Religious tensions continue to heighten in Egypt, after a terrorist bomb outside a Coptic Christian church on New Year's Eve killed 25 and injured nearly 100. The Coptic Pope, Shenouda I is urging the nation's Christians - who make up about 10% of the largely Muslim country - to engage in peaceful protest while decrying their stark lack of equality.

But something else is apparently happening as well. Writing for the Chicago Tribune, Ahmed Rehab explains the unity he is seeing and hearing in "the strong response of everyday Egyptians, Muslim and Copts."

Egyptians of all stripes seem to concur that the Alexandria bombing – the most serious act of terrorism in a decade – is an attack on the Egyptian way of life with the intent to drive a wedge between faith communities and push the nation into turmoil.

“This is not just an attack on Copts, this is an attack on me and you and all Egyptians, on Egypt and its history and its symbols, by terrorists who know no God, no patriotism, and no humanity,” said Sheikh Ali Gomaa, the grand mufti of Egypt.
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“An act like this is wholly condemnable in Islam. Muslims are not only obligated not to harm Christians, but to protect and defend them and their places of worship,” said Imam Ahmed Al Tayeb the Grand Imam of Al Azhar, Egypt’s seat of Orthodoxy.

In many ways this sounds similar to the remarkable American unity we experienced following the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. As we have learned though since then, that sense of interfaith brotherhood can be quite fragile. Here's hoping this glimpse of light can take root in Egypt and become the sustaining story in this increasingly sad situation.