Posted by Nabil Echchaibi on Monday, January 10, 2011
This is the kind of articles we need to see more often. Denouncing violence verbally is one thing but showing support through concrete and strongly symbolic action is quite another. This past week, a number of prominent and ordinary Muslim Egyptians showed up at a Coptic mass and offered their bodies as a human shield to protect the Christian community. This is a bold first step in the right direction and I hope it will provide some fodder for a frank discussion of a long checkered history of social discrimination against Copts in Egypt. Here is a good article on some of that history, which is often glossed over in Arab media. We need some of this bold expression of denunciation against all kinds of violence, including the one committed against civilians inside and outside Muslim majority countries.
I was born and raised in Morocco. My research focuses on the intersections between Islam, Arab popular culture and the media. I'm currently an assistant professor in the School of Journalism at the University of Colorado-Boulder.