Alaa Abd El-Fattah "You have not yet been defeated"

“Unlike me,” the Egyptian activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah wrote in 2017 from inside the notorious Torah prison, “you have not yet been defeated.” In doing so, he addressed all those of us who can still publicly denounce the injustice that tens of thousands like him have been subjected to for years: The Egyptian regime is suppressing a debate about systemic human rights violations by forcibly disappearing its critics. Alaa himself has spent most of the past ten years as a political prisoner: from the presidency of Husni Mubarak until today under Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

Nevertheless, Alaa has repeatedly found ways to share personal and political thoughts with his family, friends and followers. In addition to essays smuggled out of prison, this includes the speeches he gave at the rare court sessions, or public social media posts. Through this comprehensive account, Alaa examines the course of the Egyptian revolution from his specific experience of prolonged imprisonment, but thereby also carefully opens up perspectives for a life in freedom.

Thanks to the difficult work of a collective, all these documents are now available in English for the first time. On the occasion of the publication of "You have not yet been defeated", the Heinrich Böll Foundation hosts a public reading and discussion on November 11, 2021 at 7 p.m. at refugio in Berlin, addressing the situation of political prisoners in Egypt and discussing how much human rights violations in Egypt should affect German and European foreign policy.

Participants

Video message: Mona Seif, human rights activist and Alaa Abd El-Fattah's sister, Cairo

Reader:

• English: Katharine Halls
• Arabic: Anis Hamdoun

Panelists:

• Amr Magdi, Human Rights Watch, Berlin
• Jillian York, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Berlin
• Sara Nanni, Member of Parliament, The Greens, Düsseldorf

Moderation: Johannes Gunesch, Heinrich Böll foundation, Berlin

Important information

Location: Refugio Berlin, Lenaustraße 3-4, 12047 Berlin

Attendance: The event takes place under 3G rule (access only for tested, vaccinated and recovered). As attendance is limited to 60 people, please register in time. Also, feel free to send us your comments/questions beforehand and we can bring them to the event anonymously.

Language: We will read excerpts in Arabic and English, the conversation will take place in English

Online: In our digital scroll story "Giving up has no future", three activists - including Alaa's sister Mona Seif - describe their personal and political struggles.