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Breaking News - Wednesday October 29, 2003 EGYPT : EGYPT CRACKS DOWN AGAINST CONVERTS TO CHRISTIANITY Former Muslims Forbidden to Change Their Identity Papers
Mohammed Kordy, his wife, two daughters In a harsh crackdown over the past 10 days, Egypt’s state security police have arrested and tortured a Christian couple from Muslim background, along with 11 other Egyptian citizens accused of forging Christian identity papers for former Muslims.
At least 10 more Christians have since been detained and subjected to torture in the sweep, said to be headed by two security police officers known for illegal and cruel tactics against Christian converts.
The convert couple, Mohammed Ahmed Imam Kordy and his wife Sahar El-Sayed Abdel Ghany, was arrested in Alexandria on October 18. The police action apparently came after the wife was implicated in a complaint extorted under police torture that she had helped another Egyptian woman secure false identity papers.
Two days after their detention, the two were transferred to a Cairo police station, where they were beaten, hung by their arms, and bloated with painful amounts of air blown into their bodies. They were denied any food while detained under intense interrogation in central Cairo’s El-Mosky police station, where they were logged under administrative case No. 3793 for 2003.
The husband and wife were not brought before the prosecutor until October 22, four days after their arrest. Under Egyptian law, the police are required to produce accused detainees before a prosecutor within 24 hours of their arrest.
The couple reportedly told the prosecutor that they had indeed changed their own names, with the husband taking the name Yousef Samuel Makari Suliman, and the wife changing her name to Mariam Girguis Makar.
However, they declared that they did not know it was illegal for them to change their religious identity. Since it was commonly known that Christians in Egypt could convert to Islam and change their identity papers, they stated, they assumed that Muslims had the same rights.
The couple named two Coptic priests who they said had helped them change their religious identity, both of whom have died in the past three years.
Although lawyers intervened to obtain the couple’s release on bail, the wife was sent to prison October 23 for a month while the case is under investigation. Her husband was ordered released but remains under charge. The couple has two teenage daughters.
Meanwhile, 11 more arrests were reported, including the arrests of three Coptic women who had converted to Islam several years ago but have since returned to their Christian faith. The three, identified as Soheir Hosni Sedky, Fawzeya Azmy Estafanos and Marina Morcos Shenouda, face charges of bribing government employees and obtaining false identity papers.
In addition, Compass has obtained the names of eight government employees known to have been arrested in connection with the case. Two of them, Reda Zaghloul and Amal Wadi’I, are women.
Another, a Christian named Aziz Zakhary Armanios, was employed in security directorate offices in Beni Swef, a governate in southern Egypt. Armanios was arrested in Cairo on accusations of preparing Christian identity papers for 2,800 Egyptian Muslims who had become Christians. His detention has been ordered extended for 45 days by the prosecutor.
Detainee Samir Sa’ad has been identified as a Coptic Christian who had converted to Islam and then tried to return to Christianity. An employee in the civil records office in Dokki, Cairo, Sa’ad was reportedly tortured to confess the names of Muslims who had converted to Christianity.
An additional 10 Christians have been detained in the widening sweep of arrests said to be organized by Lt. Sayed Zaky, a criminal investigation officer known for following illegal procedures in detaining Christians.
Although Lt. Zaky informed the prosecutor that the newly accused Christians had been arrested off the street, local sources confirmed that in fact they were taken forcibly from their homes in the middle of the night. “They were breaking down doors, searching their homes, abusing the parents in front of their children, all in a very humiliating way,” the sources said.
Those arrested are reportedly being tortured by Lt. Walid El-Dossoky, assigned to the state security police headquarters in Lazogly. Because of El-Dossoky’s long-term reputation for inflicting cruel torture upon particularly the women Christian converts, numerous complaints have been filed to human rights organizations against him.
Although Egypt’s Coptic Christians make up more than 10 percent of the national population, the government is accused of blatant “religious apartheid” for its discriminatory laws favoring the Muslim majority.
While Christian citizens who want to convert to Islam are free to adopt Muslim names and change their official religious identity, these rights are denied to Muslims who convert to Christianity. Under the law, it is not illegal for an Egyptian to convert from one religion to another, but in practice, Muslims who become Christians face arrest, torture and ongoing threats to their lives.
In the face of such persecution, many such converts have tried to change their religious status without government permission, leaving themselves open to the charge of falsifying official documents.
In the wake of this latest crackdown, a group of former Muslims who have converted to Christianity issued an anonymous declaration from Cairo on October 26.
“We are between the jaws of the constitution and the legislation,” the Christian converts stated, noting the dilemma between constitutional guarantees of freedom of belief and Islamic law demanding that unrepentant apostates be executed.
Asserting their rights as Egyptian citizens to equal treatment under the laws of the land, the converts demanded that all cases of falsified identities against Christian converts be dropped unconditionally.
“The Egyptian government is itself responsible for this illegal action,” the declaration stated, “because it has deprived us of one of our basic legal rights, to embrace a new faith and change our name, our identity and our official papers. Give us our rights, and we will not falsify these things.”
“Is it logical,” the converts asked, “that the person who chooses a religion other than Islam is accused of blasphemy, and the opposite is not applied?” In fact, the statement noted, Egypt’s Christians were all being given the freedom to change their beliefs. “But here Muslims are persecuted, because they are not enjoying that same right!”
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I really hope you're not trying to create a religious war here. Despite all these problems Egypt is known to be the biggest example of coptic muslim integration.
I sense things will get very hot in this thread, I just hope no fights will occur. If you're civilized enough please try not to allow this to happen whoever means to post something here.
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focus, jutta is trying to learn about Egypt and Islam. Obviously she is bumping into a lot of bad propaganda. It takes many years to understand the great relations between Copts and Muslim Egyptians, as well as the great bond and friendships that existed between egyptian Mulims, Christians, and Jews for years in Egypt.
But it takes a few texts on the internet, to start a fire...and believe it is a war, ongoing between Copts and Muslims, and how the Government of Egypt treats them unfairly.
Jutta for your info: The most successful business man in Egypt is a Copt!!!
quote:Originally posted by focus683: I really hope you're not trying to create a religious war here. Despite all these problems Egypt is known to be the biggest example of coptic muslim integration.
I sense things will get very hot in this thread, I just hope no fights will occur. If you're civilized enough please try not to allow this to happen whoever means to post something here.
[This message has been edited by Monica (edited 04 May 2004).]
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Copying and Pasting articles can be a useful tool if you want to use the information to back up a point you are trying to make or use it as reference to a discussion. So, what is your point Jutta?
Posts: 3291 | From: I DO believe in Karma! | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Monica: focus, jutta is trying to learn about Egypt and Islam. Obviously she is bumping into a lot of bad propaganda. It takes many years to understand the great relations between Copts and Muslim Egyptians, as well as the great bond and friendships that existed between egyptian Mulims, Christians, and Jews for years in Egypt. But it takes only one or two texts on the internet, to start a fire...and believe it is a war.
Hi Monica, hi Focus, thanks Monica, I am fine and I have a very good time. But you are right: I am learning. And I try to learn from any point of view. Here are some people who are so offensive against US, Europe, Westeners or whatever, and you are asking me if I want to start a war, just because I am copying an article, WITHOUT giving any comments about it, just asking if people are differently treated in Egypt? I think this is not fair! If we all can be so critical about world politics, whats about to be critical about Egypt?
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Just another quick thought, when you are reading websites, especially ones of a political or religious nature, it helps to know who is behind the website. Many many sites are popping up that one would believe to be credible in nature but are in reality are just propaganda and lies from people wishing to spread more hate. Know the true source of your information.
[This message has been edited by Laura (edited 04 May 2004).]
Posts: 3291 | From: I DO believe in Karma! | Registered: Apr 2002
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My logic tells me: if you are on an Egyptian board...people will tend to defend Egypt .. try an American message board and start shooting articles against them..what will you get you think??? same as here...some will approve, some will try to defend, and some will give you explanations of this and that... It's just a board..and we're exchanging ideas...some of us know the History and the social infrastructure more than others that's all!
Egyptian mentality 101: We love Egypt unconditionally ~ even if we critize it ourselves ~ to approach us with CONSTRUCTIVE criticism is great with the right attitude....we will discuss and rationalize, but we will NEVER put Egypt down either...bad propaganda, hate stories etc...flood the internet on all issues anyway...it is an open highway after all...
And that is Egyptian jutta.
Remember: Me and and my brother against my cousin but..................................... Me and my cousin against the stranger
quote:Originally posted by Jutta3: Hi Monica, hi Focus, thanks Monica, I am fine and I have a very good time. But you are right: I am learning. And I try to learn from any point of view. Here are some people who are so offensive against US, Europe, Westeners or whatever, and you are asking me if I want to start a war, just because I am copying an article, WITHOUT giving any comments about it, just asking if people are differently treated in Egypt? I think this is not fair! If we all can be so critical about world politics, whats about to be critical about Egypt?
[This message has been edited by Monica (edited 04 May 2004).]
quote:Originally posted by Laura: Just another quick thought, when you are reading websites, especially ones of a political or religious nature, it helps to know who is behind the website. Many many sites are popping up that one would believe to be credible in nature but are in reality are just propaganda and lies from people wishing to spread more hate. Know the true source of your information.
[This message has been edited by Laura (edited 04 May 2004).]
Amen to that. A lot of Coptic organisations in the US are just as unauthentic in their reporting and dubious in their motives as Islamic fundamentalists. On one site I read that 6 million Coptic girls were raped by Muslim men in Egypt last year, which is just incredible given there are less than 6 million Coptic women in all in Egypt according to the biggest estimate.
And Jutta3, what posts against westerners do you mean? I don't see anything as incredible and unsupported as your post except maybe Shamila's psycho babble.
quote:Originally posted by Laura: Just another quick thought, when you are reading websites, especially ones of a political or religious nature, it helps to know who is behind the website. Many many sites are popping up that one would believe to be credible in nature but are in reality are just propaganda and lies from people wishing to spread more hate. Know the true source of your information.[This message has been edited by Laura (edited 04 May 2004).]
You are right, Laura. But from what can you see, if it's just propaganda or if it's the truth? I am working for a big internet provider in Germany and I can tell you, that normally nowadays we even should not believe any photo, video or whatever, because it can be faked in any way. And I am sure, that even the so called "proofs" of the most important news agencies are not true sometimes.
quote:Originally posted by Monica: hello jutta, My logic tells me: if you are on an Egyptian board...people will tend to defend Egypt .. try an American message board and start shooting articles against them..what will you get you think??? same as here...some will approve, some will try to defend, and some will give you explanations of this and that... It's just a board..and we're exchanging ideas...some of us know the History and the social infrastructure more than others that's all!
Egyptian mentality 101: We love Egypt unconditionally ~ even if we critize it ourselves ~ to approach us with CONSTRUCTIVE criticism is great with the right attitude....we will discuss and rationalize, but we will NEVER put Egypt down either...bad propaganda, hate stories etc...flood the internet on all issues anyway...it is an open highway after all...
And that is Egyptian jutta.
Remember: Me and and my brother against my cousin but..................................... Me and my cousin against the stranger
[This message has been edited by Monica (edited 04 May 2004).]
;-)) maybe this has to do something with national pride which I did not understand through my whole life and which I will never understand - not only for Egypt, but for the whole world. As I always trying to see people as human beings whatever they do and whereever they come from.
quote:Originally posted by kimo_the_maniac: Amen to that. A lot of Coptic organisations in the US are just as unauthentic in their reporting and dubious in their motives as Islamic fundamentalists. On one site I read that 6 million Coptic girls were raped by Muslim men in Egypt last year, which is just incredible given there are less than 6 million Coptic women in all in Egypt according to the biggest estimate.
And Jutta3, what posts against westerners do you mean? I don't see anything as incredible and unsupported as your post except maybe Shamila's psycho babble.
Hi Kimo, what do you mean by "incredible and unsupported"? I just asked a question in the headline without commenting anything!!!!
quote:Originally posted by Jutta3: Hi Kimo, what do you mean by "incredible and unsupported"? I just asked a question in the headline without commenting anything!!!!
Well I meant the cp stuff obviously!!!!!!!!
Well, once again a stimulating discussion. In answer to the topic title, NO there are no different laws for different religions in Egypt except in family matters because of divorce and polygamy and stuff. That's as far as the judicial and legislative branches are concerned. The police, well God knows, I am a Muslim male and they may still hurt me.
Jutta3, there are lots of republican boards on the net where no one criticises Bush, visit some of them if all of us are getting on your nerves. BTW is CNN getting on your nerves too, it has been talking about those pics for days.
quote:Originally posted by kimo_the_maniac: Well I meant the cp stuff obviously!!!!!!!!
Well, once again a stimulating discussion. In answer to the topic title, NO there are no different laws for different religions in Egypt except in family matters because of divorce and polygamy and stuff. That's as far as the judicial and legislative branches are concerned. The police, well God knows, I am a Muslim male and they may still hurt me.
Jutta3, there are lots of republican boards on the net where no one criticises Bush, visit some of them if all of us are getting on your nerves. BTW is CNN getting on your nerves too, it has been talking about those pics for days.
I dont know what you want to tell me Kimo, but to assure it one more time: I am no American, I even dont like Amercia as I have travelled there a lot and worked there, I am German, I hate Bush and his politic, I would never even read any republican boards as well as I would not even read any Nazi boards, and YES, CNN is getting on my nerves, as well as Al-Jazeera is getting on my nerves, as well as BBC, regarding the normal news, is getting on my nerves. I try to get a "somehow" objective picture by watching 5 or 6 different international channels to see what the puzzle be as a whole picture.
quote:Originally posted by Jutta3: I dont know what you want to tell me Kimo, but to assure it one more time: I am no American, I even dont like Amercia as I have travelled there a lot and worked there, I am German, I hate Bush and his politic, I would never even read any republican boards as well as I would not even read any Nazi boards, and YES, CNN is getting on my nerves, as well as Al-Jazeera is getting on my nerves, as well as BBC, regarding the normal news, is getting on my nerves. I try to get a "somehow" objective picture by watching 5 or 6 different international channels to see what the puzzle be as a whole picture.
And I don't know what you want to tell us either Jutta. You are okay overall, so I will just ignore these two manifestations of ingenuity you wrote and read your other posts which ain't bad at all.
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The titles of your threads jutta....then a C&P text...then nothin'...no point no question.. Provocative.....................very medianesque
Posts: 2385 | From: Heliopolis, Cairo, Egypt | Registered: Aug 2003
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quote:Originally posted by Monica: The titles of your threads jutta....then a C&P text...then nothin'...no point no question.. Provocative.....................very medianesque
Sorry Monica, what is "medianesque"? I did not find it in my dictionnary. Can you explain it to me? I guess it has something to do with "how to present news in the media". And yes ;-)) maybe that comes from my work in the media branch ;-))
Media ~ nesque= a way of describing a media style ~ media 'provocative' allure....
Anyway, I have to say you created some action around here!! Always nice talking to you!!
Sorry Monica, what is "medianesque"? I did not find it in my dictionnary. Can you explain it to me? I guess it has something to do with "how to present news in the media". And yes ;-)) maybe that comes from my work in the media branch ;-))[/QUOTE]
quote:Originally posted by Laura: Just another quick thought, when you are reading websites, especially ones of a political or religious nature, it helps to know who is behind the website. Many many sites are popping up that one would believe to be credible in nature but are in reality are just propaganda and lies from people wishing to spread more hate. Know the true source of your information.
Good point, especially when you get your information from the internet. Jutta, we had a discussion about a similar subject on ET - someone had posted an article about systematic forced conversion and abduction of Coptic girls in Egypt. It seemed that many supposed facts stated in this article did not bear close examination ... http://egypttalk.net/cgi-local/ikonboard.cgi?s=aba54f44392192342054db134a9e496c;act=ST;f=1;t=6468
[This message has been edited by Dalia (edited 04 May 2004).]
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Most bitterness between the Copts and Muslims are isolate incidents like El Kosheh. Many Coptics and Muslims in southern Egypt have always gotten along with each other and still do to this day. Most of the tension was during the late 90's with a group called Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya that targeted Coptics to eliminate what many percieved as Western influces from Egypt.
The goverment of Egypt,however,does have a nasty habit of treating the Muslim and Coptic peasent like dirt. Police go into villages,push people around,and even beat people to get confessions out of people. This has been going on for quite a while,but nobody really cares about the Egyptian Fellahin in Lower or Upper Egypt. This is the true crx of the situlation. Religious conflicts are just one part but not the whole part of the problem.
Many Coptics who migrate to America greatly exagerate their experiances in Egypt. Most are working hand in hand with religious right-wingers who wish to dominate or control Egypt through their branch of spirtual imperilism. Beware of Western missionaries or religious leaders that claim they come to Egypt to help the Copts. Alot are also claiming that modern Muslim Egyptians are Arab invaders.
Posts: 8675 | From: Tukuler al~Takruri as Ardo since OCT2014 | Registered: Feb 2003
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Sensationalism, Exaggerations, Outright Lies. Reminds me of when I was back in the states and watching the news coverage of the Invasion of Kuwait. Iraqi Soldiers were raping women left and right according to all the news reports. The city was burning. People were fleeing right and left. I was horrifed at the grisly picture they were painting of the whole situation.
13 years later I was having coffee with my husbands cousins who were visiting and the subject came up of life in Kuwait since they live there as many of my husbands relatives do. He himself lived and worked there for many years up until the invasion. I then started to ask a few questions concerning how they could remain there given the horrible situations going on, weren't they terrified, weren't they afraid of being killed? Why didn't they leave? I then brought up the situation of all the women being raped by the soldiers.
Well the bottom line is that in all of this there was only one woman raped. ONE, yes that is tragic but it just goes to show what people can do in manipulating and outright lying concerning events. People woke up in the morning and went about their business. Most weren't even aware what had happened. Everyday life went on in Kuwait. The soldiers came in quietly and took over quietly. There was no bedlam and horrific crimes being committed against the Kuwaiti citizens and foreigners living and working there.
End of monologue.
[This message has been edited by Laura (edited 04 May 2004).]
Posts: 3291 | From: I DO believe in Karma! | Registered: Apr 2002
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yes, Laura, remember that grisly story about Iraqi soldiers throwing Kuwaiti babies on the floor, out of their incubators? after all the media hype it turned out the whole story originated from one source.. the only witness... the daughter of the US ambassador.. interesting coincidence, isn't it?
it gives a complete picture of life and torture under Saddam, the complete history of Middle east wars and violence from independent sources, role of the US in all of this, consequences of the sanctions, health related DU information, it is very informative!
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Well I don't know from where you got these info but I can assure you that they are false. Converting to any religion in permitted in Egypt and an example is an actress I don't want to say her name to avoid any problems but she converted to Islam to get divorced from her Christian husband than she converted back to Christianity without any complications and she is a public figure. I want also to say that I am a muslim and I was in a Christian school and nuns and sisters used to teach us and all of our families didn't mind in addition to that my 2 best friends are christians and we have never faced a problem concerning our religions. If you want to learn about Coptics and Muslims for real you should consult a reliable source and not refer to bias fake sources from over the net. One thing I learned in college is that to support your claim you have to get reliable evidence and cite it and not just cite whatever source you found that suits your preferences.
Posts: 2 | From: Egypt | Registered: Jun 2004
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jutta, i am muslim and i had been raised in a coptic school, saint georgo colledge and most of my teachers were christans. When the religion period come, muslims go the islam class and the same goes for the coptics. My best friend was christan catholic egyptian and we used literally do everything together. As the police is torturing coptic, they also torture muslims. There is no difference, we all know that the goverment is corrputed. It hurts when i see these kinda of articles and hurts more when ppl post them on forums.
[This message has been edited by BahYBasha (edited 27 June 2004).]
Posts: 180 | From: halifax, nova scotia, canada | Registered: Jun 2004
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