Hundreds of Muslims and Christians attended a memorial service Sunday for a prominent Palestinian Christian who was found stabbed and shot on a Gaza City street earlier that day.
At Gaza’s Greek Orthodox church, Palestinian mourners gathered around the body of Rami Khader Ayyad, the 32-year-old director of Gaza's only Christian bookstore who hospital officials say was shot in the head and stabbed numerous times.Ayyad’s family and neighbours said Ayyad had regularly received anonymous death threats from people angry about his missionary work and was abducted late Saturday afternoon by unknown assailants near his home.
His murder came six months after the religious store he managed, the Teacher’s Bookshop, was bombed, apparently by Muslim extremists.
"We hope he was not killed because he was Christian," said Nicholas Issa, a Christian, according to The Scotsman. "That is what worries Christians in Gaza now. Today is a black day for Gaza."
Kamal Juda, a Muslim, added that the killing showed Hamas has not yet gained full control over the security situation after its takeover of Gaza in June.
The latest incident came as Christian leaders in Gaza have called on Hamas officials to make greater efforts to protect Christians in light of the instability and lawlessness in Gaza following the Islamic group’s takeover.
Previously, Christians were respected citizens and considered part of Gaza’s elite as they ran schools, hospitals and businesses. The late Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, assigned Christians to top positions in the government and the Fatah movement.
Even after Hamas wrested control of Gaza strip in mid-June, the Hamas-led coalition government consisted of a prominent Gaza Christian, Hussam Tawil. Moreover, Hamas forces had protected Gaza’s Greek Orthodox Church from angry Muslims after Pope Benedict XVI’s comment on Islam.
Yet Muslim-Christian relations are reportedly unraveling as attacks against Christians continue despite Hamas’ promises to protect the community.
Last month, an 80-year-old Christian woman in Gaza City was attacked by a masked man who, during the course of the robbery, beat her hands with a club and also hit her head with a tool causing her to bleed.
“As soon as I opened the door, he pushed me inside and shouted: ‘Where is the money, you infidel?’ I shouted back: I’m not an infidel – I’m a proud Palestinian Arab,” Claire Farah Tarazi recalled to the Jerusalem Post.
The assailant then locked her in her bedroom as he searched for money, but Tarazi was able to escape through another bedroom door and went to a neighbor for help.
Tarazi’s relatives pointed out that she was attacked because of her faith.
“The fact that the attacker called her an infidel speaks for itself,” a relative, who was not identified, told the Post. “He clearly knew that this was a Christian woman living alone. He would not have dared to do the same thing to a Muslim woman.”
