Egyptian Blogger Sentenced to 15 Years For Organizing Protest

The Guardian reports that Alaa Abd El Fattah, "one of the activists most associated with the 2011 uprising that briefly ended 60 years of autocratic rule, was sentenced to 15 years in jail for allegedly organising a protest – an act banned under a law implemented last November, and used to jail several revolutionary leaders. ... Abd El Fattah was also jailed under Mubarak, the military junta that succeeded him, and Adly Mansour, the interim president installed after the overthrow of Mohamed Morsi last summer. Under Morsi, Abd El Fattah escaped prison, but was placed under investigation." The EFF points ou that Abd El Fattah "is one of many caught up in the Egyptian government’s attempt to assert powers. Alaa set an example for how the Internet could be used to organize and exercise free speech: Egypt's leaders should not be permitted to make an example of him to silence others." Update: 06/12 20:02 GMT by T : Reader Mostafa Hussein points out that Abd El Fattah took part in a Slashdot interview more than 10 years ago, too; it gives some insight into the tech scene (and a bit of the politics) of Egypt at that time.

Comments

What?

[Chrisq]

that briefly ended 60 years of autocratic rule

Haven't we learned from Syria and Iraq that autocratic rule is better than Muslim rule. During the brief Islamic rule of Egypt non-Muslims were killed, raped, burned out of homes and places of worship. Yes, they are a bit hard on this blogger - but lets not forget what the movement he supported stood for.

Re:What?

[a_mari_usque_ad_mare]

Actually, its the right word to describe the paranoid world view of cowards who see Muslim invaders in their soup.

Note to EFF

[ColdWetDog]

Egypt's leaders should not be permitted to make an example of him to silence others.

While I don't disagree with the sentiment, I would point out that Egypt isn't the US and the protections and institutions available to us are not available to Egyptians. This does point out, yet again, the problem with the 'Arab Spring' or any rapid move to a rule-of-law, marginally democratic republic: you need strong political, legal and financial institutions for all of that to work. You have virtually none of that in the Arab world.

How you get from a military theocracy to some sort of representative and stable government is a question that has yet to be answered.

Re:Note to EFF

[cpghost]

How you get from a military theocracy to some sort of representative and stable government is a question that has yet to be answered.

Well, for Egypt, the question is rather to choose between an autocratic military regime on one side, and an autocratic theocracy on the other side.

Re:Note to EFF

[gstoddart]

Yes, they are a bit hard on this blogger - but lets not forget what the movement he supported stood for.

Indeed, let's not do that.

He wasn't in favor of Islamic rule. He was against the oppressive regime. Toppling that led to a newly formed brand new oppressive regime, not of his making or support. The Muslim Brotherhood was subsequently elected.

So let's make damned sure we're not accusing him of something he didn't do.

In his own words:

ALAA ABD EL FATTAH: Yes. That was on the 9th of October. There was a big march planned by several movements that were born out of the Coptic Christian community, basically protesting, you know, sectarian strife, violence against churches or, you knowâ"and also laws that restrict building or renovating churches. So, and it was a peaceful march, and it was quite big. I mean, I think it was like the biggest march to focus on the Coptic issues, you know, maybe 20,000 or 30,000. They marched from a popular neighborhood called Shubra, and the plan was to get just right here, behind me, to surround the Maspero building, which is where the state broadcast, radio and TV, broadcasts from. I think the symbolism around Maspero is that state media have always been, you know, downplaying the role of Christians and any other minorities in Egypt, but also have been downplaying the reality of sectarian strife in the country.

It was a peaceful march. They were supposed to just spend one hour in front of the building and then leave. But before they reached the building, they were attacked by the military. Three armed personnel carriers drove through the crowds, killing 17 people, and then live bullets were used against the protesters. Most of the protesters fled the scene. Many were injured. Around 28 people died. Then they started resisting. They started breaking the pavement and resisting the military with rocks and clubs or, you know, anything that they could get their hands on.

During that time, the media crackdown operationâ"there was a media crackdown operation by the military. Also they actually invaded a couple of buildings where independent TV channels were trying to cover the events live. The state broadcaster was showing a completely different picture. They started from the reaction. They started from the resistance, showing Christian protesters attacking the military. And then they started making false claims that tens of officers have been killed, and so on, in what appeared toâ"in what appears to have been a plan to incite sectarian strife. They were basically practically asking Muslims to come down and protect the army and attack any Christians that they find in the streets.

And yet you seem to be insinuating he was some kind of militant Islamist ... when nothing could be further from the truth.

Protesting an unjust regime and ending up with another isn't his damned fault.

Seriously, check your damned facts and at least know WTF you're talking about. Otherwise you just sound like some random idiot spouting random things -- which in this case are completely false.

But, hey, maybe you're an American and therefore in favor of bombing civilians if they're dumb enough to be near the people they actually want to kill. At which point, why should your citizens be exempt from such crap?

Re:Note to EFF

[gstoddart]

Well, for Egypt, the question is rather to choose between an autocratic military regime on one side, and an autocratic theocracy on the other side.

This particular blogger was advocating the 3rd option ... a democratically elected, representative government which didn't impose one religion or another on the populace, treat that one as the law of the land, and the oppress the minorities.

Many many Egyptians are pushing for that.

Re:Note to EFF

[bill_mcgonigle]

How you get from a military theocracy to some sort of representative and stable government is a question that has yet to be answered.

If the US is any guide, you need a couple hundred years of near-anarchy conditions to get the people used to self-determination, self-ownership, and self-responsibility. Then, if they accept a govenment, they'll put strong restrictions on it (whether those are honored is another matter). Colonial America wasn't pure anarchy, but compared to most of the regions of the world today, it was pretty close.

Given modern communications, that couple hundred years might not be necessary, though there are limits to generations' flexibility and those generations have lengthened, not shortened.

Colonial America wasn't perfect, but the oppression of a strong military certainly isn't better.

Re:Allau Ackbar

[i kan reed]

This happened after that, and since things always have exactly one cause, you must be right.

Re:Allau Ackbar

[interkin3tic]

American revolution: 1765 to 1783. About 18 years. Up to 50,000 Americans dead or wounded.

Arab spring: (Egypt), 2011-today. About 3 years so far. Deaths: over 1,100. 6,400 or so injured

American revolution casualties per year: ~2,700
Egyptian revolution casualties per year: ~2,500.

Oh yeah. It's a total clusterfuck over there, the likes of which the world has never seen, and the difference is clearly religion. Centuries from now, to say nothing of decades, the area will be total hell. Americans after and during the revolutionary war never had legal issues of any type. (/heavy sarcasm)

Lest you say "Oh, but sectarian violence, and rape!" remember that America had outright slavery, and women couldn't vote. Ending either wasn't even much of a discussion. On top of that, America benefitted from being a giant ocean away from most meddling, while Egypt is surrounded by foreign governments trying to weigh in, largely pushing towards sectarian violence. And the worlds superpowers of China, Russia, the US, and the EU are all all up in their buisiness too.

Face it: the Egyptians are handling this a lot better than we did. It could be better in theory, sure, I don't think anyone would question that. But to suggest it's terrible and it's because of religion, which many Americans seem convinced of (not just trolls) is really stupid.

Re:Coming soon ...

[gmuslera]

You mean like the plan for killing Occupy high profile members from a couple of years ago? Or the political prosecution of Aaron Schwartz? Or the more recent classifying peaceful protests as terrorism? It is already there, just that most people didn't realized it yet.

Re:Eh??

[GodfatherofSoul]

Ex post facto protections aren't a god-given privilege.

Re:Allau Ackbar

[NotDrWho]

I think a much more apt comparison would be to the French Revolution: a popular revolt against the establishment that ended up with lots of public violence, several failed democratic regimes, and ultimately led to the rise of a dictator who put down any further revolts by killing and arresting the protestors.