Egyptian Front: 125 arrested in July, including journalists, politicians

The Egyptian Front for Human Rights recorded the arrests and detention of 125 citizens, including journalists, activists and politicians, on political charges during July against the backdrop of calls for demonstrations.

Egyptian security forces arrested two journalists, Khaled Mamdouh from the Arabic Post website and Ramadan Juwaida from the Akhbar El-Yom news website, in addition to arresting the cartoonist for Al-Manassa website, translator Ashraf Omar and political activist Yahya Hussein Abdel Hadi.

The Egyptian Front conveyed in a brief statement on Friday: “In an escalatory security attack, closer to the state of widespread and arbitrary targeting with the aim of closing the public sphere between 2018-2022, the Egyptian authorities targeted dozens of citizens in a single month, including journalists, cartoonists, political activists and people of different ages and governorates who criticised economic policies on social media or expressed solidarity with calls for demonstrations. The security services targeted them by arresting them, and the State Security Prosecution issued decisions to detain them based on initial investigations and directed political charges against them.”

In recent months, the Egyptian government has escalated its targeting of movements supporting Palestine by arresting dozens of citizens since October 2023 involved in peaceful demonstrations held in solidarity with the Gaza Strip, as well as calls for demonstrations that did not take place against the regime.

According to the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms, 120 people have been arrested since the beginning of the protests in support of Palestine from the governorates of Cairo, Giza, Alexandria, Qalyubia, Dakahlia and the Red Sea. Thirty people were released, 17 others were released without investigation and 67 are still in pretrial detention. Six others have been subjected to forced disappearance.

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