Hundreds of Copts continue to visit holy sites in Jerusalem and in the West Bank in violation of the Coptic Orthodox Church's banning of visiting Palestine. Rāmī Siyāj, head of a Cairo tourist company that runs trips to holy places in Palestine, described the Church's prevention of Egyptian Christians to holy sites as a political decision, and the Church should be purely religious and not political. He added that in his experience the visits of Egyptians to Jerusalem support the Palestinian people and economy. He revealed that twenty Egyptian tourist companies take tourists to Jerusalem and that five thousand Christians have visited Jerusalem. Father Antonios al-Orshaleme, general secretary of the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate in Jerusalem, said some of the agencies published photo of visitors with him during a visit to the church to show that the Church encourages visits (Muhammad Abū al-Rab, al-Misrī al-Yawm, May 2, p. 6). Read original text in Arabic.