Christian Persecution May/Jun 2019

EGYPT—A Christian mother who was kidnapped and tortured in Egypt for her faith now fears for her daughter and her pastor-husband who have been threatened with death if she refuses to return to Islam.

The 42-year-old Ebtehaj Alsanosi Altejani Mostafa, who fled to Egypt from Sudan in 2005, was kidnapped two years ago in Cairo where she was burned, tortured, and raped.

“I will not go back to Islam—I hate Islam,” she told her persecutors. Two Sudanese Muslims kidnapped her on her way to a market in 2017. They took her to a windowless room in an unknown house where they poured water on her, pulled her hair, tied her hands and legs to a chair, raped her, and burned her.

“You are a disgrace to your Muslim family; you brought shame to the family,” they shouted as they struck her, she said. “You are kafira [infidel].”

After she told them she would rather die than return to Islam, one of the kidnappers brought a copy of the Qur’an and began reciting verses that call for killing those who leave Islam. Between verses they shouted, “Allahu Akbar,” the jihadist slogan, “Allah is greater,” she said.

Then they raped her while taking photos and video.

Four other men entered the room, two Sudanese and two Egyptians. One ordered her to say the shahada, the Islamic profession. When she refused, he had one of the others shove her onto the chair and tie her hands and legs again; her chest and back were in great pain, she said. They then forced her to kneel at length, hurting her legs; and one man burned her back with a cigarette 26 times, trying to force her to say the shahada, she said. They laughed with each cigarette burn; the room was full of smoke.

Refusing their ultimatum again, she was slapped on her face and kicked several times as they continued ordering her to renounce Christ and save her life. “Are you sure you want to keep with Jesus?” they asked her. They again tried to force her to say the Muslim profession of faith, and when she again refused, they asked her why she worships three gods: Mary, Jesus, and God.

“This is not true. I believe in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit—one God,” she told them.

Before leaving the room, they told her this was her last chance to return to her old religion before they are allowed to kill her. They returned carrying a Muslim prayer mat. “This is your last day with us,” one of them said.

After several attempts to force her to sign the papers saying she had returned to Islam, they injured her hands as they forced her against her will to sign one of the papers, she said. Then she felt a blow to the back of her head and lost consciousness. When she came to, she found herself on a street with people and cars passing by, she said.

Prior to her abduction, Mostafa had received a phone call from one of her sisters telling her that her uncle and brother were planning to hurt her. Her uncle, a prominent officer in Sudan’s notorious National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS), has great influence as the military attaché in Sudan’s Foreign Ministry in Khartoum.

Mostafa said she knows God has His purposes for her abduction and that her purpose in revealing it is so the international community will know what type of pressure Sudanese converts face in Egypt. For the complete story, go to tinyurl.com/MSTRNegypt.com.

Sudan ranks sixth on the Open Doors 2019 World Watch List of countries where Christians face persecution. Egypt ranks 16th.

morningstarnews.org