7 Killed in Egypt as Bus Carrying Christian Pilgrims is Ambushed - UPDATED

UPDATE 4Nov18: Egypt reports all who attacked Christian bus, are dead!

Egypt says security forces have killed 19 militants in a shootout, including the gunmen suspected of killing seven Christians in an attack on pilgrims traveling to a remote monastery.

The Interior Ministry says the militants were tracked to a desert hideout west of the central Minya province, where Friday’s attack took place.

The ministry published photographs purporting to show the bodies of the slain militants. It says the men opened fire when security forces surrounded them.

Friday’s attack was the second in as many years to target pilgrims on their way to the monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor. A May 2017 attack left 29 dead.

Christians make up about 10 percent of Egypt’s 100 million people and have long complained of discrimination.
— AP

Original Story follows:

Egypt was hit by a spate of multiple casualty attacks on

Coptic Christians between 2015-2017

The worst part of this theatre in the War on Christianity is that if the Muslim Brotherhood had not been thrown out of government, it would be much worse.

Thomson Reuters 

A man screams beside a bus carrying Coptic Christians that came under attack outside Cairo on Friday. Islamic militants ambushed the bus carrying Christian pilgrims on their way to a monastery south of the Egyptian capital. (Egypt Coptic Orthodox Church via AP)

Gunmen killed at least seven Christians in an attack on a bus near a Coptic monastery in Egypt on Friday, authorities said, in the most serious assault on the minority in more than a year.

No group immediately claimed responsibility, but militants linked to ISIS have regularly targeted Christians.

The attackers struck close to Saint Samuel the Confessor monastery in Minya, 260 kilometres up the River Nile from Cairo, Archbishop of Minya Anba Makarious told Reuters.

The attack took place close to where gunmen killed 28 Christians in a similar assault in May 2017.

"Terrorists opened fire on a tour bus from Sohag province, heading back from the ... monastery," the archbishop said. He had earlier said the bus was approaching the monastery.

He said seven people were killed and 14 were wounded. State news agency MENA, citing a security source, put the number of injured at seven and said the bus was transporting Christians.

Local residents said the bus was part of a convoy.

Egypt's president promises justice

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said he mourned the victims as martyrs, and vowed to push ahead with a campaign against militants.

"I assert our determination to fight dark terrorism and to pursue the perpetrators," he said on Twitter.

Outside Egypt, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the archbishop of Britain's Coptic Orthodox Church were among those condemning the attack and expressing condolences to Egyptians.

Well, that's unusual! Trudeau recognizing the persecution of Christians. Must be an election coming.

Egypt has been waging a major military and security campaign, mainly in Sinai but also on the border with Libya, to crush militants behind a wave of attacks on security forces and civilians, including Christians.

Egypt says fighting Islamist militants is a priority to restore security after the years of turmoil that followed the Arab Spring protests in 2011.

Egypt's public prosecutor ordered an investigation and said he had sent a team of investigators to the location and to nearby hospitals.