The mass death sentences handed down against a number of defendants from the Muslim Brotherhood and similar organisations that were tried on charges of mass murder triggered considerable controversy. Not only did they occasion harsh criticism of the Egyptian judiciary at home and abroad, but they also were used as a pretext to attack those who are currently ruling Egypt. Yes, the judiciary may have shortcomings, as is the case with any other institution. However, this does not refute this branch of government's long-established institutionalised performance and deeply rooted dedication to serving the principle of justice. Furthermore, this is despite the abuses it was subjected to by those in power over the past decades. The notorious “judges massacre” that took place under Abdel Nasser, similar, albeit subtler actions undertaken during the Mubarak era, and even the Muslim Brotherhood's year in power when the judiciary became the victim of the blockade of the Supreme Constitutional Court, the threat to force senior judges into early retirement to clear the bench for a new generation of Muslim Brotherhood indoctrinated judges, and other forms of harassment, did not divert the judiciary from its commitment to its duties. It continued to supervise elections, including those that brought Morsi to power and the recent presidential elections, and its various courts continued to hear and issue verdicts on the innumerable cases brought before them. In its many hearings in recent years, the judiciary made no exceptions, not for Mubarak and his regime (the nature of which is familiar to all), nor for the Muslim Brothers, nor for the activists who were found guilty of violating certain laws, even if the constitutionality of some of those laws (the so-called protest law) has been called into question. Therefore, it is difficult to find any basis for the sweeping judgement that claims that the Egyptian judiciary issues “politicised verdicts”. This is all the more so in view of the entire process of arraignments, investigations, the questioning of witnesses, examining of evidence, hearing arguments and counter arguments, all in order to determine in a systematic, scientific manner whether defendants are guilty. This attention to detail and process is rarely found in the work culture of other institutions. True, some defendants may be wrongfully found guilty due to the lack of evidence that would prove their innocence. However, the strict adherence to the established set of legal rules and processes, even if an individual or a group might be adversely affected, is a victory for the impartiality of justice in procedural form and then in substance. This brings us to the rulings handed down against members and leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood in cases involving charges of murder and incitement to murder, charges that in Egyptian criminal law can carry a penalty of life imprisonment or death. The case of Hisham Talaat Mustafa is relevant here. The business magnate was a key official in the former National Democratic Party at the height of its power. Mustafa was arrested and charged with incitement to murder. His case has not yet been settled; he faces the prospect of capital punishment. The same principle was applied in the recent verdicts against a group of Muslim Brotherhood leaders who were arraigned in various cities and governorates on charges of murder and incitement to murder following the breakup of the Rabaa Al-Adawiya sit-in in August 2013. Many innocent civilians were killed and many police officers murdered in the course of performing their duties at that time. One cannot help but to be struck by the reactions to the verdicts. The verdicts were the result of legal and judicial procedures that are followed in any judiciary, and that ultimately lead to that step in which the judge, on the basis of all available proof and evidence, pronounces his verdict. Instead of seeing those verdicts as proof of Muslim Brotherhood terrorism, critics used them, in a manner contrary to the principles of justice, to attack the process and the institution. It was, in fact, the critics who politicised the verdicts. What measures and principles do the critics of those verdicts think have been applied? Perhaps they think that an eye-for-an-eye and a tooth-for-a-tooth should have been brought to bear against the Muslim Brothers and their allies who committed or incited the attacks against innocent people, the burning of more than 60 churches and the destruction of invaluable artefacts looted from antiquities museums. The fact is that the appropriate measures were brought to bear in the framework of a more rational and impartial process, so that no one would suffer unduly. And, in fact, most of the defendants in the Al-Adwa Police Station case were acquitted. That case took place in Minya, where churches were burned, the homes of Christians attacked and burned, and many people killed. Those who were proven to have been involved in those incidents on the basis of the evidence were found guilty. This brings us to a number of crucial questions. Did the judiciary depart from its normal rules and procedures, or did it apply the text of the law? Did it attempt to avenge those who were murdered and whose homes were burned? Did the court's verdict serve as a deterrent to religious bigots whose hatred and intolerance of the other drives them to murder and burn homes in the name of religion? At another level, was it the fact that the procedures of justice were applied at all that bothered critics abroad? Consider, for example, that they did not even take the trouble, before the verdicts were pronounced, to send specialists to study the background behind those many death sentences and to ascertain whether or not the crimes took place. Instead, the foreign ministers of the UK and other countries found it more convenient to comment on the verdicts without being fully informed. To those people, I would like to ask whether it has somehow become part of the concept of freedom and democracy to not respect the process of law, even if the process has flaws that can be rectified by peaceful means. Have freedom and democracy extended to accepting the culture that assumes the right to oppose the state and its laws? Would such attitudes be tolerated in your societies where the law is applied very strictly against those who break the rules? Yes, the death sentences when passed collectively may reflect a certain alarm or hysteria. However, have you ever seen someone slaughtered by a gang of hundreds? When was the last time you saw a pack of murderers mutilate the corpse of one of their victims? If the crime was committed en masse, why do you condemn the punishment of its perpetrators en masse? The files of these cases, from their investigatory procedures to their documented evidence and their reasoned verdicts, do not only testify to the gravity of those crimes. They also testify to the crimes behind which the Muslim Brotherhood has lurked for 80 years. These crimes include the killing of innocent people, the sowing of ignorance, the indoctrination of young and impressionable minds into a cult of blind obedience, and the inculcation of a culture of terrorism. This culture has lead people to join the ranks of Islamist groups that have made it their mission to kill innocent people. Today, they are being recruited by new groups such as Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis, the Islamic State (IS) and like-minded entities for which murder is both the means and the end. The writer is managing editor of the quarterly journal Al-Demoqrateya, published by Al-Ahram.
