Muslims Only at Religious Unity Conference

Wed Jan 19, 6:55 PM ET U.S. National - AP

U.S. National - AP http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050119/ap_on_re_us/fami...
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By WAYNE PARRY, Associated Press Writer

JERSEY CITY, N.J. - It was billed as an interfaith unity event, aimed at
defusing religious tensions following the slayings of an Egyptian Christian
couple and their two children, but only Muslim leaders attended.

Organizers of Wednesday's news conference said Coptic Church officials told
them they could not make the gathering because of a religious holiday and a
local funeral. Methodist clergy invited also did not attend.

Muslim groups pleaded with the media and the public not to rush to judgment,
and if Muslims are found to have committed the slayings, not to blame an
entire religion for the acts of a few individuals.

"Whoever committed this crime should be made an example of," said Suzanne
Loutfy of Woodbridge, a leader of the Egyptian-American Group. "I would like
people to look at a criminal as a criminal. A religion cannot commit a
crime; individuals do."

Tensions have been running high between Christians and Muslims in Jersey
City following the discovery Friday of the bodies of Hossam Armanious, 47,
his 37-year-old wife, Amal Garas, and their daughters, Sylvia, 15, and
Monica, 8. Their bodies were bound and gagged, and each was stabbed
repeatedly in the neck and head.

Authorities are investigating the possibility they were slain by a Muslim
angered over postings that Armanious, a Coptic Christian, wrote in an
Internet chat room. But prosecutors also stressed that robbery remains a
possible motive.

No arrests had been announced as of Wednesday afternoon, and prosecutor
Gaetano Gregory said there were no new developments in the case to report.

Emotions flared Monday during the funeral for the Armanious family, with
some mourners scuffling inside and outside the church hall. Some yelled
anti-Islamic sentiments, and a Muslim cleric who had come to pay his
respects was escorted from the service after a heckler started yelling at
him.

Loutfy said she invited Coptic Church officials to Wednesday's event early
in the day. She said Bishop David, who according to Coptic tradition uses
only one name, told her that church officials could not attend because of
the Feast of the Epiphany, a religious holiday celebrating Jesus' baptism.

No one answered a call to the church's St. Mark Archdiocese Wednesday
afternoon and St. George & St. Shenouda Coptic Orthodox Church, where the
funeral was held. A fax sent to the church office seeking comment Wednesday
afternoon was not immediately answered.

The St. Abraam's Coptic Orthodox Church in Woodbury, N.Y., issued a
statement Wednesday cautioning against jumping to conclusions. But the
statement also said "some signs point to this incident being a religiously
motivated hate crime against Coptic Christians," and suggested that
"political correctness" could keep it from being classified as such.

"The apparent reluctance to consider this a hate crime despite Jersey City's
long history of Muslim extremism is concerning," the statement read.

A Jersey City neighborhood housed Muslims convicted in the 1993 World Trade
Center bombing, including blind sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman.

Imam Mohammad Qatanani, spiritual leader of the Islamic Center of Passaic
County, said what was done to the Armanious family is forbidden by Islam.

"Islam is the religion of love and peace, the religion of not hurting, the
religion of respecting life and humanity," he said. "What happened is
against the religion of Islam, the religion of Christianity, and the
religion of Judaism."