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Egypt arrests 59 Muslims after clash with Copts
12 May 2007 08:10:58 GMT Source: Reuters
CAIRO, May 12 (Reuters) - Egyptian security forces have arrested 59 Muslims who took part in clashes with Coptic Christians over church construction in a village south of Cairo, security sources said on Saturday. They said prosecutors ordered the arrests after taking the testimony of 10 Christians who were hurt in the clashes on Friday in which hundreds of villagers from both faiths fought with sticks and hurled bricks and firebombs at one another.
The sources said at least 10 Christian houses and five shops were gutted by fire during the clashes in the village of Behma, about 60 km (40 miles) from the Egyptian capital. Egyptian authorities were still assessing the damage.
Relations between Muslims and minority Coptic Christians in Egypt are generally peaceful despite sporadic violence, but restrictions on building churches have been one of the main grievances of Egypt's mainly Coptic Christian community.
Christians comprise up to 10 percent of Egypt's roughly 75 million people, with the remainder being primarily Sunni Muslim.
Security sources said rumours that village Christians did not have a permit for church construction had sparked anger among Muslims that turned to violence after Friday prayers when about 300 Muslims clashed with a group of about 200 Christians.
Security sources said Christians had told authorities that the Friday sermon at a village mosque had discussed ongoing church construction, sparking anger among worshippers who emerged from the mosque in a large group and then moved to the church, where clashes erupted.
Police intervened to stop the clashes and sealed off the village, initially detaining 17 people of both faiths, the sources said. They could not immediately say if any Christians remained in police custody.
A spokesman for Egypt's interior ministry confirmed that around 500 Muslims had gathered after Friday prayers, and that the entrances to three homes had been set on fire. He said three people were hurt in the commotion but declined to characterise it as a clash.
One security source said Christians in Behma were expanding a house that was used informally for prayer, although others said the Christians were constructing a new church from scratch. The sources could not immediately say whether the Christians had obtained proper building permits.
Egypt suffered its worst Christian-Muslim clashes in decades in 1999, when 20 Christians were killed, 22 people wounded and scores of shops destroyed in sectarian strife in the southern village of Kosheh.
In February, Muslims set fire to Christian-owned shops in southern Egypt after hearing rumours of a love affair between a Muslim woman and a Coptic Christian man.
Last year, a 45-year-old Muslim man stabbed a Coptic Christian man to death and wounded five others in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria, sparking three days of sectarian clashes in which one Muslim was killed. Egypt says the attacker was mentally ill.
God, this people are just like animals! At first these particular group of Muslims go to pray in their mosque and then they put houses of Christians on fire! These people don't allow any other religion next to them; someone should teach them tolerance!!!! Posts: 30135 | From: The owner of this website killed ES....... | Registered: Feb 2004
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Property dispute sparks violent clashes between Egyptian Christians, Muslims
By Agence France Presse (AFP) Saturday, May 12, 2007
CAIRO: Nine Egyptians were wounded Friday when clashes broke out between Muslims and Christians south of Cairo, security sources said. The violence, in the village of Bamha, 25 kilometers from the capital, was sparked by Muslim anger over plans to build an extension to a church on a disputed strip of land wedged between the church and a mosque.
After Friday prayers, worshippers at the village's main mosque began distributing leaflets that read: "We condemn the building of churches in our beautiful town."
"The leaflet was found by a local Coptic resident who gathered other Christians and headed for the mosque," another source told AFP.
Copts and Muslims threw stones and sticks at each other, leaving about nine people injured. Hundreds of security forces were rushed to the scene, sealing off the village and making 15 arrests.
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Muslim Riots Over Church Construction in Egypt Were Preplanned -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted GMT 5-18-2007 14:35:39 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The sectarian violence that erupted on Friday in the village of Bimha, in the Ayat district 70 kilometres south of Giza, seemed less a spontaneous outburst fuelled by wrangling among villagers than a premeditated act. Pamphlets had been distributed throughout the village before a mob, armed with everything from machetes to containers of kerosene, ran amok through the village. Within 40 minutes, 36 houses belonging to Christians had been burned and seven shops looted. Ten villagers were in hospital, two in a critical condition. At the time of going to press 35 alleged perpetrators were being questioned while another ten remain at large. A Christian man was subsequently detained, charged with throwing a plastic bag filled with inflammable liquids into a Muslim prayer area on Sunday.
Pamphlets distributed ahead of the violence called on Muslim villagers who wanted to "protect" their religion to gather after Friday prayers, in order to stop the construction of a church in their village. The pamphlet included the rumoured location of the church and concluded by saying that the time to act had come: "there must be no more laxity, no more laziness... it is necessary that every Muslim protects his religion otherwise all is lost."
While there are reports that some Christians were threatened as early as Thursday, the security forces arrived three hours after the riot began. Observers have claimed that tardy responses are typical of the security forces' strategy, which seems to involve a wait and see approach to sectarian violence, after which they move in, but only after the violence has abated. Then, they begin to attempt to clean up the mess.
Raouf Abdallah, a Coptic school teacher and part-time farmer, was working in his fields on Friday morning when he heard women screaming that their homes had been broken into and set on fire.
"When I arrived at my brother's house, I was restrained by two older men who told me that I should stay out of the house while the others finished the job inside. They said that they didn't want any killing, and that they were just there to destroy our belongings."
The mob, said Abdallah, comprised all age groups, from the very young, to elderly men. "The ghafar [local guards] were also among rioters, they used their rifles to whip people," he says. After putting out the fire in his brother's house, he went to help extinguish fires in the homes of his aunt and fiancée. "They took all the electrical appliances, the jewellery I had bought my fiancée and burned what was left," Raouf said. He also reports that in some incidents, Muslims tried to protect the property of their Christian neighbours.
"This is not the first time that this has happened in the Ayat area. Similar incidents have occurred in the villages of Girza, Izbit Wasfi Ghali, and in the town of Ayat itself," says 38- year-old accountant and Bimha resident, Magdy Ayaad.
Bimha's Christian families had long gathered in the home of fellow congregation members Atif and Arian Youssef in order to worship. Following negotiations between the clergy and security forces, it was agreed that a place of worship could be built, though without any domes or crosses which might anger the local community. After the first floor of the building was completed in 2005, construction was halted by security officials after complaints raised by local residents.
Subsequently a compromise was reached, with Christians allowed to pray in their old places of worship, the home of Atif and Arian Youssef. To compensate the two congregation members, whose home would henceforth be a dedicated space for worship, Atif was to receive money and land, while Arian opted to finish the church's partially constructed building and make it his home. "The problem is that there is a great deal of fear, anger, and ignorance regarding the presence of a church especially among young people," said Ayaad. When the rioting started, some 2,000 people began to demolish the partially constructed building.
"I predict that this will happen again now that the rioters know they can get away with it," Ayaad said.
Ayat's parish priest, Makary Labib, says that Christians are often forced to use roundabout ways to build places of worship. It is a result, he says, of the difficulties involved in obtaining a building permit for a church.
"No church had been built in the town of Ayat since 1962. A presidential decision was announced in 1973 allowing a permit for building, but then it was revoked. It wasn't until 1996 that the church could open," says Labib.
Asked about possible solutions to recurrent outbreaks of sectarian violence Mounir Fakhry Abdel-Nour, the Coptic secretary-general of the liberal Wafd Party, said the question is raised on an almost monthly basis. "We talk about it for 24 hours then forget it for 30 days, until another problem happens," he said.
"The media on both sides of the issue seem to bolster a position of fanaticism, while the true roots of the problem are cultural and educational," argues Nour.
Coptic intellectual Kamal Zakhir finds that the most alarming dimension of this latest incident is the involvement of "simple villagers" and not extremist groups. It shows, he said, how deep-rooted fanaticism has become in society.
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This makes me sick. And the worst part is, the violence against the Copts will go on forever. Thats just lovely.
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