"We are worried about violence," Mina Thabet, an activist and founding member of Maspero Youth Union, a group of Coptic Christians, told USA Today. "There will be more violence against us. There will be more discrimination. There will be more hate."

On Friday, the fourth day of demonstrations in Egypt, at least one protester was killed, more than 27 people were injured and 145 protesters were arrested near the U.S. Embassy in Cairo.

Critics have accused Holland of distorting the history of the religion in Islam: The Untold Story.

"We are shocked. It is serious," a Pastor told The Nation last night.

The gunmen, who were said to be bearing sophisticated weapons, stormed the church during the Bible Study, a Monday programme, at about 7p.m., shooting indiscriminately.

The gunmen reportedly took the worshippers by surprise. They blocked all entrances into the church, preventing people from escaping as they fired indiscriminately at the worshippers.

Yet Mr. Nadarkhani has almost none of the name recognition that Messrs. Mandela and Sharansky had. Despite the increasing ferocity with which Christians are targeted-church bombings in Nigeria, discrimination in Egypt (where Christians have been imprisoned for building or repairing churches), beheadings in Somalia-Americans remain largely unaware of how bad the situation has become, particularly in the Islamic world and in communist countries like China and North Korea.