4 June 2025. Soueif started her hunger strike in September 2024, when Egyptian authorities refused to release her son Alaa Abdelfattah from prison upon the expiry of his latest five-year-sentence. Abdelfattah spent most of the previous decade in prison on various trumped-up charges. Abdelfattah was released in March 2019 after serving a five-year sentence but was put on probation whereby he was forced to spend twelve hours daily in a police station. In September 2019, he was rearrested on another fabricated charge and has remained in jail since then. The Egyptian authorities have demonstrated that they have no intention of ever releasing him.
Abdelfattah is among tens of thousands detained in Egypt on account of their peaceful activism and expression of opinions; some persons are detained for simply being at the wrong place at the wrong time. Most of these are held in pretrial detention for years or sentenced through sham trials with utter disregard for rule of law and due process. The detention of tens of thousands of individuals is first and foremost a political choice by the government of President Abdelfattah al-Sisi, which seeks to deter all forms of dissent and at times exploit detainees as bargaining chips.
Although the Egyptian authorities bear the primary responsibility for the repression and authoritarianism that has prevailed in Egypt since 2013, many Western governments, including the British, are also culpable. Their political and financial support of President Sisi, despite his atrocious record against Egyptian and European citizens alike, have emboldened him to the point witnessed today. The time is now for Western states and the international community to use their full leverage over Egyptian authorities to pressure for genuine political and human rights reform, starting with the release of Alaa Abdelfattah.