Ten arrested, detained, after taking part in Gaza solidarity protest

Authorities arrested at least 10 people from their homes in the early hours of Thursday morning after a protest in solidarity with Gaza was held outside the Cairo Journalists Syndicate on Wednesday, lawyer Nabih al-Genady told Mada Masr. 

The ten detainees were presented to the Supreme State Security Prosecution for investigation on Thursday, Genady said, where they were questioned in relation to charges of joining a terrorist organization and publishing false news. The prosecution ordered they be detained for 15 days pending further investigation.

Several people who took part in October demonstrations in solidarity with Gaza also were detained last year on the same charges.

A number of other people, yet to be determined, who took part in the Wednesday protest were also arrested on Thursday morning and are waiting to be presented to investigating authorities, said Genady.

Weekly demonstrations in solidarity with Gaza have been held since the beginning of Ramadan on the steps of the Journalists Syndicate in downtown Cairo. They began with an invitation on a Facebook group for people to gather and hold an iftar with only bread and water, and lots of people responded, said former Doctors Syndicate secretary general Mona Mina, who attended some of the previous demonstrations. The demonstrations were held every Tuesday throughout the holy month.  “The protests got bigger as the situation escalated,” she added.

This week’s protest, however, was due to fall on the same day as the inauguration ceremony for President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s third term in office. 

Security authorities therefore instructed that the protest should not be held on Tuesday, said Mina and Omran. 

Dozens of demonstrators gathered on the steps of the Journalists Syndicate the following day instead, chanting for the Rafah border crossing to be opened and for Egypt’s authorities to do more to support Palestinians in Gaza. 

There was a security presence at the Wednesday demonstration, said several people who were present. However, security personnel in plain clothes and in uniform stood on the other side of the road from the syndicate steps, and there was little interaction between them and the demonstrators except for security personnel taking pictures, according to Mina and Omran. 

Opposition figures and activists have criticized authorities in recent months, asking them to open the Rafah border crossing to allow for goods and people to flow freely in and out of the Gaza Strip. 

Egypt has repeatedly blamed Israel for obstructing the delivery of relief supplies to the Gaza Strip, which aid organizations said falls far below the volumes required to sustain life for the 2.3 million Palestinians trapped under Israel’s aggression.

Activists and some initiatives have struggled to make progress with organizing support for Palestinians in Gaza, however. The Journalists Syndicate and another international group, the Global Conscience Convoy, tried to coordinate with the Foreign Ministry to get permission to bring aid supplies to the Rafah border but were not granted permission. A number of foreign nationals who had come to Cairo for the convoy were expelled from the country after protesting for permission to go to Rafah outside the Cairo Foreign Ministry headquarters. 

Over one hundred people were arrested in October, meanwhile, after Gaza solidarity protests were held in Cairo and Alexandria.