Free Republic

It’s an old joke: How can you tell a politician is lying? His lips are moving. It seems that may be the case for the first two Muslim women elected to the U.S. Congress. An analyst at the Gatestone Institute presented evidence that Ilhan Abdullahi Omar of Minnesota and Rashida Harbi Tlaib of Michigan lied to voters. The charge comes from Soeren Kern, a senior fellow at the institute, who who wrote that most of the media coverage since their election Nov. 6 “has been effusive in praise of their Muslim identity and personal history.” “Less known is that both...

BREAKING: It is 10:40am here in Israel and more than 400 rockets have been fired at Israel from Gaza in the last few hours — more than on any other single day in history. The IDF is retaliating. Children and their parents have had to sleep in bomb shelters all night. More rockets are coming in as I write this. High risk of even further escalation. Please pray for calm to be restored. Pray, too, for all who are being traumatized on both sides to experience the supernatural comfort of the Lord.

With the rise of Islamist organizations, repressive regimes, and civil conflicts which threaten regional stability, the promise of the Arab Spring of 2011 quickly devolved into an Arab winter. In an expansive article in The Economist, the threat to the Middle East is discussed in appropriately grave terms; Syria and Iraq are in flames while Jordan looms as the next domino to potentially fall. Libya and Yemen, where Islamic terror networks operate with impunity, are labeled “failed states.” Those Middle Eastern nations that are not in danger of imminent collapse are either absolute monarchies or counties which merely maintain...

The Egyptian army has completed the renovation of a church in central Cairo that was the scene of a bomb attack that killed 27 people earlier in December, a military spokesman announced on Saturday. President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi ordered that St. Peter and St. Paul’s Church be renovated after the attack on 11 December, which was claimed by a local ISIS affiliate, before Coptic Christians celebrate Christmas on 7 January. "The Armed Forces Engineering Authority was able to restore the church’s destroyed areas while preserving the church's architectural heritage in 15 days to be ready to receive Christians for Christmas," read...

"Egypt goes to war on ISIS, masses troops against Islamist Libyan stronghold at Darnah" Egyptian President Abdel-Fatteh El-Sisi has deployed his troops for all-out war on ISIS strongholds in Libya, the first Arab ruler to challenge the Islamists in a fellow Arab country .... Our Washington sources report that the Obama administration’s planned spring campaign to free Iraqi Mosul from the Islamic State’s occupation is stuck in the sand. Democratic and Republican lawmakers alike accuse the president of having no clear war strategy and of holding back from the US-led coalition the fighting manpower necessary for a successful operation. .......

Flight of families to Ismailia follows warning of attacks by ISIL and murders targeting community in El Arish. Flight of families to Ismailia follows warning of attacks by ISIL and murders targeting community in El Arish. 26 Feb 2017 21:43 GMT Sinai Peninsula, Egypt, Middle East, ISIS Hundreds of members of Egypt's Coptic Christian minority have fled the Sinai Peninsula to Ismailia city, 115km northeast of the capital Cairo, following a series of killings by a local armed group.The assailants have shot and killed at least seven Christians in separate attacks in Sinai's El Arish city in February.At least 90...

In Minya, Egypt, Coptic Christians were terrorized in another attack targeting the minority group on Friday. Islamic militants opened gunfire on two buses carrying Coptic Christians en route to an ancient monastery in Upper Egypt, killing seven and injuring more than eleven. Friday’s attack is one in a series of attacks on Egypt’s ancient Christian community, which currently makes up between 10 and 15 percent of Egypt’s population. Minya has the largest population of Christians in the country — 35 percent of residents are Christians — and experiences a lion’s share of the sectarian attacks. According to Open Doors USA’s...

When Egyptian general Al-Sisi ousted the Muslim Brotherhood from power, many in the West celebrated his coup. The Muslim Brotherhood's leader Mohammed Morsi had been an extremist intent on "cleansing" his country of Egypt's Christians, known as Copts. However, since becoming president, Al-Sisi has done little to nothing to protect the Copts. In fact, under his rule, more churches have been closed down than ever before. Christians are regularly targeted by Islamist extremist terrorists, and Copts generally feel that they may not have a future in their country. Al-Monitor reports: When a long-awaited law on building and restoring churches went...

"Islamic State" militants reportedly carried out the execution-style killings in early 2015. A detained IS militant who witnessed the mass murder clued in authorities to the site.Libyan authorities have recovered the remains of 21 Coptic Christians who were beheaded by so-called "Islamic State" (IS) militants more than two years ago, the anti-IS organization al-Bonyan al-Marsous announced Saturday. The gruesome discovery was made in the seaside city of Sirte — the home town of former dictator Moammar Gadhafi, who was toppled in 2011. A statement said officials were led to the site by an IS militant who had witnessed the attack...

Christians have lived in Iraq for centuries but are being ethnically cleansed from the region. In Egypt, Coptic Christians are under constant threat as well. And yet, the international community seems obsessed with accepting Muslim refugees when there is no real ethnic cleansing of Muslims anywhere. It is the Christians in the Middle East who need help and it is they who should be allowed into Western countries as refugees video at source

Who are these sisters and brothers suffering persecution for Christ?  From the Aleteia archives:  With the news of the terrible bombing during Divine Liturgy in a Coptic Orthodox church in Cairo, December 11, 2016, attention is being drawn again to the sufferings of Christian brothers and sisters in the Middle East. Who are these Coptic Christians? What do we share with them?1. The Coptic Church is among the oldest Christian communities in the world.Coptic Christians trace the founding of their church to a missionary journey by the evangelist St. Mark in the year 42. According to tradition, Mark spent his...

Islamists attacked a village after reports that Christians intended to build a churchThe homes and properties of Coptic Christians in Egypt have been attacked by radical Islamists after reports surfaced that a new church was going to be built. According to International Christian Concern, the attacks occurred in the Sohag Governorate in Upper Egypt in the village of Manshiet El-Naghamish. The village is populated by more than 2,000 Christians and the nearest church is more than three miles away. The villagers decided the build a four-storey building to be used as a community centre, nursery and retirement home, prompting suspicions...

In September 2012 Hillary blamed an “awful internet video” for the deaths of four American heroes in Benghazi. Hillary Clinton made the statements as the bodies of the four dead Americans were brought back to US soil. She made the public comments just three days after the assault on the compound that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty. But thanks to leaked Wikileaks emails we now know that Hillary Clinton wrote Chelsea during the Benghazi attacks telling her Americans were killed by an al-Qaeda like group. Hillary later lied and blamed the attack on a...

In a lengthy and disturbing piece on Egypt’s Coptic Christians this week, Rod Nordland of the New York Times described them as a community at the “breaking point,” to borrow the words of Bishop Makarios of Minya. This is not what a casual consumer of Egyptian news would expect, and it is not what the Copts expected, either. Nordland writes of high hopes for protection after the Muslim Brotherhood government of Mohammed Morsi was topped by the current Egyptian president, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who is often given solid marks by foreign observers for his stance against Islamist oppression. Egypt’s Christians...

Minya, Egypt, Jul 19, 2016 / 12:08 am (CNA/EWTN News).- For Christians in Egypt, the possibility of martyrdom is not a remote one. Icon of the 21 Martyrs of Libya. Image courtesy of Tony Rezk, via tonyrezk.blogspot.com“It is something they concretely feel, it is part of their Christian life,” Father Paolo Asolan, an Italian priest who recently visited Egypt, told CNA. “And for a mother and a father, the fact that one of their sons can become a martyr is always a great gift.” The Islamic State’s beheading of 20 Coptic Christians and another man shocked the world in February...

Christian homes and property have been attacked by a Muslim mob in Egypt over rumours a house under construction was being turned into a church. A large group of Muslims gathered around the house, owned by Coptic Christian Naim Aziz, in Qarayat al Bayda village near Alexandria after Friday prayers on June 17, chanting: "By no means shall there be a church here". "A great deal of fanatic Muslims gathered in front of the new house of my cousin, Naim Aziz, during its construction because of a rumour spread in the village that this building would be turned into a...

A Muslim mob torched and looted the homes of 80 Christian families in the Al-Beida village in Egypt, looking to punish them for wanting to turn one of the buildings in the village into a church so they can worship. One witness, Christian resident Mousa Zarif, recalled the events: "On Friday afternoon, following Friday noon prayer, a great deal of fanatic Muslims gathered in the front of the new house of my cousin, Naim Aziz, during its construction because of a rumor spread in the village that this building would be turned into a church."

A mob of over a thousand Islamic extremists attacked a Christian village destroying property and setting the homes of over 80 families ablaze over rumors that a Coptic man was converting a home into a church. The attacks, which took place Friday in Egypt’s Qaryat Al-Bayda village, near Alexandria, left two Copts seriously injured and resulted in thousands of dollars worth of damage, according to a Coptic activist. "A great deal of fanatic Muslims gathered in front of the new house of my cousin," Mousa Zarif, a Christian who witnessed the events, told Christian advocacy group International Christian Concern.

Vatican’s ecumenism comes at the expense of Egypt’s human rights Pope Francis, who is “building bridges to build peace” around the world, has naturally reached out to embrace Sunni Muslims. Last month, for the first time after years of Vatican silence, Pope Francis summoned to his private library in Rome grand imam Ahmed El-Tayeb of Cairo’s Al-Ahzar Mosque Institute. Absent a press release before this event, the Pope was quoted as saying, “this meeting is the message” – leading all to dwell on the meaning and purpose of their 25 minutes together. Christians, especially Egyptian Coptic Christians, have observed the...

In the coming days, construction will commence on a new church in Egypt dedicated to the martyred Coptic Christians beheaded by the Islamic State in Libya in February.The new church, bearing the name “Church of the Libyan Martyrs,” will be built in the Minya Governorate, south of the capital, Cairo. The church will cost $1.3 million, half of which has already been raised.Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi granted permission for the construction of the church last February after Islamic State militants murdered 21 Coptic Christians on a Libyan beach.According to Father Rafic Greiche, spokesman for the Catholic Church in Egypt,...