Dozens were killed by two deadly bombings targeting Coptic Christian churches in Egypt on Palm Sunday, 2017.

At a time when the lives of the people of Egypt have been, like the lives of most people around the world, disrupted by coronavirus; at a time when Egyptians, like others, are wearing masks, staying indoors and social distancing—a group of undeterred Islamic terrorists were preparing to launch a major terror strike on Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox churches during their holiest day of worship, this coming Sunday, April 19, 2020.

On Tuesday, April 14, Egyptian security forces were involved in an hours-long gunfight with an Islamic terror cell ensconced in an apartment building in Cairo’s Amiriyah district, which is known for holding a large Christian population and several churches. Some television stations aired footage of the firefight; many gunshots could be heard in the background. In the end, seven would-be terrorists and one police officer were killed in the shootout. Several ammunitions and automatic weapons were found and seized from their apartment.

Initial news reports presented the cell as takfiri—a reference to Muslim extremists who accuse, attack, and sometimes kill other Muslims for not being Islamic enough. Others protested that the cell’s primary if not exclusive purpose was to murder Christians in their churches.

The Egyptian ministry has now confirmed that “the suspects were planning attacks on the country’s Coptic Christians during the Holy Week and Easter Sunday. Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox Christians, one the world’s oldest Christian communities, would celebrate Easter on April 19.”

Earlier, in a live phone call, a Coptic activist insisted that the terrorist cell’s “target was to kill Christians and bomb churches around their holy days, which, of course, we are accustomed to every year.”