Coptic in Egypt

[Astor]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110422/...93ZHNwcm90ZXM-

So much for the solidarity and brotherhood shown during the Tahrir Square protests.
Now, I know it mentions that there are a few Copts amongst the protesters;

"The crowds also included Christians who object to the governor on the basis that Christian leaders often fail to adequately defend their cause because they feel compelled to side with Muslims in sectarian disputes to demonstrate good intentions."

So they're against him because of how muslim pressure on him will negatively affect them.

And now they're holding democratic elections, and if the article is true, and Salafists have as many adherents as the Copts, things look pretty bad for them. Here's what your Arab Spring gives you.
Countries that are simply not ready for a democracy.

[Dr. Oza]

I will put up a little post i made a while ago in a similar thread, though that thread was expressing shock that Muslims would protect Copts.

Here it is:

Something many people in the West don't realize is that these people (copts and muslims) and such diverse peoples throughout the middle east (Assyrians in Iraq, etc) have been living in peace and fraternity for at least a thousand years. The fringe groups benefit from people generalizing isolated and sporadic actions to condemn an entire religion to its supposed "violence," and when that is done, the terrorists benefit.

This event highlights how the Egyptian Muslims have always lived, worked, and toiled alongside their Coptic christian brothers for generations and share bonds of kinship that no fringe group can break. This is an example of the norm, not of the out-of-place. The Western media and public have only been paying attention to the middle east for the last 10-30 years, while these people, Christian or Muslim, or Jewish, or Arab, or Turk, or Copt, and etc... have been living in peace for more than a thousand.

The point is that your post is trolling. You are implying that these people are incapable of democracy because they are in some way inferior. The truth is that Copts and Muslims have nearly always been at peace and have shown remarkable cooperation and solidarity throughout their long history and throughout the last few months. Isolated acts and acts that are actually based on socio-cultural and not religious divides cannot be used to define and bash an entire movement for democracy and peace.

I would worry about Germany being "Ready" for democracy, wasn't it only 60 or so years ago that they attempted to genocide some 14 million people?

The Egyptian people and that includes Christians, Muslims, and anyone else have no deep strains of hatred, Copts are usually poor, Muslims are usually poor, you know who is rich and (was) in power? The oppressive rulers. Copts, Muslims and all lovers of freedom overthrew them and now they will be trekking slowly onwards to redefining their nation.

The road might be hard, it might be tumultuous and at times incidents may make people, the least of all High and Mighty Europeans, doubt their intentions and their route. But one thing is clear, the themes, history, motifs and declarations of the so called "Arab Spring" (Must be name everything based on some old European Event (Prague Spring) are indicative of progress and tolerance, not hate.

[PointOfViewGun]

Link.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

CAIRO: Protests against the appointment of Qena’s new government continued for the third consecutive day on Sunday.
Eyewitnesses said the demonstrations against the appointment of General Emad Shehata Mikhael as governor of the Upper Egypt province were due to his career as a police officer. However, some of Qena’s Christian residents have accused the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafi Group there of instigating the protests.
Demonstrations started after Friday prayers on April 15 from the Tahrir Mosque in Qena to the governorate building, asking for the Mikhael’s removal and citing his police career. Salafi participants said they were there to protest because Mikhael was a Copt.
Protesters cut the main Cairo-Aswan Road and the road leading to the trains. They’ve held a sit-in on the railroads connecting Upper Egypt since Saturday.
Thousands surrounded the governorate building, while others marched the surrounding streets.
Eyewitnesses told Daily News Egypt that Islamist groups had a strong presence at the demonstrations, but most citizens were objecting to having a former policeman as governor.
Prominent Coptic lawyer Naguib Gobrael told Daily News Egypt, “The Brotherhood and the Salafis are the ones that organized the demonstrations. But they took the simple citizens as cover so it would appear that the citizens are protesting against the governor being a policeman.
“There are police generals who have been appointed governors, so why didn’t they face any objections? The situation in Qena confirms that the Islamic groups in Qena don’t want a Christian governor.”

So basically once again we have the minority stealing the real news. Most people are not protesting because he's a Christian but a police officer.

Link.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Thousands of mostly Muslim protesters swelled through the streets of the Egyptian city of Qena on Friday to demonstrate against the recent appointment of a new Coptic Christian governor.
Crowds gathered Immediately after prayers outside the city’s mosques, chanting against Gov. Emad Mikhael and Prime Minister Essam Sharaf: “Oh Sharaf, say the truth … you’re being unfair to us or not?” and “Oh freedom where are you ... Mikhael is standing between us and you.”
Mikhael, a police general who served under former President Hosni Mubarak, is the only Copt among 18 new governors named by Sharaf on April 14. The decision was met by anger and exasperation from the city’s Islamic extremists and ultra-conservative Salafi groups.
Protests broke out the day after Mikhael’s appointment, but they have intensified in recent days as demonstrators blocked the railway road connecting Qena with Cairo, about 300 miles to the north, as well as several other main highways.
Copts had joined the protests in the early days of the protests because of Mikhael's connection to the former Mubarak regime. Mikhael had been appointed a police general by former Interior Minister Habib Adli, who is currently on trial for corruption charges and is allegedly responsible for giving orders to shoot protesters during the Jan. 25 national uprising.
But the demonstrations took on sectarian tones when conservative and extremist Islamists, who are vehemently opposed to a Coptic governor, increased their numbers amid the ranks of protesters. Government officials, including Interior and Local Development ministers as well as a number of Muslim clerics, visited Qena in an attempt to calm passions.
“The governor of Qena has not and will not resign and there are no alternatives. Objections based on his religion are unacceptable,” Cabinet spokesman Ahmed Al Saman said Wednesday. A day later, Sharaf expressed a willingness to visit Qena and listen to protesters’ demands when he returns next week from a tour in a number of Persian Gulf states.
Protests were condemned by the Coalition of the Jan. 25 Youth, who rejected the “sectarian and discriminative” slogans chanted in demonstrations. The Muslim Brotherhood has also voiced its concerns, saying that no one is entitled to block or halt railways and everyday activities.
Qena, which has a large community of Copts, has witnessed an increase in sectarian violence over the last few years. In January, three Muslims were found guilty of killing six Copts and a Muslim in a drive-by shooting outside a church in the governorate’s town of Nag Hammadi 12 months earlier.

[motiv-8]

So basically once again we have the minority stealing the real news. Most people are not protesting because he's a Christian but a police officer.

Alternatively, Salafists being dickheads is neither news nor indicative of the relationship between regular Egyptians. Makes the OP and its sweeping generalizations and falsified conclusions look really stupid either way.

[garudamon11]

Link.


So basically once again we have the minority stealing the real news. Most people are not protesting because he's a Christian but a police officer.

Link.

OP is owned

[mongrel]

Two attempts at this and still owned?

[Blaze86420]

Close thread?

[MehemtAli_Pasha]

it all started out with all residents, both Copts and Muslims, in Qena protesting against the new governor being part of the fallen regime, until of course the Salafists decided to hijack the protest and started chants against a Christian governor, even going as far as raising the Saudi flag.