At it again

David Kirkpatrick has an article in The New York Times about new clashes in Egypt:

In Cairo, Muslims and Coptic Christians clashed with bullets, rocks, and Molotov cocktails (photo) for the second time in seven days, sending at least 55 people to the hospital, officials with Egypt’s Interior Ministry said. The officials said that at least 33 of the wounded were Muslims, 22 were Christians, and that 28 were arrested for playing a role in the strife.
Fears of such sectarian violence have kept Cairo on edge since a nightlong battle between mobs of Muslims and Coptic Christians in the working-class neighborhood of Imbaba a week ago left at least a dozen dead and two churches in flames. (Egyptian state news media said that the death toll had risen to fifteen.)
Hundreds of Copts angry at the failure of the Egyptian police and armed forces to protect their churches more effectively, held a sit-in outside the state television building, known as Maspero. The clashes on Saturday began about 10 p.m., officials of the Interior Ministry said. Witnesses and officials said a small group of Muslims had fired shots at the sit-in. Soon groups of young men from each faith were battling each other for hours with rocks, sticks, and Molotov cocktails.
In the aftermath of the bloodshed, Pope Shenouda III, the leader of Egypt’s Coptic Christian church, urged an end to the sit-in, Egyptian state news media reported. “To our children who are protesting in front of Maspero, the protest is now no longer about expressing your opinion and has been infiltrated by those who use different means than the ones you use,” the pope said in a statement, according to the website of the state newspaper al-Ahram. “Now there is fighting and hitting, and that negatively affects Egypt’s reputation as well as your reputation. Therefore, you have to immediately end the protest.” The paper’s website said that he added: “The patience of the rulers is starting to end, and you will be the losers if you continue in the protest.”
But thousands of Copts ignored their patriarch’s admonition and continued to rally into Sunday night. “With our blood, with our soul, we sacrifice for the cross,” they chanted.
Tensions between Muslims and Coptic Christians, who make up about ten percent of the population, have risen steadily since the sweeping vows of unity during the revolution that toppled President Hosni Mubarak three months ago. Copts say they have felt increasingly embattled since clashes just south of Cairo left a church burning last month.
The battle on the night of 7 May in the neighborhood of Imbaba began with a dispute over a woman. Neighborhood Muslims were convinced that Christians were holding her in a church against her will to talk her out of converting to Islam and leaving her Christian husband for a Muslim man, a recurring theme in sectarian disputes here, where a combination of custom and law make it easier for Muslims than Christians to divorce.
With memories of last month’s church fire still fresh, about five hundred Copts rallied to defend their church, some with firearms, even before more than two dozen Muslims had approached it. Casualties were roughly even on both sides. The anger among the Copts had run so high that many continued to protest at their sit-in, even as thousands of other Egyptians held a rally for Muslim and Christian unity in Tahrir Square.
In addition to sectarian violence, general crime has jumped in Cairo since the revolution as the military council running the country has struggled to rebuild the police force. Many police officers, who were a primary target of the revolution because of their past abusive practices, deserted the force or have returned timidly. Some leaders of the protests that brought down the old government suspect a counterrevolutionary conspiracy to stir up lawlessness.