Egyptian Christian cobbler Fouad Fawzy Tawfik paid the ultimate price for his belief in Jesus Christ.

According to Compass Direct News, Muslim ex-convict Hossam Hafez Ahmad Attaya killed Tawfik last June, confessing that he had planned to murder him because he was an "infidel" whose offhand comment had offended him. Attaya knifed Tawfik as the shoemaker bent to take Attaya's foot measurement in the city of Zagazig.

"I want to kill him because he is an infidel, let me kill them all!" Attaya shouted as he stabbed an eight-inch blade into Tawfik's left lung and stomach, according to his family. Restraining Attaya from stabbing Tawfik a second time, bystanders called an ambulance. Tawfik died minutes later.

"My brother was clearly victimized for being a Christian," Noshe Fawzy Tawfik told Compass Direct.

Events over the past year have made Egypt's Coptic Christians, estimated to number between 8 and 15 million, wary of legal loopholes used to acquit those who carry out periodic attacks on Christians. Last year Egypt dropped charges against a Muslim for his knife attacks at churches in Alexandria—which killed one churchgoer and wounded more than a dozen others—after a committee of psychiatrists published a report that he was mentally imbalanced.

According to Compass Direct, although Egypt's Christian citizens are free to embrace Islam and obtain legal Muslim identities, Muslim citizens are not allowed to change their religious identity. Those who become Christians are subjected to severe harassment by the State Security Investigation (SSI), which often arrests converts for either insulting Islam or "threatening national security."

Islam is the official state religion of Egypt, which is approximately 86 percent Muslim.

Egypt is ranked number 18 on the Open Doors World Watch List of 50 countries where Christians suffer the most severe persecution.

Persecution Report is presented in cooperation with Open Doors USA, which serves the Persecuted Church through training, Bible distribution, and community development. For more information, call 1-888-5-BIBLE-5 or visit www.odusa.org.

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