Today marks a significant event in my life. Today was the first time I felt it is unsafe to go back to Egypt. My self imposed exile moved from an area where I felt Egypt is not a happy place to live in, to Egypt is an unsafe home to visit. The escalation is serious and extremely upsetting.
A few weeks ago a private contractor who worked for the Armed Forces made a series of videos exposing financial corruption in high ranks in the Army and talked about several construction projects that both drained the tax payers money and were unnecessary. The contractor, Mohamed Ali, called for people to show El-Sisi and his regime that they are not afraid and called for mass protests. In several cities across Egypt people took to the streets. In the days that followed the biggest wave of detention since 2013 took place. Over 1700 people got arrested. Many activists, lawyers, column writers, university professors and bloggers were kidnapped and many of them are being kept in secret locations. Their families cannot reach them, their lawyers cannot talk to them and the state is silent.
In the 19th of September 2019, the state kidnapped the brother of Wael Ghoniem to force him to shut up. Wael Ghoniem is a prominent political figure who also lives in self-imposed exile in California. But Hazem Ghoniem, the brother of Wael Ghoniem, is not the first. There is a long list of similar cases that includes the daughter of Youssef Al-Karadawy, the brother of Moutaz El Demerdash and many other innocent people whose only crime is that they share blood with political opposition. The strategies of the Egyptian state stooped to a new low: Kidnapping family members to force opposition to shut up.
Of course I felt scared to go back home for a vacation that was supposed to start tomorrow. People have their phones searched (extra judicially) in airports, then they are taken away to unknown location, then they are tortured and charged with fabricated cases and their lives are ruined.
The days of El-Sisi regime are numbered and like all dictators who preceded him he also will fall. I hope this time he and his thugs will get the punishment they deserve.
This post is independent from the rest of the chapters. Chapter 8 and the following chapters will talk more about Egyptian regime, oppression, illegal detention, torture and death in Egyptian prisons and more….
On the Search for Home 