This week, Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah Sisi responded to the beheadings with acts that unequivocally recognized the Copts as “innocent victims” and true sons of Egypt. He declared a week of national mourning, dispatched envoys to appeal to the United Nations and ordered air force bombers to “deliver swift justice in retribution.” Sisi’s visit to St. Mark’s Cathedral to offer condolences to Pope Tawadros II, the head of the Coptic Orthodox Church in Cairo, was another welcome gesture of solidarity. Whatever the strategic value of Sisi’s moves, his display of respect is precisely what Copts have been yearning for.

The horror in Libya could have come from a Hieronymus Bosch painting of hell: 21 knife-wielding figures hacking the heads off 21 young men in orange jumpsuits along the shoreline, blood staining the surf red. But this was no imagined scene — it was the mass execution of Egyptian Copts who had been kidnapped by Islamic State terrorists.

The killers may have aimed to exploit sectarian hostilities — as they have in Iraq and Syria — and splinter Egyptian society. Paradoxically, however, this blatantly anti-Christian attack may finally lead to the easing of Christian-Muslim tensions in Egypt.

This week, Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah Sisi responded to the beheadings with acts that unequivocally recognized the Copts as “innocent victims” and true sons of Egypt. He declared a week of national mourning, dispatched envoys to appeal to the United Nations and ordered air force bombers to “deliver swift justice in retribution.”

Sisi’s visit to St. Mark’s Cathedral to offer condolences to Pope Tawadros II, the head of the Coptic Orthodox Church in Cairo, was another welcome gesture of solidarity.

Whatever the strategic value of Sisi’s moves, his display of respect is precisely what Copts have been yearning for.

The Copts, whose name is derived from the Greek word for Egypt, trace their faith to St. Mark, the Gospel writer, thus predating Islam in Egypt by 600 years. Nevertheless, Egypt’s state policies and practices have long treated the Christian minority as second-class citizens, if not a foreign fifth column.

Persecution of the Copts intensified in the final years of Hosni Mubarak’s presidency, then escalated after the “Arab Spring” revolution. When the Muslim Brotherhood gained control of the government in 2012, tens of thousands of Copts sought refuge abroad.

A 2011 episode in Cairo’s Maspero district became an iconic example of anti-Copt persecution. People protesting a string of church arsons were ruthlessly dispersed by the military. More than two dozen were killed and hundreds wounded after being shot at or run over by police in tanks, according to forensic reports. Afterward, the government exonerated the security forces, arresting instead two dozen Copts and a sympathetic Muslim, who were jailed for months. The prime minister blamed the violence on “invisible hands,” insinuating some American and Israeli influence. The investigation of the incident was eventually closed for lack of evidence.

Read More