The Egyptian Ministry of Interior announced the arrest of 11 people, including journalists, and documentary filmmakers, on the pretext of "preparing and producing fabricated media reports for Al-Jazeera."
In a statement today, Friday, the Egyptian Ministry of the Interior said that those responsible for this move were arrested, including Moataz Billah Mahmoud Abdel-Wahab, owner of Team One Production Company, Ahmed Maher Ezzat, director and supervisor of (Bohemen) studio, and Sameh Hanin Suleiman (official) Film production), Haitham Hassan Abdul Aziz Mahjoub (Film Materials Preparation Officer), and Mohammed Omar Sayed Abdel Latif (Film Material Preparation Officer).
The statement stated that the Ministry of Interior managed to "identify the Brotherhood elements based on the management of this scheme, fleeing in the countries of Turkey and Qatar, the most prominent of which is the fleeing terrorist Brotherhood Abdul Rahman Yusuf al-Qaradawi, Abdullah Muhammad Abdul Aziz al-Qadoom, Moataz Muhammad Aliwa Matar, Muhammad Nasser Ali Abdel-Azim, and Amr Ahmed Fahmy Speech".
He added, "In the same context, the leaders of the terrorist Brotherhood organization commissioned Brotherhood Salah Ibrahim Marjouna, residing in the city of Bir al-Abd in North Sinai, to prepare an information material to produce a documentary film on the situation in North Sinai and claiming that its citizens were subjected to security restrictions, in order to broadcast it on Al-Jazeera."
He explained that Marjouna had "formed a group to implement the scheme, all of them from the Brotherhood," noting that they were "Salama Salem Ali Al-Bass, Hassan Hussein Muhammad Hassan Al-Azzawi, Ahmed Muhammad Ibrahim Abdullah Hussein, Ibrahim Salem Musa Omran, Salah Salem Khaled Sabah, and Tawfiq Salman Salama Albadrah ".
The Ministry of Interior distributed a photo report that included what it said were confessions of some of the accused, and pictures of montage devices.
It is noteworthy that among the defendants who appeared in the photo report, the Christian journalist, Sameh Hanin, who was arrested by the Egyptian security forces a few days ago, and his arrest sparked anger and ridicule of the activists, especially with his accusation of joining the Muslim Brotherhood.
As usual, the Egyptian Ministry of Interior put some famous names among the accused, the poet and the media Abdel Rahman Youssef, the son of the scholar Dr. Youssef Al-Qaradawi, the former president of the World Federation of Muslim Scholars, although he does not work in the field of documentary films, and has no relationship with Al-Jazeera.
It also placed the names of the opposing broadcasters, Muhammad Nasser and Moataz Matar, although they do not work on Al-Jazeera.
Another paradox of the statement is the reference to the Al-Jazeera program this morning, although it is a diversified program, that only presents reports on positive humanitarian and social initiatives, and does not discuss political and security issues, as well as the conflict in the Sinai.
According to Reporters Without Borders, Egypt is one of the largest jails for journalists in the region, and the report placed this country ranked 166 in the world in the freedom of the press.
A report issued by the organization recently said that the Egyptian authorities use the principle of fighting "fake news" as an excuse to justify blocking pages and websites on the one hand, and withdrawing the credit cards of journalists on the other hand.
Egypt is only ahead of this index on five Arab countries, namely Yemen, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Djibouti, out of a total of 22 countries.