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More than 20 men armed with machine guns surround a historic 4th century monastery with the monks inside for hours The Free Copts  This is not the first time where the monastery of Abou Fana has been the target of attacks. On Sunday, March 19th, 2006 Generl Said Uthman Ismael, Head of Mallawi city council, in the province of El Minia , Upper Egypt , gave 5 days ultimatum to Bishop Dimetrious of Mallawi to demolish the guest house located in the Apa Fana monastery or else face demolition by Egyptian security forces, the ultimatum was rejected at the time. New Year's Day of 2008 witnessed the start of the recent attacks where Samir Louly, a former detainee who is also a member of the "Islamic Groups" accompanied by his son Abdullah fired rounds bullets in the air from their machine guns continuously for 2 hours at the monastery. When the police officer arrived, no charges were laid. Later, Louly was publicly boasting that he will use his weapons any time he wants and that nobody can stop him. A week later, Louly and his son gathered a group of 20 armed Muslim men and attacked the monastery again firing directly at it to terrorize the monks living in it, who in turn informed the police immediately, instead of investigating the incident and arresting the terrorists, who are known to them, the police arrested 2 of the monastery monks and held them for investigation for 2 days. The Free Copts contacted the monks today and asked about the motive of the criminals, "because they want to take the monastery's land from us, especially in the absence of a fence to protect it and the government's negligence towards the repeated attacks, which implicitly give the attackers the green light to continue with their abuses" the monks said. Monks also complained of the government's continued denial of their request build a fence around the monastery. The monastery dates back to the 4th century and considered by historians and archeologists to be among the first to exist worldwide when Christian monasticism flourished out of the Egyptian desert.
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