World Watch Monitor, November 2, 2018
At least seven people have been killed and 14 injured in another attack on Coptic Christians in Egypt.
The attack reportedly took place at almost exactly the same location as the May 2017 attack by Islamist militants which left 28 dead. This latest attack again targeted a bus full of Copts heading back from St. Samuel’s monastery in Minya. Local contacts confirmed that two church-owned buses were targeted – one big, one small.
“The driver of the big bus managed to escape the scene and no-one in that bus got hurt. The second, smaller bus, did not manage to escape. The terrorists stopped the bus and opened fire on the passengers,” said a priest in Minya.
The injured have been taken to different hospitals in the area.
Hanaa Youssef Mikhael, who lost her husband in the 2017 bus attack, said: “I am very sad about what happened. And I am startled: How is it possible that this happened again?”
“Why were they not protected?” asked Emad Nasif, a deacon in a church in Minya. “There seems to be an indifference to the safety of the Christian minority.”