e_Paper, Tuesday, December 13, 2016

World
FACTBOX
Who are Egypt’s Coptic Christians?
• AFP, Cairo
Egypt’s Copts, targeted in a church
bombing that killed 25 people in Cairo
on Sunday, are the Middle East’s largest
Christian minority community, and also
one of the oldest.
Making up about 10% of Egypt’s population
of 90m, the Coptic Orthodox are
the largest Christian denomination in the
Muslim-majority country. Here is a recap
of their history, their status today and
past attacks against the minority.
‘Dawn of Christianity’
The Copts go back to the dawn of Christianity,
at a time when Egypt was integrated
into the Roman, then Byzantine empires,
following the end of the dynasty of the
Pharaoh Ptolemy, who was of Greek origin.
The word “Copt” has the same roots
as the term “Egyptian” in ancient Greek.
Their decline started with the Arab
invasions of the 7th century and the
progressive Islamisation of the country,
which today is largely Sunni Muslim.
The Bible says Joseph, Mary and Jesus
sought refuge in Egypt after Christ’s
birth to escape a massacre of newborns
ordered by King Harod.
Several churches and monasteries
in Egypt are believed to be built on sites
visited by the Holy Family during its flight.
Copts today
Copts are present across the whole
country, with the strongest concentration
in middle and southern Egypt, and
are represented in all social classes.
Most adhere to the Coptic Orthodox
Church of Alexandria, headed since 2012
by Pope Tawadros II, while a minority is
divided between the Coptic Catholic and
various Coptic Protestant churches.
Tawadros, who succeeded pope
Shenuda III, was chosen after a blindfolded
altar boy picked his name from a
chalice, according to custom.
The Catholic Copts, who form part of
the Church’s eastern rites, are headed by
patriarch Ibrahim Isaac Sidrak since 2013.
Vatican records show some 165,000
Catholic Copts lived in Egypt in 2010.
Weakly represented in government,
Copts complain that they are sidelined
from many posts in the justice system,
universities and the police.
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TUESDAY, DECEMBER 13, 2016
Deadly violence
Egypt’s Copts have also been the target
of deadly violence after the 2011 uprising
that toppled president Hosni Mubarak
and the 2013 ouster of his elected Islamist
successor after just one year of rule.
Islamist supporters of ousted president
Mohamed Morsi accused the Christian
community of supporting his overthrow.
They pointed to the appearance of
Tawadros alongside President Abdel
Fattah al-Sisi in July 2013, when the then
army chief, also surrounded by Muslim
and opposition figures, announced on
television Morsi’s removal.
More than 40 churches were attacked
nationwide in the two weeks after the
deadly dispersal by security forces of two
pro-Morsi protest camps in Cairo on August
14, 2013, Human Rights Watch said.
In October 2011, almost 30 people –
mostly Coptic Christians – were killed after
the army charged at a protest outside the
state television building in Cairo to denounce
the torching of a church in southern Egypt.
In May 2011, clashes between Muslims
and Copts left 15 dead in the popular
Cairo neighbourhood of Imbaba where
two churches were attacked.
In March the same year, 13 people
were killed in clashes between Muslims
and Copts in Cairo’s working class neighbourhood
of Moqattam, where around
1,000 Christians had gathered to protest
over the torching of a church.
On January 1, 2011, the unclaimed
bombing of a Coptic church killed more
than 20 people in Alexandria. •
DT