• MB Blogs
  • October 12, 2007
  • 3 minutes read

Egyptian Regime Blocks Opposition Websites, Weblogs

Egyptian Regime Blocks Opposition Websites, Weblogs

In a sudden aggravation against freedom of speech in Egypt, security services blocked on Friday Oct, 12th, 2007, weblogs administered by political activists and sons of Muslim Brotherhood (MB) leaders transferred to the military tribunal, the seventh in the group”s history.



The ban included the server of Mohamed Adel who administers the weblog, http://43arb.info/meit/. Mohamed Adel is a political activist and a Kifaya Movement member. The blocking included also the weblog of Saad Al Shater, son of the Egyptian reformist Khairat Al-Shater the second deputy chairman of the Muslim Brotherhood. Saad calls in this currently blocked weblog for releasing his father along with other MB detainees, in addition to weblogs of other political activists and journalists.
 
Other websites based on the server of Mohamed Adel have been blocked as well, including the Muslim Brotherhood”s website in Menia El Kameh, the Arab National Thought website and Al-Fagr Islamic Network .
 
Mohamed Adel, a prominent member of Kifaya Movement, told Ikhwanweb that:” The Egyptian regime is currently moving to fight bloggers after the tough treatment against opposition and independent journalists who have received prison sentences in cases related to the freedom of expression.”
 
The Egyptian regime is currently eying the bloggers. The bloggers, whom the regime claims they work for distorting its image, are actually the ones who unveil the truth and reality for the public opinion all over the world” said Adel .
 
” This move of blocking weblogs and a previous detention of bloggers will have repercussions. This is because we are the mouthpiece of the street” said the the Kifaya political activist.
 
Saying he will blog even if he is detained, Adel stressed that:” We will send our blogs from prisons like the MB blogger Abdul Moneim Mahmoud”.
 
Also blocked was  The Voice of Resistance, http://members.tripod.com/almoqawma1/, administered by journalist Salah Bedaiwi after Egyptian authorities shut down Al Shaab newspaper where he was working.
 
The policy of blocking websites has been repeatedly carried out by the Egyptian regime that clamps on media figures and journalists and the so called citizens press (weblogs).
 
Also, this is not the first time in which weblogs are blocked. Several Egyptian weblogs have been blocked including http://norayounis.com/, administered by the prominent political activist Nora Younis.
 
Bloggers even receive security notices ordering them to stop blogging. This happened with Egyptian blogger Alaa Abdul Fattah. Egyptian authorities detained bloggers like Abdul Moneim Mahmoud, Mohamed Al Sharqawi, Malik Mostafa, Alaa Abdul Fattah and others who took part in protests against the tyranny of the Egyptian government which works for preventing facts, reality and views of the street from reaching the local and international public opinion.