Within the Middle East lie many religions and cultures with rich histories of growth but also discrimination and hardships by other inhabitants of the Middle East. Every religion is unique from each other so the confined space of the Middle East stirred up serious controversy between some religions. The religion of Christianity receives far more persecution in the past and in modern day than the Islamic religion within the Middle East. The Coptic and Assyrian Christians have had to face much tougher hardships than other religious groups such as the Druze and other Islamic-affiliated groups. This persecution of Christians has been far more severe than any Muslim group.
The Coptic Christians started out around 55 A.D. in Egypt, saying that their founder was one of the 72 apostles of Jesus, John Mark. Mark went with Paul and Barnabas on a missionary mission but ended up going to Jerusalem instead. When Mark received his mission, Mark had the country of Egypt and its surrounding territories. He went first to Cyrene and went on to convert many to Christianity. He then went to Alexandria, where he began to anger people with his preaching and some of the pagan men of the city wanted to kill Mark for his teachings. Mark left Alexandria and went on a two year hiatus. He then returned and found the church and its teachings had flourished but was eventually caught by the pagans and is said to have been tied to a horse and then dragged to death on Easter, in Alexandria. He was martyred in Egypt around 68 A.D. and is said to the be first of the 118 Patriarchs of the Copts. This instance of punishment and murder shows how the early Copts were treated in the Middle East, which only got worse as the religion grew in size. Most of the initial discrimination came from pagans who hated the ideas of the church and Jesus.
Being a Christian-affiliated group in the Middle East eventually lead to discrimination from other groups such as the Roman empire. Emperor Diocletian had a great number of Christians put to death. Those who were murdered were eventually martyred within the Coptic Church. Since Christianity was so looked down upon by other religions or empires in power, persecution and discrimination were inescapable. Being Christian especially put a huge target on their backs and were often persecuted, but other Christians didn’t see the Copts as a true Christian groups so when the Crusades to reclaim the Holy Land from Muslim rule, the Copts were seen as a muslim group and were also attacked during the quest of the Holy Land. Copts were not seen as a christian group because of their belief that Christ had two natures, one divine and one human, setting them apart from the rest of the Christian groups.
Copts were not always treated poorly, one instance of being treated fairly came when the Arabs started their conquest of Egypt in 645 A.D., in which Muhammad had said to his followers to treat the Copts well and allow them to continue to practice their religion as long as they paid a “jizya” tax. This tax granted the Copts protection by the Arabs. Copts did not have to deal with much discrimination until the restriction were set which furthered hindered their worship in Egypt. Many of the Copts went on to convert to Islam because of the laws inhibiting their practice of Coptic Religion.
Even in the current day Middle East, the copts are still a minority group receiving heavy discrimination. “Palm Sunday, Egypt’s Coptic Christian community had been viciously hit by suicide bombers enlisted by the so-called Islamic State.” Palm Sunday is a very holy day for all Christians so this act of terrorism is directly aimed to disrespect the Copts. These acts have made the idea of removing the Christian religion from the Middle East begin to circulate, as fear of more attacks lies in the back of every Copts mind. Having such intense attacks on their religion shows how the Middle East still doesn’t have any peace and never will because of the intolerance of opposing views. Another instance of religious intolerance against the Middle East Christians is right after the Palm Sunday bombing, armed men attacked a convoy of Copts in Upper Egypt, resulting in the death of 26 innocent Copts. This intolerance was only a year ago showing how high the tensions are still and always have been. There are even instances of mob violence against the Copts. During a protest, Coptic christians were attacked by the Egyptian army and the Islamic mob, resulting in the death of 23 Copts. Not all Christians have experienced the same situations in the Middle East that the Copts have due to different religions having different relationships with different religious and ethnic groups in the Middle East. The practice of Christianity in the Middle East by far reaps the largest amount of backlash for simply practicing their religion.
Extremist groups like ISIS plague the middle East as their goal to rid the region of Christianity results in many bloody episodes, with the peaceful Copts constantly taking the attacks. But not every Muslim wants to rid the region of Christianity, some came to the aid of the Christians after the bombing. Although these acts are selfless and very admirable, it even furthers the point of Christianity in the Middle East being much more discriminated against since the Muslim community feels bad for the turmoil that the Christians must face. Islam has been a dominant religion in the Middle East for over 14 centuries, showing how much of a minority the Christians in the Middle East are. Being such a minority hurts the religion even more, as they have less power and ability to defend themselves from attack, leaving them much more vulnerable because of their lack of size. These modern day acts of terrorism against the Copts and other Middle East Christians shows how unstable the Middle East is, constant war waging and leaving people in a perpetual state of fear has not only weakened the overall structure of the Middle East, but evidently pushed an extremely bad reputation of the overall view of this region of the world. Having such high tension ultimately has segregated most parts of the Middle East, leaving many places unvisitable because of the intolerance and extreme danger that some groups have set in place.
Although the Christians face the most discrimination, every ethnic or religious group at one point has experienced harsh or fatal discrimination from a hierarchy or empire within the Middle East. These hardships and times of pure persecution are what shaped every minority group in the Middle East as a whole, giving each group a unique experience and providing them with a certain way to view and conduct life. These times allowed for the groups to really find what truly matters to them, at times forcing them to choose staying true to their faith or ultimately ending up dead. The rich history of discrimination and persecution is the largest similarity that any ethnic or religious minority groups has in each of their unique pasts. Both the
Druze and the Copts have experienced extreme discrimination, but the Copts have experienced the worst of the dsicrimination because of them being a Christian-affiliated group.
The Druze are an extremely exclusive and tight knit group, with the only way one to become Druze is being born into it with both parents already in. They also keep most of their true history and beliefs very secret, using on the elite 10% of their citizens to maintain the knowledge of their ancestors, called Uqqals. The Druze, a monotheistic and Abrahamic religion, bases their beliefs and how they conduct daily life on the teachings of high islamic figures as well as Plato and Aristotle teachings. Originally coming from Western Asia, the Druze were started when some Muslims thought that the Islamic religion wasn’t focusing enough on philosophical aspects of the teachings. The original preacher of the religion was Hamza ibn 'Alī ibn Ahmad, a scholar of Shia Islam. The Druze were also extremely well versed in Military combat and were hired to defend the Middle East from crusaders, showing early on how strong this Muslim-affiliated religious group was. They were then used at the disposal of Mamluk leaders of Egypt to end any of the remaining control of the Crusaders in coastal Syria. Although often thought to be
The Druze were not always seen as an ally to everyone in the Middle East. The Ottoman Empire claimed that a caravan was attacked by Druze, leading to persecution. The Druze began to be slandered by the Ottomans, calling them thugs. Slander compared to slaughter seems obsolete, but this slander wasn’t the full extent of the Druze’s experiences of persecution. There is still some discrimination and disrespect of the Druze throughout the years. In “Who are the Druze?”, Nina Ostrovitz recounts upon a story of the Druze being “followers of a mad and dead Sultan of Egypt”, which shows how outsiders view the Druze. It goes on to paint a picture of a hatred of a Maronites and when allowed or inclined, extremely motivated to great killings and massacres. These views on the Druze show how they are seen as as murderous group, being more of a hit-squad rather than a religious group.
In the modern era, the Druze are extremely loyal to one another due to their self induced isolation. Under the rule of the French, they were granted the privilege to conduct their own officially administer their own civil affairs according to the laws and customs of their community.