On Saturday a 16-member-committee affiliated to the Interior Ministry succeeded in defusing the sectarian dispute which erupted in the Minya governorate village of Badraman and left one villager dead and 18 injured. It was one of two sectarian clashes that took place in Minya last week. In Badraman the violence was fed by a rumoured affair between a Muslim girl and Christian boy. The homes of two Coptic families were burned down in the ensuing violence. Youanas Shawki, bishop of Delga Church, attended the reconciliatory session. “Four of the injured are still in serious condition,” he said. According to Shawki tensions started when a Muslim girl fled her home with the help of two young Coptic men and hid in the house of a Coptic family to escape from her father. “The girl's father, who found her in the Copts' house, forced her to undergo a medical check-up to ensure that she was a virgin,” says Shawki. Security forces spread through the village, says Minya's security director Sami Metwalli, and used tear gas and water cannon to disperse the crowds. Copts have long complained of discrimination. But many anecdotal stories, claims Abdallah Al-Naggar, a member of the Islamic Research Center (IRC), “are phony”. “God Almighty says in the Holy Quran ‘Let there be no compulsion in religion…' Coptic claims are nothing more than pressure cards which they use to secure some gains,” insists Al-Naggar. “The church,” railed Al-Naggar, “goes on fire if a Christian woman disappears, while if the same thing happened to a Muslim woman nothing happens.” Such claims fly in the face of the evidence. In May 2011, when a woman was rumoured to be held in a Coptic church in Cairo after converting to Islam, attacks in Imbaba left 12 dead and 240 injured. Yet Al-Naggar insists, “Copts are using all possible cards to pressure the government to respond to their requests. This is evident in the recently fabricated tension in Badraman village.” The second incident saw violence erupt in the neighbouring villages of Nazlet Ebeid and Al-Hawartah when a Coptic man from Nazlet Ebeid fenced off a piece of land in Al-Hawartah. Muslim villagers, suspicious that the plot was going to be used to build a church, entered into verbal altercations with the man's family which quickly degenerated into armed clashes. Human rights organisations accuse the government of failing to take the steps necessary to protect Egypt's Christian minority. They have called for an independent investigation into the recent attacks against Copts and their property. Ishak Ibrahim, a researcher at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, says more than 55 Copts were injured in the two incidents. “Both occurred because the perpetrators know they will go unpunished. The law will not be applied. Such incidents are a form of collective punishment, with the violence directed at people who have nothing to do with the original disputes.” Amnesty International, the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, Egyptians against Religious Discrimination, Andalus Institute for Tolerance, Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, the Arab Network for Human Rights Information and the Arab Penal Reform Organisation issued a joint statement condemning the authorities for their failure to prevent sectarian clashes. “No concrete action is taken to combat these clashes,” says Dina Al-Tahawi of Amnesty International. “Copts' feelings of vulnerability are increasing despite the 30 June Revolution. Any hopes that Christians would feel more secure following the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi have been dashed.” Emad Gad, a political analyst at Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, says that Copts have now become a target for discontented Islamists who openly accuse the Church of playing a role in Morsi's overthrow. There have always been isolated sectarian incidents, says Gad, though these were never enough to undermine the bonds that existed between Muslims and the Christian community. The worry now is that individual incidents are forming a pattern.
