“It is difficult to implement European standards of human rights in a country of 90 million people that is fighting terrorism,” President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi said during a press conference with former French president François Hollande in Cairo in April. Al-Sisi added that he had assured Hollande that “Egypt considers human rights a top priority,” adding that he was asking all “our European friends to consider our broader vision regarding human rights issues which includes the right to education, health and housing”. Hollande responded by saying “human rights mean freedom of the press and freedom of expression”, adding that they “are not a constraint but a way to fight terrorism”. Egypt has faced mounting criticism over its human rights record since the 30 June uprising. International human rights organisations and media and local human rights' observers and NGOs have denounced the government's record while the regime defends itself by emphasising that it respects freedoms and human rights but must give priority to stability and security. Since the ouster of Mohamed Morsi in 2013 Egypt has been fighting an Islamist insurgency led by the Islamic State's branch in North Sinai, formerly known as Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis. Hundreds of soldiers and police — mainly in North Sinai — have been killed. Though Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis is at the forefront of militant groups launching attacks against security targets smaller militant groups — most notably Hasm (Decisiveness) and Lewaa Al-Thawra (Revolution Brigade) — emerged during 2016, carrying out terrorist attacks in Cairo and provincial governorates. Socio-political researcher Ammar Ali Hassan told Al-Ahram Weekly that the wave of terrorism Egypt is currently experiencing “began during the Morsi presidency, with the killing of soldiers in Sinai, the blockades of the Supreme Constitutional Court and Media Production City and the burning of the Wafd Party headquarters and the entrance to Al-Watan's newspaper premises”. “It continued after the end of Muslim Brotherhood rule in a succession of terrorist attacks that is ongoing,” Hassan said. Egypt, he says, is now threatened by three concentric terrorist belts. The first surrounds the whole country and comprises jihadist takfiri groups in eastern Libya, a government close to the Muslim Brotherhood in Khartoum and Hamas rule in Gaza. A second belt “surrounds Cairo and consists of a growing number of Salafi, jihadist and Muslim Brotherhood members in the adjacent governorates of Fayoum, Qalioubeya, Sharqeya and rural Giza”. “The third belt includes the informal settlements that surround the areas inhabited by the middle and upper middle classes. They grew as a result of poverty and the government's withdrawal from providing housing and have resulted in a ruralisation of the city.” “Dismantling this belt requires a comprehensive plan and will take time to implement. The role of education, economic development, culture and the institutions that produce religious rhetoric all need to be addressed.” Hassan believes “the current wave will eventually recede and yield another ideological revision” if only because “crime does not pay and terrorism does not create a state”. “This,” he says, “particularly applies to a country whose people have shown themselves impervious to intimidation, refusing to allow the fear tactics used by the Muslim Brotherhood to dissuade them from taking to the streets in the millions to bring down Muslim Brotherhood rule.” Veteran political activist and member of the National Council for Human Rights (NCHR) George Ishak believes that the past four years have seen a serious deterioration in human rights, to the extent that “Egypt is at risk.” “We will witness an escalation in violence if things do not change.” On 16 June 10 local and international human rights organisations sent a joint letter to the UN Human Rights Council requesting it address the “human rights crises taking place in Egypt” at its 36th session in September. In the last four weeks tens of news websites were blocked because the government says they “promote extremism and spread false information about Egypt”. On 24 May the state-run news agency MENA announced that 21 news websites had been blocked. By 18 June the number had grown to 93, according to the Association of Freedom of Thought and Expression (AFTE). Some sites are affiliated to newspapers, including Daily News Egypt for which Al-Sisi wrote two articles in 2014 and 2015, Al Badil, Al-Borsa, and Al-Masryoon. Others — Mada Masr and Masr Alarabia — are owned by companies registered in Egypt. HuffPost Arabi, Al-Horreya Post, Cairo Portal, 6 April Movement and Al-Gornal have all had access to their sites blocked. Article 70 of the 2014 constitution states that “freedom of the press, printing and paper, visual, audio and electronic publication is guaranteed”. Article 71 reads: “It is prohibited to censor, confiscate, suspend or shut down Egyptian newspapers and media outlets in any way.” However, Egypt's 59-year-old emergency law, which Al-Sisi invoked on 11April after deadly twin church bombings by the extremist group Islamic State, allows the authorities to censor publications. “The constitution includes articles guaranteeing press and media freedoms. However, we are still establishing a new media and press system to conform with the constitution and through the newly formed regulatory authorities [the Higher Council for Media Regulation, the National Media Organisation (NMO) and the National Press Organisation (NPO)]. These bodies will play their role in guaranteeing the independence of the media,” says Salah Eissa, former secretary-general of the now-dissolved Supreme Press Council. “Meanwhile, we are battling terrorists who rely heavily on technological advances in the communication and media field. And it is clear some of the blocked websites served as mouthpieces for terrorist organisations.” In addition to blocking news websites, says Ishak, “opposition political and public figures are prevented from appearing in the media and newspapers only accept to publish supporters of the regime.” Ishak warns that polarisation has reached unprecedented levels and “anyone who has an opposing or different opinion is labelled a traitor by the media”. When Al-Sisi declared a state of emergency two months ago Parliament Speaker Ali Abdel-Aal said social media websites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube fell under state of emergency censorship provisions.
