Mohamed Abdel-Baky reports on the reaction to this week's threats against Copts Two national security threats were enough for the Egyptian government to beef up security measures in the country over the last five days. The first came from Iraq as a terrorist group linked to Al-Qaeda led a deadly attack on a Catholic church Sunday in Baghdad that killed 58 people and wounded nearly 80. Al-Qaeda in Iraq, named "the Islamic State of Iraq", claimed responsibility for the attack in an Internet message and tied it to claims that the Coptic Church in Egypt is holding two women who have converted to Islam. The group gave the Egyptian Coptic Church 48 hours to release the women and threatened that "if they were not freed Al-Qaeda would target Christians not only in Egypt or Iraq, but also across the Middle East," the statement said. The terrorist group specifically mentioned two Egyptian women, Camellia Shehata and Wafaa Kostantin, who are wives of Coptic priests and believed to have converted to Islam. It is also Al-Qaeda that is suspected of being behind attempts to smuggle packages containing explosive material through Egypt's airports, as well as the UK, the United Arab Emirates, Germany and Greece. Following the threats, the Egyptian government implemented a comprehensive enhancement of security measures around churches in all governorates and airports. For churches, the task is not easy as important events approach on the Coptic calendar, the nearest being a major Coptic festival that will be held in Luxor and that is expected to pull two million visitors from Egypt and abroad. The Saint Marry Guirguis Festival, organised every year for two weeks in Luxor, is considered one of the largest Coptic gatherings in Egypt. Luxor Gov Samir Farag told the local media that new checkpoints were set up on the road leading to the monastery of Saint Guirguis on Zuriyqat Mountain, where Christians gather to celebrate the birthday of the saint. Farag added that extra security measures would remain in place until the festival is over. Another event that is expected to attract hundreds of thousands of Egyptian Christians in mid-November is the 39th anniversary of Pope Shenouda III's ascension to the papacy of the Egyptian Coptic Orthodox Church. In Al-Abbasia neighbourhood, where the main Coptic cathedral is located, security was tightened in advance of the anniversary. A security guard at the cathedral told Al-Ahram Weekly that more soldiers have been added to the original detail that guards the church at all times. At the gate, all visitors are asked to show ID, searched by security, and pass through an electronic security gate. The two threats come a few weeks before parliamentary elections in Egypt. Some experts who spoke to the Weekly believe regional powers are behind them, mainly Iran and Israel. "Copts in Egypt have never been a target of Al-Qaeda or any armed Islamist group. It is a brand new tactic; to focus on destabilising the situation in Egypt before the parliamentary elections," said Abdel-Rehim Ali, an expert on terrorist groups. Ali said that holding hostages in an Iraqi church for the sake of Muslims in Egypt does not make sense. He believes that all indications are that a regional power is behind the attack. "The only regional state that has the ability to push Al-Qaeda to do anything for its interest is Iran, which has a history of offering assistance to the group and shelter to its leaders," Ali said. He added that since the US invasion of Iraq, there was no incident that linked any terrorist group in Iraq to any group in Egypt. Ali argues that destabilising the Egyptian regime at this time is a top priority for the Iranians, who disagree with the close Egyptian and Saudi relationship with the United States. Other experts like Fouad Allam, a retired major general in Egypt's state security responsible for counter- terrorism, told the Weekly that Al-Qaeda is not thinking about Egypt at this stage. "Egypt has eliminated all the groups that could be affiliated to Al-Qaeda, after the Dahab attack in 2006, so the group has no capacity to launch any attack, like bombing a church," Allam said. Allam is also suggesting that the group statement could have been fabricated by many possible sources interested in generating tension between Copts and Muslims in Egypt in a hot political season. On Monday, Lebanese news websites published quotes from the former head of Israeli Military Intelligence Amos Yaldin saying that Israel was working hard in the last couple of years to infiltrate Egypt in order to destabilise its regime and leave it busy with internal divisions. Disagreeing with Allam and Ali that a regional power may be behind the church attack, political analyst Wahid Abdel-Meguid said that Al-Qaeda in Iraq wanted to attract attention and restore its image in the Arab world by targeting Christians and the sensitive issue of relations between Muslims and Copts. For his part, Amr El-Shobaki, an expert at the Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, said, "an attack by Al-Qaeda in Egypt, Europe or the US, similar to those that have been launched in Iraq, is not possible." Though El-Shobaki did warn that other fundamentalists in Egypt could use Al-Qaeda as cover for sectarian violence against the Coptic Church.
