Dissent Crushed: Abdel Kareem, Egypt’s Free Speech Martyr
The four-year jail sentence of student blogger Abdel Kareem Soliman for the crimes of "contempt for religion" and "insulting the president" has dealt a harsh blow to the Egyptian blogosphere and free speech in the Middle East in the Internet age.
The popular blogger known as Sandmonkey reports from Cairo on Abdel Kareem's story and the grave consequences of his case.
Egyptian blogger Abdel Kareem Soliman was sentenced to four years in prison yesterday in a Cairo court. He will sit in jail for three years for the crime of “contempt for religion” and one year for “insulting the president”.
For those of you who haven’t been following the case, welcome to the Middle East. They do indeed have crimes like that around here.
Almost as disturbing as the sentence was the public reaction. As the court hearing ended, the media moved to the street in front of the courthouse and started interviewing people about what they thought of the trial. With the exception of human rights activists and bloggers, the Egyptian public seemed satisfied with the verdict, if not disappointed it wasn’t longer.
Many people expressed the view that Abdel Kareem should be killed for what he wrote, and each of them shared their preferred way to kill him: stabbing, hanging, and of course, the classic beheading. One actually asked a lawyer if it was legal to now kill him, since this verdict clearly brands him as an apostate, and the Sharia punishment for an apostasy is death. People were talking about killing him in the most casual manner, as if he was no longer a human being to them.
The whole sad story began almost a year ago, when Abdel Kareem wrote a blog post describing the prestigious Islamic University of Al Azhar – where he was enrolled a student – as “the other face of Al Qaeda.”
When a copy of the post was forwarded to the Al Azhar administrators, they were, naturally, not amused, and a disciplinary hearing was set up.
During that hearing, they confronted Kareem with what he wrote about the university and about Islam in general (he had, among other posts, written one comparing The Prophet Mohammed and Ariel Sharon, and favoring Ariel Sharon as the better human being) He admitted to his writing unapologetically, and started to accuse them of suppressing his freedom of speech and conducting a Middle Age-style inquisition against him.
That same day Kareem was expelled from Al Azhar University.
A few days later, a university official went to the police and filed a police report accusing Abdel Kareem of insulting Islam and general contempt for religion.
The authorities, seeing that the report was filed by Al Azhar University, took it seriously and called Abdel Kareem in for questioning. Contrary to his lawyers’ advice, he refused to remain silent and proceeded to fight with and insult the prosecutor. The prosecutor decided to punish him by holding him for two weeks, “pending investigation.”
When Abdel Kareem faced the state prosecutor again two weeks later, it was too late. They were all, by then fully aware his writings and grossly offended, which helped add a personal touch to Abdel Kareem’s punishment from then on. He was refused the right to be released on bail, and finally was formally charged with his now three infamous charges: 1) disdain for religion, 2) insulting the President, 3) inciting sectarian strife and harming the stability of the country. All of these charges are very hard to define or defend against.
For the three months between his initial incarceration and trial, Abdel Kareem was held in solitary confinement, for fear his fellow inmates would find out why he was in jail and try to score extra points with God by harming him. The judge refused all of the requests from the defense to ease his conditions, causing Abdel Kareem’s lawyers to withdraw in protest.
Then, when it seemed things couldn’t get any worse, his Islamist father publicly announced that he intended to attend the sentencing in order to disown him in public, and demanded Sharia law be applied his son.
The day of the verdict promised to be nothing short of a circus, and it didn’t disappoint.
In front of the courtroom during his trial, scores of journalists gathered with their cameras, recorders and notepads. There was a buzz in the air, speculations about the sentencing, chatter over the meaning of the case, and the random conversation with curious by-standers who wanted to know what the big deal was, and who that very important Abdel Kareem person is. On sentencing day, the judge declared that he would announce his verdict at the end of the day, and wouldn’t allow cameras and journalists inside the courtroom prior to that. It seemed that the press was going to spend a few hours outside doing nothing.
But then a surprise — out of nowhere, a big surprise from an unrelated case. Abu Omar -the famous Egyptian imam who was allegedly kidnapped from Milan by the CIA and was transferred to Egypt, where he was tortured for 3 years straight- showed up and started an impromptu press conference, violating the conditions of his release. He told the reporters that he was not permitted to talk to the media and is constantly under watch, so when he heard about the trial he figured that it would have lots of reporters present and decided to show up. He showed reporters his torture scars and told them that he wants to get back to Italy and asked the Italian government to help him. After that, he immediately left the building.
Shortly after, the Abdel Kareem sentence was announced: four years in prison.
The consequences of the verdict and sentence are grave, both for Abdel Kareem and the for the Egyptian blogosphere in general.
If Abdel Kareem’s appeals are unsuccessful, he will have to spend the next four years in prison, where he could very likely get killed by an over-enthusiastic believer. His other option is to spend the next four years in solitary confinement, which won’t probably bode well for his mental health. Dead or crazy, those are his options now.
As far as the blogosphere, the implications are equally dangerous. This verdict sets a legal precedent for prosecuting someone for what they write on the Internet, on charges that are not easily defined or defended against. This could be used to prosecute any blogger the government feels like punishing, and serves a huge blow to freedom of speech in Egypt.
In the last years, the country’s blogosphere has been shedding light on the victims of police torture by showing videos of their mistreatment and identifying the police officers who committed those acts, which has embarrassed the Ministry of Interior and the government greatly. This is the real reason why they are now prosecuting bloggers. They have made an example out of Abdel Kareem, who was neither influential nor famous before, punishing him with an unprecedented long sentence in order to send a message to the rest of the blogosphere: This could happen to you, so watch what you write.
It is too early to judge whether this intimidation tactic will make some Egyptian bloggers tone down their rhetoric. However the Egyptian bloggers, at least the ones that have talked about it, remain defiant for now and express their view that they won’t let the verdict scare them or soften their writing. Whether that fighting spirit will linger if the government intensifies its crackdown on bloggers remains to be seen.
Sandmonkey is a pseudonymous blogger living in Egypt. He is the author of the blog Rantings of a Sandmonkey
Given Kareem’s writings and the response of the general Egyptian public to his case, it would be safe to say that Kareem was right.
May Divine Providence protect him. Allah certainly will not.
This case gives me a sick feeling in my stomach for the future of the world. Most worrisome is the ongoing export and expansion of these types of cases to places like the UK. That’s waaaaay too close for comfort.
Is there somwhere we can get “Free Abdel Kareem Soliman!” gear?
And how many billions of dollars in aid does the US give to Egypt every year?
Given this, it should be zero.
Interesting facts are that every non-Muslim country that is bordering a Muslim country is in some type of conflict or war with them. And in some areas of the World it’s been this way for decades and centuries.
There is something wrong with this picture. And recently (past 20 years) almost every other night when we watch CNN or read newspaper, we see increasing numbers of Muslims self-sacrificing themselves in the name of their religion, in name of Alah.
They are killing innocent women and children; they are killing even their own race with same religious beliefs.
How can Muslims, as a religion, as one people, stand for this? And why does not “good” side of the Muslims take some type of action against all this impeccable and unimaginable terror and evil that these people bring towards anybody on this planet. Please explain to me, the PROUD Egyptian Muslims , what is your solution. And try to avoid just expressing your hate towards the world. Just give me an example or solution in a peaceful manner for once. It just seems a high level of Muslim majority just wants to destroy everything. I just don’t understand that, how can one live with such hate, and how can one teach their kids the same hate…When will it stop?
Have you people ever read Kuran? Do you know the basics of the religion? I have read both, Kuran And Bible and they both preach the same: “Do unto others as you would have them do to you”, so why is it that your religion is blowing them self up for the cause that I don’t think they even understand? (For 12 virgins???) And how come religions preaching from the Bible don’t sacrifice themselves in a name of Jesus?; Or any other religion out there, except your religion…
Wow, I just can’t imagine what Mr. Soliman must be going through. What true courage this man has.
When I read the moral preeners such as the Dixie Chicks, Tim Robbins, et al complain about their free-speech rights supposedly being taken away, it just sickens me.
Mr. Soliman’s case is what it really means to have lost your right to free speech.
ps Mike, you have a good post.
Mike – you may or may not have seen the Bloody Borders Project, but it provides a graphic presentation of what you’ve described.
Chip – As for crushing of dissent creating that sick feeling, it is happening on many, many levels – and not only in Islamic countries or in the left-o-sphere.
And Hollywood worries about global warming? Best thing for the world it just goes up in a big bang and takes the entire middle east with it…
Thamk God that Kareem, the Apostate, will go to jail for now. I certainly hope that your prediction of being killed in prison becomes true. That’s all ya kafara.
You cannot sentence a man to four years over this.
It’s stuff like this that will allow idiots like Khomeni and Mubarek to rule forever or put them out of business. When are the Egyptian people going to take to the streets by the millions to put an end to this insanity. Or is the place so taken over by Islamist nut cases that there is no hope?
This is really upsetting. What can we do in the west to help free these jailed bloggers in Egypt, Iran and other places in the mideast?
Well, I noted it on my blog. Hope it helps.
Free Kareem gear can be obtained at http://www.cafepress.com/freekareem
Also you may donate via PayPal at http://www.freekareem.org — the people who run that site are using the funds to publicize Kareem’s case by sending press kits to important figures like Hillary Clinton and other politicians as well as to the media.
Egypt is one of those emerging middle east democracies bush.killer and cundy talks about all the time no?
I mean didn’t they hold elections to see which Hosni would be the dictator for life?
al-fallujah:
Congratulations for speaking in the same words and tone that got Kareem four years in jail.
“Bush.killer”? That’s clever.
How about “Hosni.killer”? That soubriquet actually has legal standing in terms of real orders to have dissenters assassinated. But the obvious lack of genuine justice and rule of law in Egypt renders firm evidence of criminal activity moot.
It is amazing, that you could take one person’s sentence to four years — which translates to death or mental destruction — and use it as an opportunity to bash people you obviously loathe. But isn’t freedom of speech wonderful, al fallujah? You’re not facing jail for this are you? Or will the Bush.killer come after you now?
Unfortunately, the level of moral argument you utilize to make your point about the President and Secretary of State is somewhere in the sub-sub-basement of rhetorical discourse. This debased language smears its speaker far more than it does the objects of his hatred.
It is what comes out of a man’s mouth that matters…your bile bites no one but you, fella.
——-
Meanwhile, to Chris –
Thanks for the heads-up on the donation page for Kareem.
Unfortunately, the site seems to be down. I hope that this merely means there is so much traffic it disrupted service. Here’s the message when you try to open the site:
Error establishing a database connection
This either means that the username and password information in your wp-config.php file is incorrect or we can’t contact the database server at mysql3.the-enlightenment.net. This could mean your host’s database server is down.
I googled it — i.e., “free Kareem” — and got 211,000 hits. I found the image and some more info on support and will try the site again later.
It behooves every blogger in the ‘sphere to hit the pay pal button. Even though times are hard for us right now, I intend to pony up. Sometimes moral support is the only thing that keeps courageous (if somewhat brash!) people like Kareem going…especially in the deep loneliness he is facing.
I hope he is a man of faith; that will help him make it through with his mind intact. If I could, I’d send him Viktor Frankl’s book, “Man’s Search for Meaning.” The over-arching meaning Frankl assigned to his own concentration camp experiencemakes that need abundantly clear.
This is a very sad story indeed. God bless Kareem and keep him safe, hopefully he will be free someday.
absurd thought-
God of the Universe says
don’t tell the truth
evil men will jail you
kill you to protect their lies
.
THIS IS NOT ABOUT ISLAM.
you may not know this, but it is a crime in Egypt to disdain any religion, not just Islam. Many countries have “hate speech” laws and this is where the line is here.
nothing in Islam about insulting the president.
this is about repression. get your heads out of your asses.
A very sad story indeed. Mubarak is afraid of the Islamist extremists. God bless Kareem and keep him safe, and may he be free as soon as possible.
absurd thought-
God of the Universe says
don’t tell the truth
evil men will jail you
kill you to protect their lies
.
Yeah, but no other religion besides Islam gets all mad and pouty and violent when criticized or mocked. One of his charges was for his attack on Islam.
absurd thought-
God of the Universe says
never mock religion
.