Chapter two: The Beginning of Persecution of Copts within the Era of Pre-Umayyad Caliphs:

  Desert-Arabs and Bedouins, who are described in the Quran as the most disbelieving and hypocritical people, had declared their rejection of the new religion once Muhammad died. Some of them even attacked Yathreb once more, and the first Arabian civil war, called the renegade war, broke out during the reign of the first caliph, Abou Bakr. Once renegades were quelled by Abou Bakr, he saw to it that Arabs must be unified within one goal that will contain, channel, and direct their belligerent nature and love of looting outside Arabia; hence, the era of Arab conquests began. The once-before renegades constituted the main number of soldiers within the conquering army prepared by Abou Bakr that crushed and invaded the Persian and Byzantine empires, whose territories became provinces within the Arab Empire which was still growing and extending its borders. When Egypt was conquered by the caliph Omar Ibn Al-Khattab and his military leader Amr Ibn Al-As, Copts suffered a great deal. Coptic suffering went on during the Umayyad caliphate whose caliphs were known for their fanaticism and bias for the Arab race and their bias against non-Arabs among conquered nations of Iraq, Persia (today's Iran), and Egypt. Sadly, many historians today in Egypt shy from tackling how Egyptian Copts suffered persecution within the era of pre-Umayyad caliphs, as these caliphs are sanctified, deified, revered, and worshipped by Sunnites. In fact, persecution of Copts began as early as when Amr Ibn Al-As ruled Egypt as its governor, and this period is tackled by many non-biased Coptic historians who witnessed the Arab conquest of Egypt and asserted how Amr Ibn Al-As, as a military leader and conqueror, loved and acted fairly at first with the Egyptian population, which was mostly Coptic at the time. We focus in this paper on two main features of persecuting Copts at the time: imposing tributes and the coined term ''dhimmitude''.                 

Imposing tributes:

   The only Quranic verse that mentions tribute is the following: "Fight those who do not believe in God, nor in the Last Day, nor forbid what God and His messenger have forbidden, nor abide by the religion of truth-from among those who received the Scripture-until they pay the tribute, willingly or unwillingly." (9:29). The Quranic legislations have three spheres: (1) legislative commands which are governed by (2) legislative rules that aim at achieving (3) legislative purposes. For instance, the Quranic legislative commands ''fight'' (as in 2:190 and 9:29) and ''mobilize'' (as in 9:38 and 9:41) are governed by legislative rules that make them applicable only within the frame of self-defense regarding aggressors, in retribution without transgressions: "And fight in the cause of God those who fight you, but do not commit aggression; God does not love the aggressors." (2:190); "…Whoever commits aggression against you, retaliate against him in the same measure as he has committed against you. And be conscious of God, and know that God is with the righteous." (2:194). Hence, within Islam, the only goal of fighting in the cause of God is to stop compulsion in religious matters or religious persecution, i.e., fitna in the Quranic terminology. Thus, the legislative purpose of fighting in the cause of God is to stop fitna or persecution so that people remain free to embrace whatever faiths they choose, as God has created the humankind as free agents, while judging them on the Day of resurrection based on their own free choice done at their own free will. This is the meaning of the Quranic command to fight those aggressive disbelieving Arabs in the 7^th century A.D. Arabia who persecuted those who had converted to another religion apart from theirs: "And fight them until there is no fitna (i.e., persecution), and religion becomes a matter related to God alone. But if they cease, then let there be no hostility except against the oppressors." (2:193); "Fight them until there is no more persecution (i.e., fitna), and religion becomes a matter exclusively judged by God. But if they desist-God is Seeing of what they do." (8:39). Thus, we are to understand Quranic sharia legislations only within Quranic legislative commands, rules, and purposes; thus, we will get to know that those whom were fought as per this verse: "Fight those who do not believe in God, nor in the Last Day, nor forbid what God and His messenger have forbidden, nor abide by the religion of truth-from among those who received the Scripture-until they pay the tribute, willingly or unwillingly." (9:29), were ONLY the aggressive ones among ''People of the Book'' (i.e., Jews and Christians) in Arabia at the time and NOT all Jews and Christians themselves in Arabia or elsewhere who were peaceful and never committed any sort of aggression against the Yathreb city-state led by Muhammad and the early Muslims. This is because there is no room within real Islam (i.e., Quranism) to commit any sort of aggression at all against anyone; military self-defense and retribution are allowed in cases when peaceful Muslims are attacked first by aggressors. Therefore, 9:29 tackles the case when an aggressive community/country that lacks faith in terms of behavior and belief that commits military aggression against a peaceful (therefore, "believing" in terms of adherence to peace) community/country, and this wronged party has the right to defend itself militarily, and when victory is achieved over aggressive enemies who are deterred and driven out, this enemy must be obliged to pay a tribute  – NOT forced to convert to 'Islam' – as usually done past and present in all human societies as means of punishment and compensation within peace treaties between parties involved; e.g., Germany paid compensations after WWII and Iraq did the same after its invasion of Kuwait. Thus, when we see how the verse 9:29 was applied in the 7^th century Arabia, it referred at the time to Byzantines; as we read in history that they began aggression against the Yathreb city-state led by Muhammad and incited Arabian Christian tribes against early believers in Yathreb, resulting in battles of Mo'ta and Tabuk. History tells us also that the Byzantines paid tributes after they committed military aggression against Arabs when Arabs defeated them. Likewise, Mu'aweiya the Arab governor of the Levant, who later became the first Umayyad caliph, personally and unilaterally paid an annual tribute of one hundred thousand dinars to the Byzantines to ward off their military aggression against the Levant during the years in which he fought the caliph Ali (who was later on deified after his death as the supreme Shiite god/deity). The Byzantines used to pay tributes to the First Abbasid Era caliphs, whereas the Second Abbasid Era caliphs used to pay tributes to the Byzantines; hence, the two parties (Arabs and non-Arabs) exchanged roles as per their military strengths, the sort of aggression, and by who it was committed. The Byzantines should have paid tribute to Arab military leader Amr Ibn Al-As after he defeated them and drove them out of Egypt, but contrary to what was expected, the Egyptians paid this tribute, after they made a pact with this military leader against the Byzantines. Al-Makrizi the historian in his book titled ''Khetat Al-Makrizi'' tells us briefly about how Egyptian Copts at the time helped the Arab conquerors against the hated Byzantines who ruled Egypt at the time (who persecuted Copts for religious reasons). Once Amr Ibn Al-As entered Sinai with his troops, the pope/patriarch of Copts in Alexandria, capital of Egypt at the time, issued orders to all Copts in Egypt to help Arabs in every possible manner and he predicted the collapse of the Byzantine rule; of course, Copts obeyed such orders. When Amr Ibn Al-As reached the walls of the Sinai city of Al-Farama, Copts helped him with information and victuals, and they helped him as well to conquer Alexandria after a long siege, providing Arabs with victuals and information for more than two months. Copts managed to win the Coptic leader of the guardians, who manned the gates of the wall around Alexandria, to their side and convinced him to open all gates to Arab troops to enter the city and vanquish the Byzantines. It was expected that Amr Ibn Al-As would feel gratitude and return the favor to Copts for their aid to his limited troops that enabled him to conquer Egypt. Yet, Cyrus the byzantine ruler of Egypt at the time (or Al-Muqawqis in Arabic), managed to convince Amr Ibn Al-As that the Copts were the ones to pay tribute instead of the defeated Byzantines. It was typical that Copts paid tributes to the Byzantines as per Middle Ages laws, and the Arab conquerors learnt this unjust law and applied it on Copts who helped them conquer Egypt! After a seven-month siege of the Babylon fortress, located at the Nile River bank, Arab conquerors managed to break into its gates, and Cyrus had to negotiate surrender with Amr Ibn Al-As, proposing to him that Copts would pay the required tribute to Arabs; every man would pay two dinars. Cyrus managed to convince Amr Ibn Al-As that the Byzantines would never pay anything after they lost Egypt, whereas Arabs insisted on it would fight for it, especially that Copts would not convert to 'Islam'. Amr Ibn Al-As agreed, and thus Cyrus managed to spare the Byzantines more losses and war in Egypt. Copts felt forced to pay this tribute to Amr Ibn Al-As whom they helped to conquer their country. Six million Egyptians paid this tribute at the time, and Amr Ibn Al-As imposed another demand; Copts were to receive Arabs as guests in their villages for three consecutive days. The greed of Amr Ibn Al-As increased as he coveted more money and asked Copts/Egyptians to pay more. Al-Makrizi writes that the governor of  the city of Ekhna asked Amr Ibn Al-As about the amount of money that should be paid by the residents, and the governor of Egypt, Amr Ibn Al-As, pointed at the corner of a church there and told him that even of money reached the roof of this church, this would have not been enough, as the whole of Egypt was like a treasury to the caliph Omar Ibn Al-Khattab in his capital, Yathreb. The governor of Ekhna managed to escape from Egypt and Amr Ibn Al-As to seek the aid of the Byzantines, and he returned with Byzantine troops that retrieved Alexandria to the Byzantines. Amr Ibn Al-As re-conquered Alexandria with great difficulty and drove the Byzantines out of it. Amr Ibn Al-As was the torchbearer for the Umayyads, whom he helped to establish their dynasty in return of keeping his post as a governor of Egypt, as he inspired them to become greedy in collecting heavy tributes and taxes from Copts and other conquered nations. Even Copts who converted to Islam were never exempted from paying heavy tributes and taxes during the Umayyad rule, except during the short months of the reign of the Umayyad caliph Omar Ibn Abdul-Aziz, who never took heavy tributes and taxes from those who converted to Islam, and when the governor of Egypt at the time, Hayyan Ibn Shureih, warned this caliph about the fact that such a decree will lessen the amount of money collected annually and sent to Damascus (capital of the Umayyad Empire), Omar Ibn Abdul-Aziz sent him a letter to rebuke him severely, asserting that God has sent Muhammad as a guide to people and not as a tax-collector. Within later eras, the tribute was a plague imposed by all governors of Egypt on non-Muslim Egyptians during the Umayyad, Abbasid, and Mameluke eras, the Mameluke Era or sultanate ended in 921 A.H./157 by the Ottoman conquest of Egypt, and the Ottomans imposed tributes on all Egyptians, 'Muhammadans' and Coptic Christians alike. Indeed, the Egyptian Treasury routinely paid a certain sum annually to Turkey as tribute (though the Ottoman caliphate ended in 1924) until the late president Gamal Abdel-Nasser put an end to this humiliation and theft. Al-Makrizi writes the following about the Arab conquest of Egypt: Amr Ibn Al-As declared to Egyptians that those who hid any treasures away from him would be killed. An Upper Egyptian Copt, named Boutros had a Pharaonic treasure, and someone blew the whistle about him to Amr Ibn Al-As, who imprisoned and interrogated him to confess under duress about the hiding place of the treasure, but Boutros insisted adamantly on denying that he possessed such a treasure; eventually, Amr Ibn Al-As managed to figure out the location of the hidden chest of that treasure, and he killed Boutros and hung his severed head by a string on top of the gate of a mosque, thus terrorizing the rest of Copts, and whoever had a Pharaonic treasure handed it willingly and readily to Amr Ibn Al-As to avoid being put to death. Al-Makrizi writes also that Amr Ibn Al-As imprisoned a Copt who was accused of being an ally/spy serving the Byzantines, and this Copt was released after paying more than 50 quintals of gold! Such confiscations made the ill-gotten wealth of Amr Ibn Al-As reach 140 quintals of gold, and he collected them in his room while dying, as he was asking his two sons about who would get that large sum of money. The two sons adamantly refused to receive this ill-gotten wealth, and it was confiscated by the first Umayyad caliph, Mu'aweiya, who said he did not care about injustices committed to procure such ill-gotten money! Despite all of the above, Amr Ibn Al-As remains to be the best ruler of Egypt and a more lenient one in dealing with Egyptians in comparison to Arab governors who succeeded him. It is a historical fact that he did not commit bloodshed so often as his successors and that he adopted a good policy in tax-collecting and getting tributes by never overburdening Egyptians; he extracted from them annually the total sum of 12 million dinars, and later governors, especially his direct successor appointed by Mu'aweiya, namely Abdullah Ibn Abou Sarh, extracted 14 million dinars from Egyptians annually. The Umayyads were so greedy and hoarded countless sums of money from everyone, and they quelled and crushed the successive Coptic revolts very severely by committing brutal heinous acts. Within the decades of the Umayyad rule in Egypt, Copts were persecuted severely to prevent any possible revolts. Further details on that topic are provided in this research paper.                  

The coined term ''dhimmitude'':

   The term Quranic "dhimma" has nothing to do with the term ''dhimmitude'' coined by Umayyads to refer to non-Arabs within the Arab Empire; it occurs twice in two verses in the Quranic Chapter Nine, within a context talking about the bellicose and belligerent Bedouin nature of polytheistic Arabian tribes who fought Muhammad and early believers and how they never respect any treaty if they gain victory: "How? Whenever they overcome you, they respect neither kinship nor treaty (i.e., dhimma) with you. They satisfy you with lip service, but their hearts refuse, and most of them are immoral." (9:8); "Towards a believer they respect neither kinship nor treaty (i.e., dhimma). These are the transgressors." (9:10). The terms ''dhimmitude''  and ''dhimmis'' coined by Umayyads to refer to all conquered nations that were thought to be 'owned' by Arab rulers as second-class citizens in our modern-age terms. This applied even to those non-Arabs when they converted to Islam; for instance, the Iraqi people and the Persians (who mostly converted) suffered as much as Copts under the Umayyad rule in general, as Arabs despised non-Arabs and thought that Arabs are superior to other races. Within the passage of time, within later generations, Persians and Iraqis enjoyed all their rights during the Abbasid rule as they had participated in the endeavors to found the Abbasid caliphate, and were no longer treated as dhimmis as they spoke Arabic fluently and practiced Islam and Arabs were not preferred to Muslim non-Arabs or treated as superiors. Yet, dhimmitude as a term remained used all over the Arab Empire to refer to those non-Muslims of non-Arab origins, while Christian Arabs were never treated as dhimmis at all, but as equals, because of their Arab origins. Dhimmis were non-Arab Christians in Egypt, Iraq, and the Levant, and they suffered a lot within the racial persecution under the Umayyad rule and then the religious persecution for in later centuries because of the status of dhimmitude. This inferior look toward Christians of non-Arab origin that violates the Quranic higher value of equality of all people (see 49:13) has been codified in Sunnite fiqh/jurisprudence books regarding rules of how to deal with non-Muslims, while fabricating countless hadiths/narratives falsely ascribed to Muhammad to allow the ongoing persecution of the People of the Book (Jews + Christians) within the Arab Empire while deeming 'Muslim' Arabs as superior to them. Those criminal fiqh scholars and imams ignored on purpose the Quranic discourse addressed to the People of the Book and the Quranic commands to believers to treat them kindly debate with them in a dignified manner (see 16:125). Another ignored fact by those unjust imams is that God has told Muhammad to ask the People of the Book if he had any doubts: "If you are in doubt about what We revealed to you, ask those who read the Scripture before you. The truth has come to you from your Lord, so do not be of those who doubt." (10:94). Moreover, God describes Christians as the nearest in affection toward Quran-believers: "… And you will find that the nearest in affection towards the believers are those who say, "We are Christians." That is because among them are priests and monks, and they are not arrogant." (5:82). God commands kind treatment in fairness toward non-Muslims as long as they are not aggressors who fight peaceful Muslims or would ally themselves to enemies of commit aggression against Muslims: "As for those who have not fought against you for your religion, nor expelled you from your homes, God does not prohibit you from dealing with them kindly and equitably. God loves the equitable. But God prohibits you from befriending those who fought against you over your religion, and expelled you from your homes, and aided in your expulsion. Whoever takes them for friends and allies - these are the wrongdoers." (60:8-9). Another ignored fact by those unjust imams of the Sunnite Muhammadans is that God commands fair treatment of the People of the Book as equals on the same levels as Muslims especially in relation to intermarriage and food as long as they coexist peacefully with Muslims: "Today all good things are made lawful for you. And the food of those given the Scripture is lawful for you, and your food is lawful for them. So are chaste believing women, and chaste women from the people who were given the Scripture before you, provided you give them their dowries, and take them in marriage, not in adultery, nor as mistresses. But whoever rejects faith, his work will be in vain, and in the Hereafter he will be among the losers." (5:5). Thus, this established security and peace within intermarriages, shared social life is based on equality in duties and rights as well as religious freedom as long as people are nonviolent and peaceful. Such great values were lost because of the Umayyad term ''dhimmitude'' that has created discrimination and persecution. Imposing tributes within the era of the four pre-Umayyad caliphs was the fact leading to the coinage of this Umayyad term and its consequences. If the caliph Omar Ibn Al-Khattab would have refused to impose tributes, the Copts would have been on equal footing with Arabs; sadly, Omar Ibn Al-Khattab and his successor Othman Ibn Affan imposed these tributes on all conquered nations, indicating that they are second-class citizens to be robbed and persecuted by later generations of Arabs. The Umayyads followed in the same route but persecuted Copts in Egypt and the nation of Iraq (who were precursors to Shiites) more severely than ever.