INFO on Wafaa Constantine & Camilla Shehata case in Egypt used by ISI to kill Iraqi Christians. Both attempted to convert to Islam to divorce allegedly abusive husbands but never actually did convert [They may have been duped]

From AP,

The wives of two Egyptian Coptic priests, forbidden by the Church from divorcing their abusive husbands, desperately sought another way out by converting to Islam. When their intentions were discovered, police handed them over to the Church and their whereabouts since have been unknown.

The cases caused a furor at home that spilled over the borders and turned deadly when al-Qaida in Iraq cited the women as the reason behind the bloodiest attack ever on Christians in Iraq — a five-hour siege of a church in October that left 68 people dead.

Both Wafaa Constantine, 53, and Camilla Shehata, 25, lived in remote rural towns and enjoyed prestige as devoted and pious wives of conservative Coptic priests [but were being abused].

Though Egyptian religious authorities say the women never succeeded in converting, the controversy in both cases escalated with angry protests by Egyptian Christians, who accused Muslims of abducting the women and forcing them to convert.

Egypt's Salafi movement — extreme conservative Muslims — have long accused the Coptic Church here of conspiring to "Christianize" Egypt. Though Salafis in Egypt reject violence, their doctrine is only a few shades away from that of groups such as al-Qaida. Both adhere to a strict interpretation of Islam that supposedly is a purer form of Islam said to have been practiced by Islam's Prophet Muhammad in the 7th century.

The Salafis have set up dozens of websites and Facebook groups to spread the word about the two women.

Police said they handed Constantine [who briefly disappeared in December 2004] over to the Church after she came to police for help [after someone used her deteriorating relationship with her husband to try to convert her to Islam].

Her husband [a diabetic who lost a leg to it] later died in 2006.

Egyptian news reports said she [Shehata] too left her home [and husband Father Tadous Samaan] and disappeared for a few days.

Under heavy pressure from Islamists who accused the Church of holding her against her will, Shehata appeared in September in a videotape posted on an Egyptian news website, al-Youm al-Saba or the Seventh Day, insisting she had never converted to Islam.

"I am Christian and I will die as Christian," the young woman standing in front of a picture of Jesus said in the video. But many Muslims doubted its authenticity.

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Source: AP

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Comments: Typical Muslim double standards and failure to even grasp basic concepts of fairness, due to their supremacist beliefs that deny equality to non-Muslims.

It is sad to hear that Wafaa and Camilla were allegedly mistreated by their husbands. This is something that is forbidden in Christianity, unlike in Islam where wife beating and spousal rape (some in US, UK and Afghanistan say husbands can have sex with their wives without their consent) is allowed.

And as usual, some Muslims try to take advantage of it and try to convert these women, while in their religion apostasy is considered a capital offense.

Christians are free to chose their religion and there are many in the West who (unwittingly) convert to Islam (with some becoming terrorists).

But Muslims will kill those leaving Islam while trying unfairly to convert others, like these vulnerable women here.

This is totally illogical. It's like a child that thinks only of itself and can't think of others.

The reason why these Muslims don't treat others as equal is because of Islamic supremacist beliefs that treats non-Muslims as inferior. They always complain about minor issues and ignore far worse things being done by Muslims.

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Some previous similar or related stories:

Christian convert from Islam, Nurta Mohamed Farah, 17, killed in Somalia. Her parents treated conversion as mental illness & tortured her [Death for apostasy in Islam]

“Barbaric” Baghdad church attackers now to target all Christians with “sword of slaughter”, call Copts “dog”, Catholics “idolaters” and insult Pope [Islamic State of Iraq or ISI killing and threatening Iraqi Christians over Wafaa Constantine & Camilla Shehata]

Conspiracy theories and blame games: South Sinai governor, Mohamed Abdul Fadil Shousha says Mossad could be behind Sharm el-Sheikh shark attacks [Conspiracy theories are widely believed by Muslims suffering from delusion of persecution so they would easily believe the story that the Wafaa Constantine & Camilla Shehata are being held hostage.]

Musa Sayed, 45, and Ahmad Shah, 50, awaiting trial and facing death penalty in Afghanistan for conversion to Christianity from Islam [Death for apostasy in Islam]

Ex-Muslim Atheist Palestinian, Walid Husayin, facing life sentence for “insulting” Islam as some call for his death for apostasy [Death for apostasy in Islam]

WikiLeaked US embassy UK cable: Muslims most unemployed and disabled, some supports killing for Islam, and apostates (6 percent) [Death for apostasy in Islam, in the UK!]

UAE supreme court rules Sharia allows wife and child beating if no marks left [Wife beating allowed in Islam]

For similar or related stories posted after this article (if any), copy the title of this article and paste it in the search box on top of the page and click search or click on the 'Lables' below.

Conspiracy theories and blame games: South Sinai governor, Mohamed Abdul Fadil Shousha says Mossad could be behind Sharm el-Sheikh shark attacks

Last week, 'oceanic white tip sharks mauled three Russians and a Ukrainian tourist'² 'off the coast of Sharm el-Sheikh.'² 'In one of those attacks, a shark bit off an elderly woman's hand and tore off another woman's leg.'²

After those attacks authorities hunted down two sharks and reopened the beach deeming it safe.¹

'However, an Egyptian NGO warned on Saturday that at least one of the sharks behind the attacks was still at large.'¹

On Sunday an elderly³ German woman tourist snorkeler died after a shark 'mauled her thigh and arm'.¹

According to AFP, 'South Sinai governor Mohammed Shosha has said the sharks could have turned frenzied after a ship transporting livestock dumped dead sheep into the sea, while marine experts said overfishing may have forced them closer to shore.'¹

'Environmentalists warned that the string of recent attacks is likely a result of the Red Sea's declining ecosystem. Gabar, the head of the CDWS [Chamber of Diving and Water Sports], said he's seen a jump in the number of sharks off Egypt's Red Sea coast, which he said could be caused by overfishing, which could force sharks to swim closer to shore in search of food.'²

BBC reports that,

Conspiracy theories are always popular in the Middle East, with unlikely suggestions often made that troubles in Arab countries could be caused by Mossad agents.³

Rumours had circulated in Egypt that there could be an Israeli connection to this unusual spate of Red Sea shark attacks.³

An official Egyptian news site reported South Sinai governor, Mohamed Abdul Fadil Shousha, as saying³ 

"What is being said about the Mossad throwing the deadly shark [in the sea] to hit tourism in Egypt is not out of the question, but it needs time to confirm"³

Sources: 1. AFP, 2. AP, 3. BBC


Comments: Conspiracy theories and blame games in the Muslim world are nothing new and reaches up to the highest levels of society.

And as usual, such beliefs are followed by further beliefs of being persecuted (victim-card) and visions of the grandeur and supremacy of Islam.

This problem is made worse by politically correct censors who censor any attempt to expose it, while feeding the fire with politically correct lies that praise those in the wrong as being good, right and wonderful, and condemn legitimate criticisms as 'hate', 'bigotry' and 'Islamophobia' (worse things said and done by the other side are ignored). 

A few days ago this site reported the revelation from US embassy cables leaked by WikiLeaks that Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was susceptible to Islamist conspiracy theories - some of them pulled from the web. The following quote is from that story.

AFP reports other cables as saying,

Erdogan lacks "vision" and "analytic depth", reads "minimally", ignores foreign ministry expertise and is guided by an "iron ring of sycophantic (but contemptuous) advisors... which partially explains... his susceptibility to Islamist theories."

He is said to rely on "his charisma, instincts, and the filterings of advisors who pull conspiracy theories off the Web or are lost in neo-Ottoman Islamist fantasies, e.g., Islamist foreign policy advisor... Ahmet Davutoglu."

A cable signed by the US ambassador in January 2010 says Davutoglu wants to reassert on the Balkans the influence the Ottoman empire used to exert on the region.

As for the blame game, here are some quotes from two previous articles which can be found here and here.

Walter Rodgers, a former senior international correspondent for CNN said,

Bernard Lewis, the renowned Princeton scholar of Islam, has called attention to the Arab tendency to play “the blame game.”

He notes Arabs traditionally blamed the Mongols, the Ottoman Turks, the colonial powers, and now the Jews and the Americans for everything that has gone awry

And Political science teacher Houchang Hassan-yari, of Canada's Royal Military College said,

it is Tehran's standard practice to finger "outside forces and outside enemies for everything bad that goes on inside the country."

Some previous similar or related stories:

Turky's Islamist PM Erdogan 'hates' Israel on religious grounds, Foreign Minister Davutoglu wants influence in Balkans like in Ottoman empire days

Deadly dysfunctional Muslim culture, past, present, future, and why democracy and modernization fail

(Bad) Muslim psychology: The blame game

For similar or related stories posted after this article, copy the title of this article and paste it in the search box on top of the page and click search. There is unlikely to be any though if the story is very recent but check if you want to make sure.

For even more similar or related stories, click on the 'Labels' below.

Abdel Kareem Nabil (aka Kareem Amer), the first Egyptian blogger jailed for criticizing Islam, al-Azhar and the government freed after a 4yrs sentence

Abdel Kareem Nabil, 26,² who wrote under the name Kareem Amer, was the first Egyptian blogger jailed specifically for his writings as part of a crackdown and to serve as a warning to others.¹

In his writings, Nabil called President Hosni Mubarak "a symbol of tyranny"¹ and Al-Azhar

"the university of terrorism," the "other face of the coin of al-Qaida" that "stuffs its students' brains and turns them into human beasts ... teaching them that there is not place for differences in this life."¹

For expressing his opinions online, Babil was expelled from the state-run religious al-Azhar University² where he was studying law¹ and arrested in 2006.²

The judge at his trial said that he also insulted Islam by writing in an article that

Muhammad and his seventh century followers were "spillers of blood" for their teachings on warfare.¹

The article was written after Muslims rioted and attacked an Egyptian Coptic Christian church in 2005 over a play deemed offensive to Islam.¹ He also wrote in it that

"Muslims revealed their true ugly face and appeared to all the world that they are full of brutality, barbarism and inhumanity."¹

 In a later article not cited by the court, Nabil clarified his comments on Muhammad saying he was "great" and that he should be viewed in the context of the seventh century.¹

After his release, he said that he has no regrets and would not be deterred from future activism.²

Gamal Eid, head of Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) which had supported Nabil said,²

"We defend opinions regardless of whether we agree or disagree with them."²

"We would [also] protect (religious) extremists' right of freedom of expression on condition that their thoughts remain thoughts and are not coupled with implementation,"²

Sources: 1. AP, 2. Reuters


Comment:

Gamal Eid is not entirely correct by supporting the religious extremists here. He has made the usual 'moral equivalence' error.

Those who argue for freedom to criticize oppression and repression are not equivalent to the Islamists who abuse freedom of expression in order to destroy it. Unlike others, Islamists want freedom only for themselves and are using freedom in order to deny others their freedom.

Freedom comes with the proviso that it be not used against freedom. Using freedom to destroy freedom is a perversion of freedom. Freedom is not meant for such purposes and therefore can and must rightly be denied to those who abuses it.

As Abraham Lincoln said

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.

Islamists wish to deny others freedom and so they do not deserve any and so should not have any.

Nabil also went to far in trying to excuse Muhammad with the usual 'out of context' explanation. The quick reply to it is that if one looks at all of what Muhammad did, a lot of his actions are inexcusable even by the contexts and standards of the seventh century or even the stone age. And if each individual cases are looked at closely, the excuses given for the violence and extremism of Muhammad can also be questioned. 

Like Nabil, Walid Husayin, who is now in custody facing a possible life sentence, recently said

Allah has attributes of a "primitive Bedouin."

and called Islam a "blind faith that grows and takes over people's minds where there is irrationality and ignorance."

The fact that even supposedly secular and 'moderate' Muslim governments in Egypt, the Palestinian West Bank ( Walid Husayin facing life in prison for blasphemy) and Pakistan (Asia Bibi's death sentence for alleged blasphemy) are like this shows that depth of Islamic problem despite politically correct lies.

It is also ironic that while Human Rights activists in Muslim countries like Egypt are calling for freedom of expression, the politically correct elites in the West are trying so hard to bring in blasphemy laws, disguised as 'hate speech' and 'Islamophobia', to censor, silence and punish any criticism of Islam or Muslims and turn it into a taboo.


Some previous similar or related stories:

Ex-Muslim Atheist Palestinian, Walid Husayin, facing life sentence for “insulting” Islam as some call for his death for apostasy

Death sentence for Christian woman Asia Bibi, accused of blasphemy in Pakistan

Finally some PROOF: German studies find religious and cultural roots to Muslim propensity to violence, PC excuses can't explain all – like so DUH!!!

Muslims angry Coptic Bishop Bishoy said they were guests in Egypt and questioned Koran 5:7

Muslims burn Christian homes in the Egyptian village of Nawahid over rumors of relationship between a young Christian and Muslim girl

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For even more similar or related stories, click on the 'Labels' below.

Muslims burn Christian homes in the Egyptian village of Nawahid over rumors of relationship between a young Christian and Muslim girl

 Young Muslim men set on fire² at least ten homes¹ of Coptic Christians in the village of Nawahed on the outskirts of the city of Abu Tesht in Qena, Egypt,² over rumors of a relationship between a young Copt and a Muslim girl. The attacks happened after the two were spotted together at night in the village cemetery.¹ Officials say they are not aware of any injuries.²

According to the Associated Press,

Human rights groups say attacks on Copts are on the rise, underscoring the government's failure to address chronic sectarian strains in a society where religious radicalism is gaining ground.¹

Sources: 1. AP, 2. Al-Masry Al-Youm (An Egyptian newspaper)

[It looks like those young Muslim men are just jealous. It's quite obvious why the girl is with the Christian boy and not with any one of those sore brutes raging with envy. 

 This also adds more proof to the fact that Muslim terrorism and violence aren't related to America or the West or this or that specifically as Muslims and apologists of terrorism disingenuous claim. When it comes to them, they always have some excuse or other for conflict and violence, no matter what.]

Days after Pakistan sentenced Christian woman to death for blasphemy, Muslim countries will vote again at the UN for global blasphemy law

 Only days after a Christian woman, Asia Bibi, was sentenced to death for blasphemy in Pakistan, U.N. members will again vote this week on the resolution “On Combating Defamation of Religions” put forward by Organization of the Islamic Conference, made up of 57 states with large Muslim populations.³ The resolution calls for a ban on expressions which offend religious sensibilities. Pakistan has been pushing for an international blasphemy law since 1999.³

 Freedom House's Paula Schriefer wrote in the New York Times that it was hypocritical that countries with appalling religious and other human right records, such as Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Egypt were pushing for the resolution.³ He also pointed out that blasphemy laws were used to suppress religious minorities and those dissenting from orthodoxy, or simply to settle personal scores.³

 According to AsiaNews.it, the National Commission on Justice and Peace (NCJP) of the Catholic Church recorded 974 people being charged for “defiling the Qur'an or insulting the Prophet Muhammad” between 1986 and August 2009 in Pakistan.²  Christians and Ahmadis (who do not consider Muhammad the last prophet) there made up less than 2 percent of the population but accounted for nearly half of the cases during the last two decades, showing how minorities were disproportionately targeted.³

 Deacon Keith Fournier wrote on Catholic Online that,

This so called "Blasphemy Law" is in actuality an instrument of oppression with which Christians and other religious believers are persecuted by Islamic supremacists.”²

 The Catholic League, which is an anti-defamation organization, also claim that blasphemy laws were

designed to give Islamist nations the right to plunder the religious rights of non-Muslims—under the guise of fighting religious intolerance!¹

 It said that “it is one thing to issue a news release, conduct a letter-writing campaign, call for a boycott or hold a street demonstration; it is quite another to criminalize offensive speech” and has urged for the resolution to be voted down.¹

[Theo Van Gogh was murdered in 2004, on the 2nd of this month, by a Muslim for making a short film called "Submission" that was considered blasphemous. Molly Norris, who a few months ago urged people to draw pictures of Muhammad as an exercise of free speech has had to changed her name and go into hiding following FBI advice, after death threats. The threat from Muslims is there. The only difference is tactical, between those who openly use violence and those who engage in stealth jihad and lawfare, playing the victim card, while issuing death sentences, such as those at the U.N. on this issue.]

Sources: 1. Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights (U.S.), 2. Catholic Online (www.catholic.org), 3. The New York Times 

Related stories: Death sentence for Christian woman Asia Bibi, accused of blasphemy in Pakistan

[Note: The New York Times article by Paula Schriefer contains some false "moral equivalence" arguments, such as trying to equate (or suggest) the Danish Muhammad cartoons and opposition to the 9-11 mosque in New York with things such as death penalty for blasphemy. This is the standard practice of Muslims and their liberal and leftist sympathizers. It is unlikely that the New York Times would publish anything critical of Islam without also including some criticism of others, however minor, trivial, petty and insignificant it may be. This is borne out of "inferiority complex" leading to obsession with "equality". There is a complete hatred and ressentment (ressentment, not mere resentment) of anyone being better.]

“Barbaric” Baghdad church attackers now to target all Christians with “sword of slaughter”, call Copts “dog”, Catholics “idolaters” and insult Pope

 The self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) terror group that carried out what Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari calls a “barbaric”¹ attack on Our Lady of Salvation church, leaving sores of Christians dead, has announced that all Christians are now targets. It came after their 48 hour deadline⁴ expired for the release of two women, who they allege to have converted to Islam but are being held captive by the Egyptian Coptic church. 

 The following is included in ISI's message,

"The Ministry of War of Islamic State of Iraq declares that all the centers, organizations and bodies of Christian leaders and followers have become legitimate targets by the Mujahedeens, wherever our hands will reach them."⁴

"We will open upon them the doors of destruction and rivers of blood,"³

"Let these idolaters, and at their forefront, the hallucinating tyrant of the Vatican, know that the killing sword will not be lifted from the necks of their followers until they declare their innocence from what the dog of the Egyptian Church is doing,"²

"The sword of slaughter will not be lifted off the necks of their followers until they denounce what the dog of the Egyptian church has committed, and until they show the Mujahedeens their serious endeavor to pressure the combatant (Coptic) church for the release of our Muslim sisters, who are captive in the prisons of their monateries,"⁴

(Christians would be) “extirpated and dispersed” (from Iraq.)⁵

 [This is a public declaration of plan by Muslim terrorists to commit genocide against Christians.]

Sources: 1. 2. AFP, 3. AP 4. CNN 5. Reuters 

Worse than “animals” Muslim terrorists who took Baghdad church hostage left 51 Christians dead

   Jihad terrorists from Al-Qaeda aligned Islamic State of Iraq attacked Our Lady of Salvation,⁶ a Syrian Catholic church in Baghdad,⁴ during Sunday evening service¹² attended by 120.¹⁰

   The Muslim terrorists killed some worshipers and held the rest hostage while demanding the release of al-Qaeda in Iraq members in Egypt and Iraq.¹⁰ The terrorist who made the demands appeared to be a foreigner as he did not have an Iraqi accent.¹⁰

   The terrorists also said they were avenging "the burning of the Qur'ans and the jailing of Muslim women in Egypt."⁶ The Qur'an burning probably referred to the threatened but later canceled Qur'an burning event by Reverend Terry Jones to protesting an Islamic cultural center being built near Ground Zero.⁹

   The Muslim women allegedly jailed in Egypt were Wafaa Constantine and Camilia Shehata, who Muslims falsely claim, had been abducted and held in Egypt's Coptic Christian monasteries for converting to Islam from Christianity.⁷ These claims had been rejected even by the Sunni authorities of Al Azhar,⁴ the leading Islamic institution in Egypt.⁷

    The church was stormed after 9 p.m. by Iraqi Special Operations troops¹⁰ after learning that some hostages had been executed earlier.¹¹ 51 worshipers, including two priests, at least 8 women, 5 children, and 7 troops were killed during the rescue operation and nearly 60 others were injured.¹⁰ Five of the attackers were also killed and eight of them arrested.¹⁰

   Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said the attack was an attempt to [ethnically and religious cleanse and] drive more Christians out of Iraq.² Chaldean Cardinal Emmanuel III Delly claims over a million have already fled the country since the fall of Saddam Hussein.²

   In an internet message claiming responsibility for the attack, Islamic State of Iraq called the church "the dirty den of idolatry"⁸ [although Muslims consider the Kaaba, a black rock in Mecca, as the most sacred site and pray facing it and walk around it during the Hajj] and/or a "den of polytheism".¹⁰

  The Chaldean bishop of Baghdad, Shlimoune Wardouni, condemned the attacks saying, "It's a great sorrow, because this was an inhuman act. Even animals are not doing this to each other".¹


  Some descriptions of the worst than animal behavior

  This from CNN

   Mass was in progress when attackers stormed in⁵

   Silvana Maro said

“They said if anyone lifts their head we will shoot. My cousin moved slightly. They shot him, his brains exploded all over”.⁵

  Anna Hannow held her aunt’s bloodied purse, the stench of death still fresh. Her aunt was eighty years old.⁵

“They shot her in the face, there was nothing left of her face” She told us.⁵

  This report from the Guradian

At sunset yesterday, Raghada al-Wafi walked excitedly to mass with news for the priest who married her a month ago. Tonight, exactly 24 hours later, she returned to the Our Lady of Salvation church – this time carried by her family in a coffin that also contained her unborn child.⁶

Today the priest who blessed her marriage and pregnancy minutes before he was killed will also be buried, as will several dozen other members of his congregation – all of them slain by terrorists⁶

  This report from AP

They ordered the priest to call the Vatican to demand the release of Muslim women who they claimed were being held captive by the Coptic church in Egypt. When the priest said he could not do that, the gunmen shot him and turned their guns on the congregation, killing most of those in the front pew.³

One woman told investigators she survived only because her father wrapped himself around her body in a shield that ultimately killed him.³

Sources: 1. AFP, 2. 3.* AP, 4. AsiaNew.it, 5. CNN, 6. Guardian, 7. National Review, 8. Reuters, 9. The Christian Century, 10. 11. The Washing Post, 12. UPI


Note: The AP report written by Barbara Surk for source number 3 was orignally posted at The San Francisco Chonicle at this link but it has recently been replaced with another story. The original story can still be view at the link given in the sources section, at the time of writing this story.

Egypt charge Shias with insulting religion & denying tenets of faith

 At least four Shias have been arrested and charged with "insulting religion and denying the tenets of faith" in Egypt. Seven others are also in detention, held since mid-2009 charged with "forming a group trying to spread Shi'ite ideology that harms the Islamic religion."

Source: AFP

Muslim violence and discrimination causing Christians exodus from Middle East to be discussed at Vatican synod

 A synod of Catholic bishops from the Middle East has opened at the Vatican. Issues discussed will include Muslim violence and discrimination forcing Christians to leave the the region, resulting ever decreasing Christian presence. Special attention will be given to the situation in Egypt, Iraq and Turkey.

Source: AFP

Muslims angry Coptic Bishop Bishoy said they were guests in Egypt and questioned Koran 5:7

 Muslims protested in Egypt and insulted Christians by throwing shoes¹ at picture of  Coptic pope Shenouda III in Alexandria, after Coptic Bishop Bishoy reportedly said they were "guests of the Christians,"² and suggested Koran verse 5:17 was inserted by Caliph Uthman¹. Islamic Research Council of Al-Azhar university¹, a key learning centre of Sunni Islam³ also issued a “Statement to the Nation”¹ saying such comments crossed "a red line" and that Christian should accept accept Islamic dominance as Dhimmis, similar to Christians of Najran, Medina, during the rule of Muhammad.¹ The Coptic pope has issued an apology for the comments.³

 Despite the typical hypocritical Muslim anger over the comments, Christians were the original inhabitants of Egypt² prior to the invasion, conquest, and occupation by Muslim Arabs in the 7th century A.D., which continues to this day. While Al-Azhar denounces others, it has also been accused of challenging and ridiculing other religions since it's founding in 972 A.D., including by Grand Imam Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, the current head of it's Islamic Research Council that issued the criticism of Bishop Bishoy, who challenged the validity of the Bible on TV.¹

Sources: 1. Continental News (ContinentalNews.net), 2. AFP, 3. BBC