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Egypt Jails Alaa Abdel Fattah for 5 Years

Activist Alaa Abdel Fattah stands behind bars before his verdict is announced at a court in Cairo, February 23, 2015. REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih/Files
Activist Alaa Abdel Fattah stands behind bars before his verdict is announced at a court in Cairo, February 23, 2015. REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih/Files
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Egypt Jails Alaa Abdel Fattah for 5 Years

Activist Alaa Abdel Fattah stands behind bars before his verdict is announced at a court in Cairo, February 23, 2015. REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih/Files
Activist Alaa Abdel Fattah stands behind bars before his verdict is announced at a court in Cairo, February 23, 2015. REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih/Files

Egypt on Monday sentenced Alaa Abdel Fattah, a prominent activist, to five years in jail, with two others receiving four years.

Abdel Fattah, his lawyer Mohamed al-Baqer and blogger Mohamed "Oxygen" Ibrahim were convicted of "broadcasting false news" in their trial in Cairo.

Abdel Fattah was sentenced to five years, and Baqer and Ibrahim four years.

Rulings in the court cannot be appealed. They require final approval by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

The three have been detained since September 2019.

Abdel Fattah, a leading activist in the 2011 uprising that toppled president Hosni Mubarak after three decades in power, had previously been imprisoned for five years in 2014 and released in 2019.

He was arrested again a few months after his release and had been placed in pretrial detention.

Ahead of the trial session, Egypt's foreign ministry lambasted the German government on Saturday for a statement calling for a "fair trial" and the release of the three men.

Cairo described the German foreign ministry's call as "a blatant and unjustified meddling in Egyptian internal affairs."

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Palestinians Get Food Aid in Central Gaza, Some for the First Time in Months

Donated flour is distributed to Palestinians at a UNRWA center in the Nuseirat refugee camp, Gaza Strip, Tuesday Dec. 3, 2024. (AP)
Donated flour is distributed to Palestinians at a UNRWA center in the Nuseirat refugee camp, Gaza Strip, Tuesday Dec. 3, 2024. (AP)
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Palestinians Get Food Aid in Central Gaza, Some for the First Time in Months

Donated flour is distributed to Palestinians at a UNRWA center in the Nuseirat refugee camp, Gaza Strip, Tuesday Dec. 3, 2024. (AP)
Donated flour is distributed to Palestinians at a UNRWA center in the Nuseirat refugee camp, Gaza Strip, Tuesday Dec. 3, 2024. (AP)

Palestinians lined up for bags of flour distributed by the UN in central Gaza on Tuesday morning, some of them for the first time in months amid a drop in food aid entering the territory.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, gave out one 25-kilogram flour bag (55 pounds) to each family of 10 at a warehouse in the Nuseirat refugee camp, as well as further south in the city of Khan Younis.

Jalal al-Shaer, among the dozens receiving flour at the Nuseirat warehouse, said the bag would last his family of 12 for only two or three days.

“The situation for us is very difficult,” said another man in line, Hammad Moawad. “There is no flour, there is no food, prices are high ... We eat bread crumbs.” He said his family hadn’t received a flour allotment in five or six months.

COGAT, the Israeli army body in charge of humanitarian affairs, said it facilitated entry of a shipment of 600 tons of flour on Sunday for the World Food Program. Still, the amount of aid Israel has allowed into Gaza since the beginning of October has been at nearly the lowest levels of the 15-month-old war.

UNRWA’s senior emergency officer Louise Wateridge told The Associated Press that the flour bags being distributed Tuesday were not enough.

“People are getting one bag of flour between an entire family and there is no certainty when they’ll receive the next food,” she said.

Wateridge added that UNRWA has been struggling like other humanitarian agencies to provide much needed supplies across the Gaza Strip. The agency this week announced it was stopping delivering aid entering through the main crossing from Israel, Kerem Shalom, because its convoys were being robbed by gangs. UNRWA has blamed Israel in large part for the spread of lawlessness in Gaza.

The International Criminal Court is seeking to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister over accusations of using “starvation as a method of warfare” by restricting humanitarian aid into Gaza. Israel rejects the allegations and says it has been working hard to improve entry of aid.