Against the Frenzy of the Regime… Against Mass Execution Sentences… Against the Death Penalty

Statement by the Revolutionary Socialists

A frenzy that grows wilder, madness that escalates, and relentless repression through one mass execution sentence after another—these are merely the headlines of just two days under the rule of Egypt’s counter-revolution. As for the details, they are nothing but pure criminality.

Yesterday, the Cairo Criminal Court sentenced 107 leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas to death by hanging on charges of escaping from Wadi al-Natrun Prison and conspiring with Hamas. At the forefront of those sentenced was former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi. This ruling represents nothing but a badge of shame on the state that issued it—a state whose judiciary operates through “phone call directives” to punish and eliminate its enemies.

Words fall short of describing the horrific nature of yet another mass execution ruling issued by the counter-revolutionary judiciary in Egypt. Nor are words enough to capture the rabid frenzy of a regime that did not even trouble itself to verify the bare logical possibility of the accused committing the alleged crimes before condemning them to death. Among those sentenced to execution are two Palestinian martyrs who were killed in battles against the Zionist occupation years before the Egyptian revolution even took place and another detainee who has been imprisoned in Israeli jails since 1996—fifteen years before the revolution! What kind of insanity is this?!

A death sentence is not supposed to be issued unless a judge’s conscience reaches absolute certainty—beyond any doubt—that the accused committed a crime warranting execution. So what kind of conscience is this that has reached “certainty” regarding the actions of the dead and the imprisoned at the time of the alleged crime?! And how many other individuals, sentenced to death in this case and others, have similarly been victims of a judiciary that fabricates charges to serve the regime’s agenda?

But the crime here is not limited to the executions themselves. What the judge considered a crime worthy of death is, in reality, a crime committed by the Egyptian judiciary. With yesterday’s ruling, Egypt’s counter-revolutionary judiciary is attempting to criminalize the January 25 Revolution itself, treating the widespread revolutionary violence directed at the regime’s repressive forces as an offense punishable by execution. We do not deny that, by definition, a revolution is the greatest crime in the eyes of the regime it seeks to overthrow—it is the ultimate transgression that cannot be forgiven. And when the counter-revolution—an enemy of everything the revolution stood for—is in power, such a ruling becomes entirely predictable.

Yet the crimes of the Egyptian judiciary did not stop there. They extended to another systematic crime perpetrated by the Egyptian state and its institutions—chief among them the judiciary—by demonizing and targeting Palestinian resistance factions. Yesterday’s verdict classified supporting Hamas in its resistance against the Zionist entity as a crime of espionage warranting punishment! This is an extension of a previous ruling by the Egyptian judiciary labeling Hamas a terrorist organization, perfectly aligning with a long-standing state-sponsored smear campaign—orchestrated by security-controlled media—against Palestinian resistance factions, branding them as terrorists using the same rhetoric as the Zionist entity.
And the irony? This ruling coincided with the 67th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba, serving as yet another reminder that Arab regimes—chief among them the Egyptian regime—are the primary and ever-renewing cause of the Nakba, so long as power remains in their hands.

But did the rabid counter-revolutionary state stop at merely issuing politically motivated mass execution sentences against its opponents? No—the crime went even further. Today, it carried out the premeditated murder of six opponents by executing them in the ‘Arab Sharkas’ case. Among those executed were two individuals who were already imprisoned by the regime at the time of the crime they were accused of committing!

A swift and brutal response—just one day after outrage erupted over the absurdity of issuing death sentences against the deceased and the already imprisoned. And what is the message behind this response? The state will persist in its rabid madness, indifferent to reason or logic. What any rational person would consider undeniable proof of wrongful conviction—namely, that an accused person was either dead or already imprisoned at the time of the crime—means nothing to this regime. Under the grip of the counter-revolution’s insanity, no one is safe.

From our side, we condemn the deliberate, premeditated murder carried out by the Egyptian regime today through its execution of the defendants in the ‘Arab Sharkas’ case. We also reject yesterday’s mass execution sentences against the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas in these fabricated cases and affirm our full solidarity with them. Furthermore, we reaffirm our unwavering rejection of all politically motivated rulings issued by the Egyptian judiciary to crush the regime’s opponents. These rulings are nothing but state crimes committed through the judiciary—crimes that the people’s revolutionary consciousness will never forget. And the day will come when every criminal in power will be held accountable for their atrocities.