If you’re a Christian in a Muslim dominated country, you are marked for death. Yet, when Muslims come to the United States they demand to be treated special by refusing to assimilate into the culture. However, our constitution dictates that we be tolerant of other faiths and offer them equal protection under the law.That is not the case in the Middle East and it is unacceptable that the same kind of tolerance does not exist there!
Until I see the day that Christian churches can be built in Saudi Arabia and other Muslim dominated countries, until I see the day that so-called moderate Muslims will begin to speak out against the killing of Christians, and until I see the day that Muslims in the Middle East can demonstrate religious tolerance such as we have here in the United States, I will continue to view these people as perpetrators of peace and faith.
CBS News reports that a powerful bomb, possibly from a suicide attacker, exploded in front of a Coptic Christian church as a crowd of worshippers emerged from a New Years Mass early Saturday, killing at least 21 people and wounding nearly 80 in an attack that raised suspicions of an al Qaeda role.
The attack came in the wake of repeated threats by al Qaeda militants in Iraq to attack Egypt's Christians. A direct al Qaeda hand in the bombing would be a dramatic development, as Egypt's government has long denied that the terror network has a significant presence in the country. Al Qaeda in Iraq has already been waging a campaign of violence against Christians in that country.
Police initially said the blast came from an explosives-packed car parked outside the Saints Church in the Mediterranean port city. But the Interior Ministry later said it was more likely from a suicide bomber who blew himself up among the crowd. Both tactics are hallmarks of al Qaeda and have been rarely used in Egypt, where the government crushed an insurgency by Islamic militants in the 1990s.
Though the government of President Hosni Mubarak denies an al Qaeda presence, Egypt does have a rising movement of Islamic hard-liners who, while they do not advocate violence, adhere to an ideology similar in other ways to al Qaeda. There have been fears they could be further radicalized amid growing sectarian tensions between Egypt's Muslim majority and Christian minority. Nearly 1,000 Christians were attending the New Year's Mass at the Saints Church, said Father Mena Adel, a priest at the church.
The service had just ended, and some worshippers were leaving the building when the bomb went off about a half hour after midnight, he said. "The last thing I heard was a powerful explosion and then my ears went deaf," Marco Boutros, a 17-year-old survivor, said from his hospital bed. "All I could see were body parts scattered all over - legs and bits of flesh."
Blood splattered the facade of the church, as well as a mosque directly across the street. Bodies of many of the dead were collected from the street and kept inside the church overnight before they were taken away Saturday by ambulances for burial. Some Christians carried white sheets with the sign of the cross emblazoned on them with what appeared to be the blood of the victims. Mubarak vowed to track down those behind the attack, saying "we will cut off the hands of terrorists and those plotting against Egypt's security."
"This terrorist act has shaken the conscience of the nation," he said in a statement, adding that "all Egypt was targeted, and terrorism does not distinguish between Copt and Muslim."
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