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Christian Muslim Riot In Egypt Coptic

Juan Cole 04/16/2006

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Christian-Muslim Riot in Egypt

Coptic protests in Alexandria, Egypt, got so out of control on Saturday–turning into a Christian-Muslim riot– that Egyptian police intervened to arrest 15 persons. The protests were against the knife attack on Easter Friday by an unbalanced man at Coptic churches, which left one man dead. Copts charged that Muslim fundamentalists were behind the attack, and rejected the description of the man as unbalanced. The Muslim Brotherhood condemened the attack, but a spokesman on Aljazeera managed ungraciously to add that a lot of Muslims get beaten up and hurt by the Egyptian government (i.e. implying that Copts are coddled by Mubarak while good Muslims get the jack boot.)

In fact, the attacker was likely from al-Zawahiri’s Islamic Jihad, i.e. al-Qaeda, and was trying to polarize sectarian relations in Egypt. It worked.

The real mystery? Why this isn’t news in the United States.

Egypt comprises one-third of the Arabs, and the Copts are probably 6 or 7 million strong, and so are the biggest Christian community in the region.

I guess those small town American murder mysteries and missing white women just take precedence.

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About the Author

Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Professor of History at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page

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