Egypt: 100 arrested in riot over Facebook comments “insulting” to Islam

A hundred people were arrested for assault and rioting Wednesday evening after a large group of Islamists attacked Coptic Christian houses and a church in the village of Deir El-Bersha in the Minya governorate, Agenzia Fides reports. The rioting was triggered by Facebook comments made by a young Coptic man that were considered insulting to Islam and the prophet Muhammed.

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Christian watchdog says abduction of Coptic Christian women and girls in Egypt is a “bane”

A Christian watchdog group has published a report describing the widespread trafficking and abduction of Coptic Christian women and girls in Egypt as a “bane”, CBN News reports. Coptic Solidarity released its report "Jihad of the Womb: Trafficking of Coptic Women & Girls in Egypt" last Thursday. The report will be submitted to United Nations agencies and the US Office for Trafficking in Persons.

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Egyptian Churches Encounter Administrative Hurdles on Path to Legal Status

As Egypt continues to go through the process of becoming more officially inclusive of Coptic Christianity, many Christian leaders complained on August 5th that fewer churches had been granted legal status this time around by the presidential committee appointed for the task by Abdel Fattah el-Sisi.

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Egypt Legalizes Over 1,000 Churches in Apparent Bid to Create Tolerant Islamic Society

The Egyptian government on Monday approved legalization of 127 churches, the culmination of a 2016 law by which President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi sought to make the world’s largest Arab nation more officially inclusive of Coptic Christianity.

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Mob Violence Terrorizes Small Christian Village in Egypt

International Christian Concern (ICC) has learned that on September 14, a Muslim mob in the village of Tawa in Minya attacked the local Coptic Christian community. Homes, businesses, and cars were destroyed and three Copts suffered minor injuries. These attacks were in retaliation against a Facebook post which was widely shared among Christians. The author, a 22-year-old Christian resident of Tawa named Bassem, had written the post in May following the deadly attack by Islamic extremists against a caravan of Coptic Christians traveling to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor.

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