Mission No. 77

Government documents seized by protestors in Egypt chillingly suggest that the Egyptian State Security was involved in the church bombing on New Year's Day in Alexandria. The bombing killed 21 people and wounded 80, the worst violence against Egypt's Coptic Christian minority in more than a decade.

The legitimacy of the document hasn't been determined, but its distribution touched off protests in Cairo by hundreds of Coptic Christians.

Copts, especially those in Alexandria, had suspected state involvement in the bombing, noting that a stepped-up security force that was supposed to have protected the church had vanished before the bomb exploded.

According to the document, one of eight said to discuss attacks on churches, State Security used a jailed jihadist to help organise the plot, including details on the church's entrances and exits. The document was dated December 2nd, 2010, and was addressed to the interior minister. It referred to the church bombing as "Mission No. 77."

If this information is confirmed to be true, it would be a damning indictment of Mubarak's deposed "secular" government, and would also not be remotely surprising. After all, this wouldn't be the first time in recent history that Egyptian security forces have been complicit in the persecution of the Copts.

It is telling that our witless media only noticed in the last few weeks that Egypt and other Arab countries have oppressive governments. Before the despots began slaughtering their own people who were protesting against their rule, all the mainstream media ever noticed in the Middle East was the imaginary "war crimes" of Israel. Their silence on the persecution of Christians in Egypt in favour of antisemitic slurs against the only pluralistic democracy in the region is truly shameful.