Egypt: Is it like Déjà vu all over again?

The saying attributed to the great Yogi Berra seems ominously appropriate for what we are watching take place in Egypt today.

Although we hope and pray that the demonstrations in Tahrir Square in Cairo, and elsewhere throughout the country, will lead to increased freedom and democracy for the people of Egypt, we fear that some Egyptians and some in our own United States government in their eagerness to push out President Mubarak are pushing in the Muslim Brotherhood.

We have seen this situation before, in Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution. Recently as I was doing some research for a couple of articles on the persecution of Christians in Iran for Front Page Magazine and for The Living Church, I was surprised to learn that many of Iran’s Christians, including church leaders, had welcomed the Revolution. They had hopes that it would bring a change from the authoritarian ways of Mohammed Reza Shah. It was not long before they, and most other Iranians, realized how sadly mistaken they had been.

Now some Egyptian Copts and other Christians believe that the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak may lead to an improved situation for Egypt’s vulnerable minorities. Certainly they have been severely persecuted while Mubarak has been in power. I wrote about the attacks on Egypt’s Christian population in February of last year, and spoke at a conference organized by Voice of the Copts in December. These horrendous attacks have continued since that time. Most recently, Islamists killed two Coptic families in Upper Egypt on January 30. Eleven people in all were massacred, including the children: a fifteen year-old girl and eight year-old boy in one family, and a four year-old boy and three year-old girl in the other.

If such oppression and persecution has gone on under the regime of Mubarak, who, with all his faults, kept a firm rein on the radical Islamists of the Muslim Brotherhood, what will happen now? Will Egypt choose to grow in freedom and democracy and spurn the advances of the Islamists who want to establish another base for the world-wide Caliphate (the global reign of Islam)? We can only hope and pray that it does.

While feeling helpless in the face of this coming storm, here are at least two things that you can do:

1. The Washington Post on February 10, 2011, allowed one of the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood to publish an opinion editorial entitled “Don’t Be Afraid of the Islamists,” by Abdel Moneim Abou el-Fotouh. If you understand both the worldwide and American agenda of the Muslim Brotherhood, you will know that what he says is based in deception. Register your disapproval to the Post for their allowing this unqualified statement by a member of the organization that spawned terrorist organizations all over the world: [email protected].

2. Keep praying for the Egypt and for the whole Middle East. You may wish to remember these words from the Prophet Isaiah (19) when you pray for Egypt, as well as praying specifically for the Christians who face such danger:

In that day there will be an altar to the LORD in the heart of Egypt, and a monument to the LORD at its border. It will be a sign and witness to the LORD Almighty in the land of Egypt. When they cry out to the LORD because of their oppressors, he will send them a savior and defender, and he will rescue them. So the LORD will make himself known to the Egyptians, and in that day they will acknowledge the LORD. They will worship with sacrifices and grain offerings; they will make vows to the LORD and keep them. The LORD will strike Egypt with a plague; he will strike them and heal them. They will turn to the LORD, and he will respond to their pleas and heal them.

In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria. The Assyrians will go to Egypt and the Egyptians to Assyria. The Egyptians and Assyrians will worship together. In that day Israel will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The LORD Almighty will bless them, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my handiwork, and Israel my inheritance.”