Egypt has not been a safe place for Christians recently, with extremist attacks on Coptic churches and individuals increasing and death tolls mounting, including a horrific bombing on New Years Day:
A devastating New Year's Day terrorist bombing at a Coptic church in Egypt that killed 21 people was the latest in a spate of violent assaults against the Middle East's vulnerable Christian communities.
The car bomb explosion also injured 79 people just after midnight Saturday as worshipers were leaving a New Year's Mass at the Saints Church in east Alexandria, Egyptian officials said.
But just as things seemed darkest for Egyptian Copts, a light appeared in the form of their Muslim neighbors:
Egypt’s majority Muslim population stuck to its word Thursday night. What had been a promise of solidarity to the weary Coptic community, was honoured, when thousands of Muslims showed up at Coptic Christmas eve mass services in churches around the country and at candle light vigils held outside.
From the well-known to the unknown, Muslims had offered their bodies as “human shields” for last night’s mass, making a pledge to collectively fight the threat of Islamic militants and towards an Egypt free from sectarian strife.
“We either live together, or we die together,” was the sloganeering genius of Mohamed El-Sawy, a Muslim arts tycoon whose cultural centre distributed flyers at churches in Cairo Thursday night, and who has been credited with first floating the “human shield” idea.
Among those shields were movie stars Adel Imam and Yousra, popular preacher Amr Khaled, the two sons of President Hosni Mubarak, and thousands of citizens who have said they consider the attack one on Egypt as a whole.
Muslims, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Hindu, whatever. We are all human beings. We all are simply trying to better our lives and create a better tomorrow for our children.
An insanely small minority of religion extremists of all faiths dominate the news cycle, and a handful of Muslim extremists are enough for charlatans like Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller to spend hours and hours stirring up hatred, fear, and the sense that we are mortal blood enemies.
The mainstream media and the hate merchants will never report on what happened yesterday in Egypt, where real people of faith came together and said "no more" to religious violence.
Government will never do it. These are the true Christians and the true Muslims. These are the peacemakers.