Gunmen opened fire on a bus carrying Christian worshipers heading to a remote Coptic Christian monastery in upper Egypt on Friday, killing at least seven and wounding 14, said a top religious leader and local officials. CAIRO —
“Terrorists opened fire on a bus carrying people from Sohag to Minya’s St. Samuel Monastery,” said Coptic Christian Archbishop Makarious of Minya, a town roughly 150 miles south of Cairo, in a phone interview.
No group has claimed responsibility for the attack, but it bears the hallmarks of Egypt’s Islamic State affiliate, which has vowed to attack the nation’s Coptic Christians, who make up about 10 percent of the country’s population.
[After Egypt church bombings, Israel closes southern border with Sinai]
Friday’s violence comes more than a year after a similar assault on pilgrims heading to the Saint Samuel the Confessor Monastery in the country’s western desert. In May 2017, gunmen attacked buses carrying worshipers, leaving at least 28 people dead.
Last month, an Egyptian military court sentenced to death 17 people convicted in a series of suicide attacks on Christian churches in 2016 and 2017. The defendants were charged with belonging to the Islamic State and orchestrating the assaults.
Attacks by the Islamic State prompted the government of President Abdel Fatah al-Sissi to launch a major military operation this year in Egypt’s restive northern Sinai province, the stronghold of the militants. A wave of Islamist militancy has pervaded the country since the military overthrow elected former president Mohamed Morsi and the subsequent crackdown on his Muslim Brotherhood party’s supporters.
Read more
Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world
Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news
Credit:Washington Post
via USAHint.com
No comments:
Post a Comment