“We were forced to clean toilets and were humiliated and insulted during our detention. I will never forget the torture my colleague, Matta Younan, suffered when he refused to say ‘Pope Shenouda was despicable’.
Younan was threatened to be killed and was beaten on his head with a stick until one of the policemen said to his torturers: That’s enough. You have your own religion and I have mine,” Zaki said.
“From time to time, an Islamic preacher came to tell us about Islam and question our Christian faith and the Bible. We constantly heard them shouting ‘Obama, Obama, all of us are Osama’, in reference to al-Qaeda’s late leader Osama bin Laden,” Zaki added.
Zaki went on to describe how they arrested Father Paula, the church’s priest in Benghazi, and a worker in the same church. The two were detained in a room next to them and Zaki noted how the priest had his mustache shaved and was humiliated and tortured.
“I was deeply affected by the position of the Egyptian embassy,” said Zaki. “Some of us contacted the Egyptian ambassador to intervene but he said he could not do anything.”
“We call on the presidency to intervene and recover our dignity that was usurped unlawfully,” Zaki demanded.
Sherif Tawwab Nabil, a 15-year-old student, said that his father is a poor man who could not support his family, so he went to work in Libya to be able to pay for his own study fees and help support his poor family.
Nabil explained that while he was selling clothes on a table in one of the markets in Benghazi, dozens of bearded men attacked the area and arrested Christians after checking their [right] hand to see if there was a sign of a cross [Egyptian Copts usually tattoo their right wrist with a sign of a cross].
Nabil told MCN they took him inside a car with other Christians and kept them in detention for four days. According to Nabil, they were exposed to all kinds of agony, including beatings, torture and humiliation, to the extent they wished for death.
“I was forced to insult Pope Shenouda to get food, and the bearded men told us they were seeking the Prophet’s rapprochement by torturing us,” Nabil explained.
Atef Nadi Habib, a 33-year-old vendor from Samalout district, Minya, described the conditions Copts faced in Libya as a racist campaign never witnessed before.
“I have worked in Libya for 13 years, and I hold a residence permit and all my documents are legal. Conditions were stable, but suddenly the situation changed and Copts began to be subjected to constant threats,” Habib said.
“Before my arrest, I was selling clothes on a table in Benghazi. A bearded man stood in front of me to buy something and when he saw the sign of the cross on my hand, he said that he would not buy from Christians. He asked me to leave Libya or else he would tell Ansar el-Sharia about me and that I would pay jizya. He then invited me to embrace Islam.”
Habib said they heard from some Libyans there was a campaign led by Ansar el-Sharia and Libya’s First Armor groups to arrest all Egyptian Christians.
“On 28 of February, we were surprised to find 20 bearded armed men storming the Suq el-Zalam area and asking Egyptian workers about their religion and arresting Christians. They were shooting randomly to terrorize us. They took me and my colleagues, Subhi Andrawis, Nashaat Mina and Medhat Khamis, inside a car and drove us to a prison, and within hours other detainees were brought.”
Habib told MCN they were detained in a 6 sq. m. room and received no food, drink nor had sanitation means to relieve themselves. He said when they asked about the reason for their detention they were told they were missionaries who want to Christianize Muslims.
“They told us a priest persuaded a girl named Safaa to convert to Christianity. They frisked us and confiscated our belongings, including saints’ pictures and crosses we possess for blessing. They considered these pictures evidence for accusing us of proselytizing,” Habib added.
“A series of torture began and they beat the oldest among us, uncle Bushra, severely, having no mercy for his old age. The second to be tortured was Mina Salah, and then Andrawis, who was taken to an adjacent room. We could hear him screaming from pain, and when they brought him back he refused to tell us what happened to him so that we did not break down. He was exhausted and almost fainted.”
“Later, they took Hani Gaber and told him in front of everyone: ‘Say good bye to your friends because this is the last time you will see them’. He was returned after three hours, however, and signs of torture were clear on his face and body.”
“The most difficult phase was being forced to insult Christianity. Three bearded men came into the detention room and asked us to extend our hands in order to beat us on the cross sign [tattooed on our wrests] with sticks and wires. At night, they poured cold water on us despite the cold weather. One of them used to hang up a sword on the door of the detention room and threatened to apply Sharia punishment on us because we are infidels, describing us as the ‘firewood of hell’ because we worship ‘Jesus’ and he was just a ‘messenger, not God’.”
Habib said they were taken out of the detention room and asked to take off their clothes, they then forced them to stand barefoot on tapered gravel and repeat the phrase “Allahu Akbar” [God is great].
Habib said they repeated the phrase because God is great in all religions. He said the torturers also asked them to declare the two statements of Islamic faith – There is no god but Allah and Mohammad is His Messenger – and when they pronounced the first statement only, they were tortured more, until most of them were eventually forced to declare the two statements.
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Edited from: http://mcndirect.com/showsubject.aspx?id=43539