Milad Malak, a 20-year-old Christian from Egypt, was killed by Islamic State fighters in Libya after he refused to deny Jesus and convert to Islam, The Christian Post reports. Open Doors said he was the only Christian among the Egyptian workers the militants held, citing two Muslim friends who were held with him and later freed. For several days his captors tortured him and threatened to kill him unless he gave up his faith, and he refused every demand.
International Christian Concern reports that he told his captors, "Even if you cut me into pieces, I would never renounce my faith." His sister, Madonna Malek, told Worthy News that the family paid a ransom, but the kidnappers kept him because he alone among the captives was a Christian and used violence to press him to convert.
Malak served as a deacon at his Coptic church in Sebarbay, his home village in Egypt's northern Gharbia governorate. Like many young Egyptians, he left for Libya to find work as Egypt's economy declined, hoping to provide for his family. He set out on Sept. 2 with two Muslim friends from his village, and after a one-day trip they reached Zliten, a city on Libya's Mediterranean coast, where they stayed with other Egyptians who had come for work. ISIS fighters seized the three men on the morning of Oct. 4.
The kidnappers abused the captives and demanded money. The two friends were released after their families paid $4,700, and both are now in a hospital in Egypt. Malak's family learned of his death from them and asked the Egyptian government to press for his body to be sent home. On Oct. 28 relatives and other Christians gathered to mourn him, and a family friend said he stayed faithful to Christ until he died.
Open Doors ranks Libya No. 9 on its World Watch List of the most dangerous countries for Christians. Both Open Doors and ICC tied Malak's death to the 2015 killing of 20 Coptic Christians and a Ghanaian man, Matthew Ayariga, whom ISIS beheaded on a Libyan beach after they refused a final demand to renounce their faith. Coptic Orthodox Pope Tawadros II declared the 21 men martyrs, and in 2023 the late Pope Francis added them to the Roman Catholic Church's list of martyrs. Hebrews 13:3 speaks of remembering those who suffer for Christ. Pray for Malak's family, for his church in Sebarbay, and for the two friends who are recovering.
Read Hebrews 13:3
