.

Nayak explained, “The police will not take any action, and we have seen in the past that I will be threatening my life by doing so.”

Report from Compass Direct News

INDIA: NEWS BRIEFS

Recent Incidents of Persecution

Andhra Pradesh, March 19 (Compass Direct News) – Hindu extremists armed with sticks assaulted a pastor, seriously injuring him, on March 11 in Medak. About 30 extremists from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh stopped pastor Ezra Krupanamdam as he was returning from a prayer meeting at the home of a recently converted Christian, reported the All Indian Christian Council. The intolerant Hindus beat, punched and stomped on him. The pastor was found lying in a pool of blood and was rushed to a hospital. A medical examination showed that he sustained fractures to his spinal cord and ribs. At press time the pastor was in intensive care at Gandhi hospital. Area Superintendent of Police Bhaskar Reddy told Compass that four extremists were arrested in connection with the attack.

New Delhi – About 12 Hindu extremists armed with rods and hockey sticks assaulted a pastor and his family and threatened to murder them on March 8 in India’s capital. The extremists beat Apostolic Assembly Church pastor A.K. Wilson, his wife and son and took 15,000 rupees (US$290) from them, reported the Evangelical Fellowship of India. Warning the Christians not to continue their ministry, the Hindu hardliners threatened to burn their house and kill them if they did not vacate their home in one week. Pastor Wilson told Compass that he and his family sustained minor injuries; he added that he believes the attack was planned rather than spontaneous. The pastor filed a police complaint with Uttam Nagar police, and Station House Officer R. K. Tyagi told Compass that an investigation was underway.

Uttar Pradesh – Hindu extremists in Unnao accused a pastor of forceful conversion on March 8 and threatened to destroy his church building. A source told Compass that the extremists tried to enter pastor K.K. Vimal’s house at about 11 p.m. shouting denunciations of Christianity and falsely accusing him of hitting a neighbor’s car and forcibly converting people. The pastor locked the doors and hid in the attic. The intolerant Hindus told the pastor to leave the area and to stop leading worship meetings. Unable to enter his home, they filed a police complaint and returned to the pastor’s house with seven officers. After questioning, police found the accusations against the pastor were baseless. The Hindu hardliners, however, threatened to destroy his church building, shouting, “We’ll see how big a pastor you really are.” Pastor Vimal told Compass that he has relocated to another area.

Karnataka – Hindu extremists from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council) disrupted a prayer meeting and threatened Christians on March 6 in Bangalore. The Global Council of Indian Christians reported that Siloam Brethren Assembly Church members had gathered in new church premises at about 7 p.m. for an inaugural prayer meeting when the Hindu extremists barged in. Led by a Hindu hardliner identified only as Ramamurthy, they disrupted the meeting, verbally abused the Christians and threatened to harm them if they met for Sunday worship on March 8. Church leaders filed a police complaint, and two police officers were posted on the church premises. A church representative told Compass that Sunday worship service was not conducted on March 8, as police advised church leaders against it.

Andhra Pradesh – Upper-caste Hindu extremists on March 1 attacked the Sunday worship of a church in Khammam. The All India Christian Council reported that the extremists attacked pastor Isaac Ravi as he was leading the service, disconnected the power supply and beat the pastor and other Christians, including women and children. The attackers also damaged the church’s furniture and sound system, shouting that there was no place for Christians in the area. A police complaint has been filed against the assailants, but no First Information Report has been registered.

Uttarakhand – Police on March 1 beat a Christian after detaining him in Dehradun. The Global Council of Indian Christians reported than an unidentified group had repeatedly disturbed church meetings at a rented home by playing high-volume music during services the past few months. Pastor Kuldeep Singh filed a complaint against them at Patel Nagar police station on Feb. 24, and at about 10 a.m. on March 1, as Sunday worship was about to begin, officers arrived and took the Christian renting the house, Sanjay Verma, into custody. Some of those Pastor Singh had named in the complaint had summoned police to the site. Officers beat Verma and detained him for about two hours. Christians gathered at the police station to support Verma, according to the Evangelical Fellowship of India, and police urged them to reach a compromise with those disturbing their worship services. The Christians refused, as members of the opposing group insisted that they would stop playing loud music only if the Christians stopped worshipping. The church moved worship services to another venue.

Himachal Pradesh – Hindu extremists armed with sticks assaulted a Christian on Feb. 26 in Damtal. According to the Evangelical Fellowship of India (EFI), Joginder Masih had gone to a local shop when a group of extremists began following him and making derogatory comments about Christianity. Masih asked the Hindu hardliners to stop, and they beat him relentlessly. EFI reported that the intolerant Hindus opposed construction of a church building that Masih and other Christians had begun. Area Christians said they believed the attack was premeditated, with the extremists trying to provoke Masih into retaliating. Sustaining minor injuries, he filed a police complaint but no First Information Report has been registered.

Report from Compass Direct News