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HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES IN EGYPT

JOINT HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, 

GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND 

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

AND THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

THE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

DECEMBER 10, 2013

Serial No. 113–147

Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/ or

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/

(II)

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman 

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

TED POE, Texas 

MATT SALMON, Arizona 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

TOM COTTON, Arkansas 

PAUL COOK, California 

GEORGE HOLDING, North Carolina 

RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

STEVE STOCKMAN, Texas 

RON DESANTIS, Florida 

TREY RADEL, Florida 

DOUG COLLINS, Georgia 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

TED S. YOHO, Florida 

LUKE MESSER, Indiana 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American 

Samoa 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

KAREN BASS, California 

WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

JUAN VARGAS, California 

BRADLEY S. SCHNEIDER, Illinois 

JOSEPH P. KENNEDY III, Massachusetts 

AMI BERA, California 

ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California 

GRACE MENG, New York 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii 

JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas

AMY PORTER, Chief of Staff THOMAS SHEEHY, Staff Director

JASON STEINBAUM, Democratic Staff Director 

(III)

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey, Chairman 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas 

STEVE STOCKMAN, Texas 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

KAREN BASS, California 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

AMI BERA, California

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida, Chairman 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois 

TOM COTTON, Arkansas 

RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas 

RON DESANTIS, Florida 

TREY RADEL, Florida 

DOUG COLLINS, Georgia 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

TED S. YOHO, Florida 

LUKE MESSER, Indiana 

THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

JUAN VARGAS, California 

BRADLEY S. SCHNEIDER, Illinois 

JOSEPH P. KENNEDY III, Massachusetts 

GRACE MENG, New York 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

(V)

C O N T E N T S 

Page

WITNESSES 

Zuhdi Jasser, M.D., vice chair, U.S. Commission on International Religious 

Freedom ................................................................................................................ 9

His Grace Bishop Angaelos, General Bishop, Coptic Orthodox Church in the 

United Kingdom ................................................................................................... 30

Mr. Samuel Tadros, research fellow, Center for Religious Freedom, Hudson 

Institute ................................................................................................................ 39

Morad Abou-Sabe, Ph.D., professor emeritus, Rutgers University (former 

president of Misr University for Science & Technology) .................................. 47

Mr. Tad Stahnke, director of policy and programs, Human Rights First ........... 55

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

Zuhdi Jasser, M.D.: Prepared statement ............................................................... 12

His Grace Bishop Angaelos: Prepared statement ................................................. 33

Mr. Samuel Tadros: Prepared statement .............................................................. 42

Morad Abou-Sabe, Ph.D.: Prepared statement ..................................................... 51

Mr. Tad Stahnke: Prepared statement .................................................................. 58

APPENDIX 

Hearing notice .......................................................................................................... 78

Hearing minutes ...................................................................................................... 79

Written response from Mr. Samuel Tadros to question submitted for the 

record by the Honorable Mark Meadows, a Representative in Congress 

from the State of North Carolina ........................................................................ 80

Material submitted for the record by Morad Abou-Sabe, Ph.D. .......................... 82

(1)

HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES IN EGYPT 

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 3, 2013

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

AND SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA,

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS,

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittees met, pursuant to notice, at 9:08 a.m., in room 

2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher H. Smith 

(chairman of the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global 

Human Rights, and International Organizations) presiding. 

Mr. SMITH. The subcommittee will come to order. Subcommittees, 

I should say. This is an important and unique day. It is Human 

Rights Day. And both the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, 

Global Human Rights, and International Organizations and my 

distinguished colleague, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and her subcommittee 

are combined today in chairing this hearing and raising the issues 

of human rights abuse in Egypt. Today’s hearing examines the escalating human rights abuses in Egypt. It is fitting that we are 

holding this hearing today on International Human Rights Day, 

December 10th, because we are witnessing grievous violence and 

other abuses directed against religious and political minorities, particularly the Copts and other Christians about which our Government and the media has said far too little, which seems to be a pattern worldwide. 

I would note parenthetically that the persecution of Christians is 

escalating. Witness the slaughter of Christians in Central African 

Republic, CAR. I would note Bishop Nongo of the CAR told my subcommittee just a few weeks ago in this room that Christians were 

being targeted simply because of their faith, while the United Nations, the United States, and the rest the world looked on. 

On Thursday, I will be chairing a hearing on American Pastor 

Saeed Abedini, who was jailed and is suffering torture in Iran. Pastor Abedini’s wife, Naghmeh, will tell our subcommittee on Thursday, and I quote, in part,

‘‘While I am thankful for President Obama’s willingness to express concern about my husband and the other imprisoned 

Americans in Iran during his recent phone conversation with 

Iran’s new President, Hassan Rouhani, I was devastated to 

learn that the administration didn’t even ask for my husband’s 

release, when directly seated across the table from the leaders 

of the government that holds him captive.’’

2

She goes on to say,

‘‘My husband is suffering because he is a Christian. He is suffering because he is an American. Yet, his own government, at 

least the executive and diplomatic representatives, has abandoned him. Don’t we owe to it him as a nation to stand up for 

his human rights, for his freedom?’’

Unfortunately, there seems to be a pattern. 

After President Mubarak resigned in February 2011, the world 

hoped for a new Egypt, a just government for all Egyptians, which 

would not make and replicate President Mubarak’s mistakes, but 

reality has been just the opposite. Horrific anti-Christian pogroms 

have taken place under each of the post-Mubarak governments. For 

some of these abuses, the governments bear the responsibility of inaction. For others, they bear direct responsibility. In recent 

months, undercurrents of abuse and contempt for human dignity 

long existing in Egypt have turned into flash floods of violence. 

For example, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces presided 

over the Maspero protest massacre in October 2011. At least 25 

people were killed and more than 300 injured, almost all of them 

Copts, when the military drove trucks through the crowd and used 

live ammunition against the unarmed protesters. Under the now 

displaced Morsi government, three low-level soldiers involved were 

charged with minor crimes and received 2- to 3-year sentences. No 

commanding officers were held responsible for ordering or failing to 

prevent the deadly assaults. 

While Mr. Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party at times voiced support for an Egypt that was home to 

both Muslims and Christians, his inaction belied his rhetoric. In 

April 2012, St. Mark’s Cathedral, seat of the Coptic Pope, was attacked by 30 to 40 Muslim youths. While dozens of Copts were 

sheltering inside, security forces joined the mob. Rather than dispersing the crowd they participated in the all-night attack or stood 

idly by as rocks, gasoline bombs, and gas canisters were lobbed into 

the iconic cathedral. 

Despite this, President Morsi denied that the clash was sectarian 

in nature. After Mr. Morsi was removed in July of this year, the 

military ended the Muslim Brotherhood’s sit-in with violence, killing hundreds of protesters. Tragically, some in the Muslim Brotherhood scapegoated the Copts, although the Copts had nothing to 

with the military’s violence response. On August 14th, the day that 

will be remembered as the worst day for Copts in some 700 years, 

37 churches, five schools, and three bible societies, four other 

Christian institutions, and many homes and businesses were 

burned or damaged by mobs. More than 100 deaths were documented in the initial spate of violence and its aftermath. 

Some Copts had charged the military government in Egypt with 

allowing the attacks on Coptic persons, businesses, churches, and 

homes to continue, often inside of police stations and in spite of repeated and direct calls for help, in order to solidify government 

power as an alternative to the Muslim Brotherhood as well as to 

justify their own heavy-handed crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood denies any involvement in the attacks occurring across the country and has at times condemned 

3

them. Yet the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party branch in 

Helwan reportedly posted a statement holding the Coptic Pope responsible for Morsi’s removal and otherwise linked Copts to attacks 

on the Muslim Brotherhood. 

The Brotherhood also called for Friday prayers to be held in an 

evangelical church in Minya after it was occupied and converted 

into a mosque on August 15th. Whoever the attackers are, and that 

is one thing we hope to learn more about today, the bottom line is 

that Coptic citizens are having their most basic human rights—

freedom of religion, association, and equal protection of the laws—

denied. We can never rest while human dignity, when it is so 

grossly trampled upon, nor can we ever accept the suffering that 

has marked Coptic life for decades, very much including the abduction, forced conversions, and forced marriages of Coptic girls and 

women. 

These abuses have continued unabated, and by some reports, 

have escalated sharply following the Arab Spring, as have the 

abuse of the Egyptian courts to prosecute blasphemy cases against 

Christians, moderate Muslims, and secularists. Moreover, despite 

the nearly $1.5 billion in foreign aid American taxpayers gave to 

Egypt each year, neither the Mubarak government nor the Morsi 

government, or now the military government, has seen fit to return 

kidnapped American children Noor and Ramsay Bower, who were 

abducted by their mother to Egypt in 2009, in violation of valid 

U.S. court orders, to the United States. They, along with some 30 

other American children in Egypt, are forced to live without the 

love and guidance of an American parent who daily fights for their 

return, while being stripped of half of their culture and half of their 

identity. 

In addition, freedom of expression continues to be under fire. The 

current interim government has been arresting and jailing journalists critical of the military government, jamming the broadcast signals, deporting foreign reporters, and otherwise closing the offices 

of news outlets that are, ‘‘broadcasting lies.’’

In his September 23rd speech at the United Nations, the President stated that his ‘‘approach to Egypt reflects a larger point: the 

United States will at times work with governments that do not 

meet the highest international expectations, but who will work 

with us on our own core interests.’’ These core interests were early 

defined in the speech to include the ‘‘Camp David Accords and 

counterterrorism’’ efforts, but I believe mistakenly have not included human rights. Human rights and the intrinsic dignity of 

every human being from womb to tomb are important in and of 

themselves. But for those who fail to grasp this, there is another 

important point to be made. It is the strategic interest of the 

United States to encourage governments to respect the rights of 

their own people because governments have failed to do so are, in 

the final analysis, unstable. This should be the abiding lesson of 

the Arab Spring. 

The President also stated that future U.S. support to Egypt ‘‘will 

depend on Egypt’s progress in pursuing a democratic path.’’ Again, 

it is unclear what criteria this entails. What if the democratic path 

does not include the protection of human rights, such as what we 

saw under the Morsi government and now the interim government. 

4

It is not democracy per se that is to be the goal, but rather dulyelected constitutional government that respects minorities, the separation of power, and fundamental human rights. Tyranny of the 

majority is not an acceptable option. 

What is clear is that the U.S. needs a new approach. This administration’s shortsighted approach of not clearly linking aid to the 

protection of human rights in Egypt has been unequivocally ineffective. It is my hope that our hearing today will shed light on what 

went wrong and how the U.S. can be more effective in protecting 

human rights going forward. 

I yield to my good friend and distinguished colleague, Chairman 

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. 

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Thank you very much, Mr. Smith. Thank you 

for your leadership throughout the years on any issue related to 

human rights and thank you for shedding some light on this terrible human rights abuse that is going on in Egypt. It is an honor 

to hold this hearing with you. Thank you, sir. 

During the Morsi and Muslim-Brotherhood-led era, we witnessed 

a steady increase in human rights abuses perpetrated by the 

Islamist government as Morsi began to solidify his power and crack 

down on fundamental freedoms of Egyptians. There was a precipitous increase in the arrests of journalists, a widespread crackdown 

on opposition demonstrators, wanton disrespect for the rule of law, 

and an overall deteriorating state of human rights throughout 

Egypt. Then this past July, the people of Egypt grew tired of 

Morsi’s oppressive regime and its blatant disregard for human 

rights and again, took to the streets en masse. 

Since Morsi’s removal from power, Muslim Brotherhood supporters have terrorized the Egyptian people with violent protests, 

and the end result has left hundreds killed and many more injured. 

The Egyptian military has responded in kind, and the interim authorities have moved to initiate restrictive assembly laws. And 

though the military has taken some steps to keep Egypt safe and 

secure, such as conducting operations against al Qaeda and the 

lawless Sinai, the general security situation restrictions on civil society and a lack of the rule of law and respect for human rights 

demonstrate that Egypt still has a long way to go toward creating 

a truly democratic society. 

While Egypt’s interim government has said that it is protecting 

religious minorities, we still see attacks against the Coptic Christian community all the time. Though the government may not outwardly incite these attacks, it fails to provide the adequate protections to prevent them from happening. Christians have seen a 

drastic increase of attacks against them as they have been 

scapegoated by Morsi supporters. Horrifying reports of attacks 

against Christian communities and of young Christian girls being 

abducted and forced into marriage with radical Islamists depict the 

grim reality that Christians are currently facing in Egypt. But 

Christians aren’t the only groups that continue to suffer. Other religious minorities such as Jews, Bahais, Sufi Muslims, Shiites, and 

others, have been targeted by extremists, and women’s rights are 

woefully inadequate. 

While the latest draft Constitution in theory has provided more 

rights, in practice, it is so left open to interpretation, thus not necVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:04 Jun 25, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00010 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131210\86002 SHIRL
5

essarily affording any more rights to those groups who need protection the most. The committee tasked with drawing up this new 

Constitution was not truly representative of the interests of all 

Egyptians. Of the 50 members, only five were women, and only 

four were Coptic Christians. It is the duty of the interim government to help shepherd Egypt toward a new dawn of democracy. In 

order for Egypt to return to the path toward democracy, the new 

Constitution must protect the rights of women and religious and 

ethnic minorities, everyone’s human rights must be recognized, and 

the political party process must be allowed to take root with free, 

fair, and transparent elections. 

I hope that the new draft Constitution will be implemented in a 

way that adequately addresses these concerns and is not just simply a document that can be thrown out at a moment’s notice. The 

ideals enshrined in this document must be the bedrock foundation 

that can inspire a country that is in danger of losing its way. 

A successful democratic transition in Egypt can only occur once 

those protections are respected, solidified and enforced. In addition, 

Egyptian authorities must pardon the 43 NGO workers, many of 

whom are American citizens, who were unjustly convicted and sentenced earlier this year and allow the NGOs to operate without 

fear of government reprisals as they help to support civil society. 

The path to democracy is a difficult one, but it would be a tremendous accomplishment if the people of Egypt can implement the 

democratic reforms they have called for and realize a free and functioning civil society. Without a strong basis in democracy, any election will fail to achieve the democratic results we all hope and pray 

to see in Egypt. And I thank the chairman again for the joint hearing. 

Mr. SMITH. I want to thank the distinguished chairwoman for 

her very eloquent statement and for her never-ending efforts to 

combat human rights worldwide. Thank you, Chairman RosLehtinen. 

Mr. Weber. 

Mr. WEBER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing. 

And I want to echo my colleague to the left. I want to associate myself with her remarks. She did a great job. You are exactly correct, 

we need to address this. When we make policy, that should be utmost and foremost on our mindset. If we don’t, then we are, as the 

Scripture says, a clanging gong and tinkling cymbals. So what we 

want to make sure that we pay close attention and the policy that 

we set holds these people to account. We express our concern, our 

love, and our intent to put an end to these human rights violations 

across the globe, but especially in Egypt and that we set the policy 

in place to do that. And I commend you once again for holding this 

hearing. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Chair recognizes Chairman Rohrabacher. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Today 

we hope that we will be sending the message that the people of the 

United States are standing in solidarity with those oppressed 

Christians who are suffering persecution in Egypt. That is the message of today. But the greater message is that the people of the 

United States believe in religious freedom. We believe that people, 

no matter what their faith, have a right to live their lives as they 

6

choose without being persecuted or brutalized by either their government or by the citizens of the country in which they reside. 

The United States is on the side of those people who believe in 

freedom, and we are on the side of those who are persecuted for 

their beliefs, whether they be Christians or whether they be Muslims, whether they be Buddhist, or whether they be atheists. The 

fact is our country was founded on those principles. But far too 

often, our Government has not had the courage to act upon those 

beliefs which are supposed to be the fundamental beliefs that we 

have held since the beginning of our country. 

So today, Mr. Chairman, I would hope that we reaffirm not just 

in words, but are willing to reaffirm in policy and in deed that 

when people, especially as we focus on the Christians in Egypt, are 

being brutalized, that we will not stand idly by and not just express our words but stand with those in Egypt who would end that 

oppression. And this, today, unfortunately, there seems to be confusion in our Government as to whose side we should be on. We are 

on the side of those people who want freedom and not radicals who 

would repress their own fellow citizens. 

So today we welcome our witnesses. I thank the chairman for 

calling this hearing so that we can express these very important 

sentiments of solidarity to a people who are being persecuted. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Chairman Rohrabacher. 

Ms. Frankel. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Thank you. I am honored to be here. Thank you 

for being here. 

I join Mr. Rohrabacher. I think it was last month when we went 

to Cairo. And we met with General al-Sisi and Acting President 

Mansour, and also we met with the Coptic Pope there. It was a 

very short but interesting visit. I am really just looking forward to 

hearing what you have to say. When we were there, we were assured by General al-Sisi and President Mansour that they were redrafting a Constitution. And that this would be the first critical 

step back toward democracy. So, of course, I would be interested 

in hearing about that. 

And of course, the Coptic Pope did talk about some of the repression and abuses. So I would certainly be interested in hearing 

about that. And again, I thank you for being here. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Ms. Frankel. 

Like to recognize Chairman Frank Wolf and just note parenthetically that our first witness, Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, is with the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. Mr. Wolf, in 1998, was 

the author of the International Religious Freedom Act, which not 

only created a State Department effort and an office, but also a 

parallel organization that has spoken truth to power ever since 

when State has fallen short. More importantly, it has been absolutely robust in bringing human rights issues and religious freedom 

issues to the forefront. That law was written by Chairman Wolf. 

Mr. Wolf. 

Mr. WOLF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will be very brief. I don’t 

serve on the committee. But I want to thank Mr. Smith and all the 

members of this committee. This is almost the last bastion in the 

Congress that really holds hearings and deals with these issues. 

7

Last week, the House of Commons did a 3-hour debate. You 

couldn’t get a 3-hour debate in the House or the Senate if you paid 

for it. And if it were not for the members of this committee, all of 

you, this issue may very well go away. And Mr. Rohrabacher talked 

about our obligation. President Reagan, who he was a speechwriter 

for, said that the words in the Constitution were a covenant not 

only with the people in Philadelphia in 1787, but with all the people in the world. They are a covenant with the people of Cairo, 

their covenant with the people of Alexandria, they are a covenant 

with the people of the people all over the world. I believe that we 

are breaking the covenant at this very moment. And a covenant is 

more significant than a contract. We are breaking a covenant. And 

I visited Egypt a couple months ago and met with women’s groups. 

They all believe that our Government was a strong supporter of the 

Morsi government. We met with a Muslim group. That they believe 

that our Government was the strongest supporter of the Muslim 

Brotherhood. We met with the Christian groups. They all believe 

that we were the strongest supporter of the Morsi government. 

They believed that Anne Patterson and the American Embassy was 

not a sanctuary of freedom, but it was basically a support group 

for the Morsi government. And also we met with a number in the 

secular community. 

So again, I thank the committee. I think we could lose Egypt. I 

think we are really facing a point, if this administration doesn’t 

deal with certain things, and they are going to be here for the next 

3 years, we could lose Egypt. And then the stories will be about 

who lost Egypt. And the answer will be, the Obama administration 

and the Congress lost Egypt because they did not side with the 

people of Egypt who wanted freedom and democracy against the 

Muslim Brotherhood. So I would thank Mr. Smith and all the 

members here. If it were not for you guys, men and women, this 

issue just would not be dealt with. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Chairman Wolf. 

Mr. Meadows. 

Mr. MEADOWS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this important hearing. Thank you for being here. It is good to see you. You 

know, obviously, the transition of power is never easy. It is always 

combined with, not only cultural, but religious differences, among 

protests many times and trying to scream for power. What I am interested in hearing from you this morning is how can we help provide a standard. I think what we have heard today has been that 

there is really not a dependable standard on what we expect. And 

if you go all the way back to Cuba and some of the others we knew 

what those were about. I lived in Florida at the time. And I knew 

the human rights abuses that were happening there because we 

could feel them. We heard the stories. And yet the story is not getting told, whether it is in Egypt or across the Middle East. So how 

can we as Members of Congress come alongside you, support this 

effort, and make sure that it gets highlighted. 

At your same table, we had people talking about NGOs and how 

they had been convicted in absentia and how they felt like Congress had left them out and was not bringing those issues to the 

forefront. And so I look forward to hearing your testimony on how 

we can, not only highlight this issue, but how we can make a difVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:04 Jun 25, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00013 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131210\86002 SHIRL
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ference. For those that are persecuted, that perhaps do not have a 

voice, it is critical that we have this. As important as so many of 

the issues are, it is critical that we use this not to ignore human 

rights abuses in favor of economic stability, or whatever it is, but 

let’s tie those together. And I look forward to hearing your testimony. And I thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Meadows. 

Mr. Bilirakis. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate it very 

much. And thank you, Chairman Ros-Lehtinen, as well. This is 

such a very important issue. And because of your leadership, we 

continue to focus on this. And it is so very important to me, my 

constituents. So I appreciate the opportunity again to participate 

since the safety of Coptic Christians in Egypt is something that I 

have worked on since I have been in Congress. As an Orthodox 

Christian and a member of the International Religious Freedom 

Caucus, I am especially alarmed at the dwindling number of Christians in Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Egypt, and throughout the Middle 

East. While this hearing today focuses on Egypt, and it should, I 

want to take a moment to reiterate that Christians are facing persecution across the region. Christianity is not new to the Middle 

East, and we must not forget that the ancient indigenous communities of Coptic, Syrian, Assyrian, Catholic, and Greek Orthodox 

communities that have lived and thrived in the Middle East for 

thousands of years. 

Today in the face of ongoing unrest, these Christians have exhibited bravery in the face of existential danger, these attempts that 

we see to push Christians from their ancestral homeland. Let us 

not forget that ‘‘Coptic’’ translated means Egyptian. These attempts 

must be denounced by all. I thank the chairman, of course, Ms. 

Ros-Lehtinen and Chairman Smith, for holding this hearing today, 

and I remain committed to working with my colleagues in the 

House to continue bringing light to the situation in Egypt and 

across the Middle East. 

I would like to thank the panelists again for being here today. 

I thank them for their testimony. I have met with many of you to 

discuss the topic at hand over the past year. And while I wish I 

could say that things have improved over that time, I am afraid 

they have not. So let’s continue to work on behalf of these wonderful people. Thank you so very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Bilirakis. 

I would now introduce our first witness, on the first panel, who 

is Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, who is a member of the U.S. Commission on 

International Religious Freedom. He is also the founder and president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy. Dr. Jasser is 

a first-generation American Muslim whose parents fled the oppressive Baath regime of Syria. He earned his medical degree on a U.S. 

Navy scholarship and served 11 years in the U.S. Navy. He 

achieved the rank of Lieutenant Commander. His tours of duty included medical department head aboard the USS El Paso, chief 

resident at Bethesda Naval Hospital, and staff internist for the Office of Attending Physician for the U.S. Congress. 

He is recipient of the meritorious service medal. He is a respected physician currently in private practice, specializing in inVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:04 Jun 25, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00014 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131210\86002 SHIRL
9

ternal medicine and nuclear cardiology. He is the past-president of 

the Arizona Medical Association. He has been a frequent speaker 

on behalf of human rights and religious freedom, has been before 

our subcommittee before. We have always benefited greatly from 

his wise counsel and insight. Dr. Jasser. 

STATEMENT OF ZUHDI JASSER, M.D., VICE CHAIR, U.S. 

COMMISSION ON INTERNATIONAL RELIGIOUS FREEDOM 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you, Chairman Smith. And I want to thank 

the members of Subcommittees on Africa, Global Health, Global 

Human Rights, and International Organizations and on the Middle 

East and North Africa for holding this very important hearing on 

human rights in Egypt and inviting the U.S. Commission on Religious Freedom to testify. 

With your approval, I would like to submit my written testimony 

which also reflects what we have learned in our delegation to 

Egypt in February for the record. 

Mr. SMITH. Without objection, so ordered. 

Dr. JASSER. Today could not be a more appropriate day to hold 

this hearing, given that 65 years ago, 48 nations in the U.N. General Assembly adopted a remarkable document that is relevant 

today as it was then, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 

Yet today, too many governments including Egypt fail to honor 

human rights. Among the recent convulsions in Egypt, few have 

been more shocking or emblematic of the January 2011 revolution’s 

derailment then the Egyptian security forces killing more than 

1,000 demonstrators in August and then the horrific attacks by extremists in the Muslim Brotherhood supporters against the country’s Coptic Christian population. Today I want to highlight the 

plight of the Copts and the other religious minorities and Muslim 

dissidents, and briefly review the new Constitution and conclude 

with recommendations on protecting religious freedom for everyone 

in Egypt. 

Since the transition’s beginning, Egyptian human rights activists 

have been concerned that radical groups have advanced the country with detrimental effects on fostering an open civil society and 

democratic reform and improving freedom of religion or belief. During former President Morsi’s year in power, sectarian rhetoric and 

incitement increased significantly with conservative clerics and extremists without consequence or accountability, fanning the flames 

of hatred. 

The most vilified groups included Christians, Shi’a, Bahais, and 

all religious minorities. In fact, five Shi’a were lynched to death in 

June as a consequence of increased sectarian incitement to violence 

by jihadi and Salafi groups. While the government has failed to 

bring to justice the perpetrators of sectarian attacks, the courts 

have continued to charge, convict, and imprison Egyptian citizens 

for blasphemy, concept, and defamation of religions. Since Egypt’s 

2011 revolution, our Commission has observed a significant increase in these cases, with disfavored Muslims being the most targeted, however, Christians are disproportionately affected. 

In September 2013, just a few months ago, a leading Egyptian 

human rights organization reported a significant surge in religious 

defamation cases and identified 63 cases of individuals, 41 percent 

10

being Christian, a percentage out of proportion to their population. 

The Copts are particularly affected and victims of impunity for 

those who target them. Besides directly violating religious freedom, 

blasphemy and defamation of religion laws fuel Egypt’s longtime 

impunity problem by provoking assaults against Copts and other 

religious minorities for alleged blasphemous speech. 

Large-scale attacks on Christians during 2011 resulted in the 

deaths of dozens and injuries to hundreds with the perpetrators remaining unpunished to this day, inviting further violence. Following Morsi’s July ouster, violent attacks again increased, targeting Copts and other Christians. Since mid-August, at least 

seven Copts have been killed and more than 200 churches and 

other places where Christians congregated have been assaulted, 

many of which destroyed. In October, four Copts were killed, including two children. Besides Copts, other vulnerable religious minorities have faced assaults on their religious freedom. 

My written testimony briefly reviews the status of the Bahais, 

the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and the continued growing anti-Semitism. 

Let me note here that Egypt has banned the Bahai faith and Jehovah’s Witnesses since 1960s, and then 2012 material vilifying Jews 

continued to appear regularly in Egypt’s state controlled and semiofficial media. 

Egypt’s 50-member constitution committee recently completed its 

work and sent the final draft to the Egyptian interim President. 

The draft will be put to referendum coming this January. An initial 

reviews shows the removal of some problematic provisions from the 

suspended 2012 Constitution, and other positive additions, although how the provisions are interpreted and implemented will be 

crucial. For example, Article 64 of the new draft provides freedom 

of belief being absolute. Article 65 broadly guarantees freedom of 

thought and opinion, and 53 prohibits discrimination on the basis 

of religion, among other grounds. But like the Morsi era Constitution, Article 64 limits the freedom to practice religious rituals and 

establish practices of worship to only three divine religious: Islam, 

Christianity, and Judaism, thereby not allowing the Bahai community to exercise their own rights and establish places of worship. 

And even that freedom is limited with Christians having limitation 

on being able to build new churches and other manifestations of 

that. 

In the end, our recommendations are, number one, due to Egypt’s 

failure to protect the religious freedom and even the lives of its 

people, USCIRF, for the third consecutive year, recommended that 

the U.S. designate Egypt a Country of Particular Concern. The 

U.S. must urge Egypt to repel its contempt of religion and related 

laws, its Penal Code, and discriminatory decrees against religious 

minorities. Given the continued violence against Copts and other 

religious minorities, the U.S. should press Egypt to prosecute government-funded clerics, officials, and others who incite violence, 

and urge Cairo to bring the violent to justice. 

Finally, the U.S. should refuse to certify the disbursement of the 

appropriated $1.3 billion in foreign military financing to the Egyptian military until the Egyptian Government demonstrates that it 

is using some of the FMF funds to implement policies that protect 

freedom and related rights. Once the Egyptian Government so 

11

demonstrates, it should be urged to ensure that its police implement a comprehensive plan to protect religious minority communities in their places of worship. Congress should require the State 

Department to report every 90 days on the Egyptian Government’s 

progress on these and related recommendations. The treatment of 

Egypt’s religious minority communities is a barometer of the country’s well-being. If the Egyptian revolution is to succeed, nothing is 

more important than ensuring that Egypt’s Government recognize 

the full freedom of religion or belief being a fundamental human 

right. For the sake of stability and security, and because of Egypt’s 

international human rights commitments, the U.S. Government 

should urge Egypt to choose the pathway to democracy and freedom. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Dr. Jasser, thank you so very much for your leadership and your extraordinary statement. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Jasser follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. In his testimony, Bishop Angaelos, His Grace Bishop 

Angaelos, makes the point that religious minorities in general, 

Copts, Jews, Shiite, Sufi, and Bahai, are suffering attacks, in large 

part, because of the breakdown in law and order. You have pointed 

out that although the true test will be—there are changes being 

made in the Constitution—the true test will be as to how the Egyptian Government interprets and implements the new documents 

once passed by referendum. 

Is the Constitution really going to make a difference in the abuse 

of blasphemy laws? You also point out that there is a surge in religious defamation cases, particularly since January 2011, including 

in the 2 months after Morsi was removed from power. One hundred 

percent of the individuals who were accused and tried were found 

guilty. Maybe you could speak to what is causing this surge in 

blasphemy cases, and again, will the new Constitution mitigate 

that abuse? 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you, chairman. 

These are really key questions, in that, you know, we can always 

try to give a government a honeymoon period, if you will, as they 

reboot and try to course correct their democracy. But the bottom 

line is that there is a lot of evidence to show that while there is 

a rush to take to trial those who are arrested or brought to justice 

supposedly for blasphemy and restrictions on freedom of speech, 

those who commit acts of violence are not brought to justice. 

So certain phrases in the Constitution that we see, some of the 

articles I mentioned are hopeful, there are some things that we 

should be concerned about, in that they have a limitation on freedom of speech discussing incitement to hate. It is not the standard 

that we agreed to even at 1618 that talked about limitation on incitement to violence, or imminent violence. That is not the standard they are using. So there is a large, gaping hole there that can 

allow the current regime, the current government to continue in a 

way that would not respect human rights and freedom of speech. 

And there is an opportunity now. 

I think as much as there was clear direction downward and backward during the Morsi regime in which there was a loss of human 

rights, the Constitution was an Islamist document that was based 

in Sharia and other aspects that were not based in freedom. Now 

is an opportunity. And I think what we need and our recommendation that we are laying out—is that our policy needs to be linked 

to religious freedom. What happened is that you saw the violence 

happen in August against the Coptic and Christian communities 

and it took until October until there was actually a mention that 

we would limit funding and restrict some of the military funds. So 

there was no connection there. 

Sometimes it was referred to as criticism of the Brotherhood. 

And meanwhile, as many of the other members have stated, it is 

being interpreted by the world that we did nothing during the 

Brotherhood year, and now we are doing something once the Brotherhood have left and the people have made a statement. So unless 

we do things and link them to religious freedom, they are going to 

be misinterpreted. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t continue to put 

pressure because of the limitations of the current Constitution and 

the fact that it has just been a piece of paper, and the only way 

22

to make it real is to hold them accountable with measurements 

every 90 days, as we laid out, and then linking that to cases. 

The Hegazy case, the Asfour case, and other cases in which people have been put in jail. These human beings are depictive, as you 

will hear from other testimony, of the reality on the ground, which 

is very different than the Constitution. 

Mr. SMITH. My time is just about out. But I would just note parenthetically that in the last foreign operations appropriations bill, 

Frank Wolf, Trent Franks, Kay Granger, and I, and others, included language conditioning our aid on religious freedom. Sadly, 

it was waived by Secretary Clinton. 

Mr. Connolly. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Welcome, Dr. Jasser. 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. From your testimony, how would you compare 

the issues of religious freedom in Egypt between the Morsi government and the current government? 

Dr. JASSER. Well, it is hard to judge the current military government since they have only been still getting their organization together. But I think on the ground, we see the Constitution shows 

some improvement. There have been certain provisions from the 

Morsi Era Constitution that have been removed. We have seen 

some aspects that have gone. There is one article, 235, that talks 

about separating from government provisions the building of religious structures, which I think would be very important for the 

Coptic community, to control the building of their own churches, 

that has for long been authorized. There have been no new churches authorized. So there are some things we are seeing that would 

be hopeful. On the ground——

Mr. CONNOLLY. With respect to religious freedom. 

Dr. JASSER. With respect to religious freedom——

Mr. CONNOLLY. I am just clarifying what you are saying. You’re 

talking about—because I want to be very clear. There are obviously 

aspects of the draft Constitution, current draft Constitution that 

Americans would find abhorrent. The carve-out for the military, 

the lack of civilian oversight of the Defense Minister. Those are not 

democratic provisions, those are most certainly protections for a 

military government that are not democratic provisions. We would 

agree? 

Dr. JASSER. Yes, sir. And——

Mr. CONNOLLY. So what you are referring to is this Constitution 

draft, however, is better than the one previously promulgated with 

respect to religious freedom. 

Dr. JASSER. Yes, sir. And it is not a binary choice in that the 

voice of the people in Egypt I think could be better than either. 

What the Brotherhood brought to the table with Morsi and what 

currently is being brought to the table by President Mansour and 

this constitutional committee. But if you look at Morsi’s Constitution, every minority abandoned the process. This process has still 

engaged many of the minority communities in the committee itself. 

But what it is going to produce—and I will agree with you in that 

on the ground there has been little change as far as religious freedom. The impunity for acts of violence—nobody has been brought 

to justice for what happened to all of the churches that were deseVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:04 Jun 25, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00028 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131210\86002 SHIRL
23

crated in August. Very little justice has been brought with that. So 

these are the things that need to be targeted. And our Commission 

has been built on the fact that when religious freedom is protected, 

the rest of society will be healthy. When it is not protected, it will 

deteriorate and all the other things you are talking will never be 

a success. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Right. Just want to make sure that we got that 

clear on your record. I thank you for your testimony. I know we are 

under a time bind today. So appreciate you being here. Thank you, 

Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SMITH. Chairman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. 

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. 

Dr. Jasser, thank you for your service on the Commission. And 

for several years the Commission has argued that Egypt should be 

placed on the Country of Particular Concern list when it comes to 

the human rights situation there. What headway do you see that 

we are making in that? What progress? And you also recommend 

about the disbursement of aid that we were talking about, that the 

U.S. should refuse to certify the disbursement of our military aid 

to the Egyptian armed forces. We have already seen many Gulf nations pledge sums of money that dwarf our $1.3 billion. 

Do you worry that if we cut off aid Egypt will get that money 

elsewhere? We hear that a lot when we talk about conditioning our 

aid and leveraging our aid, and that we would lose whatever leverage we have left and these human rights abuses will continue. So 

if you could address that one as well. 

And would you favor an approach in which we transition the foreign military assistance money that we give to economic support 

funds in which that money could still go to Egypt, but would go to 

building up civil society, democracy promotion programs, and other 

security programs that Egypt would need in order to maintain its 

stability and security? Thank you, sir. 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you, Madam Chair Ros-Lehtinen, and I appreciate the opportunity. 

There is no doubt, as we designated Egypt as a CPC in 2011, 

2012 and 2013, it has not only not improved, it has continued to 

worsen. So not only does it deserve that designation, but 2012, especially under Morsi, demonstrated significant strides backwards. 

And this is why you saw in revolution 2.0 in Egypt 10 times more 

demonstrations of people against that government than you saw in 

the first revolution. 

And as a result of the criteria by which our Commission works 

in designating CPC status, Egypt fits every one of those as far as 

specific targeting, egregious offenses, and religious freedom. As far 

is the aid is concerned, I believe, as you mentioned, there can be 

90 days review in which that aid doesn’t become a lever that you 

can only pull once. In that it is a constant measure of the success 

or failures that that society is making. 

If you use, and this is one of our primary criticisms of the current approach of the State Department, is that often, as was mentioned by Chairman Smith, because we were so late and because 

then it was waived in 2011, 2012, the certification was waived, 

there are specific benchmarks that was legislated by this body that 

Egypt should meet, in elections and human rights, et cetera, that 

24

it has not met. And when it was ready to decertify that funding 

when we should have with the Brotherhood, it did not happen and 

it was waived. And now it appears when we are doing it in October 

2013 that we are somehow rewarding the Brotherhood. And this is 

why we have to get the timing right, but that doesn’t mean we 

shouldn’t link that to civil society, progress, and methods in which 

we link it every 90 days to progress on the ground that protects 

women’s groups, that protects religious minorities, shows that some 

of these cases that we have highlighted in my written testimony 

are actually being released and we have a program in which Members of Congress can identify individuals in jail that they can then 

promote as being examples of how Egypt and other countries can 

fix themselves. 

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Thank you very much. And thank you for 

your work. 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Ms. Frankel. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Thank you again and welcome and thank you for 

your testimony. 

So I have a number of questions. I will try to get them out first 

and you can then try to answer them. 

Again, first of all, the timetable on the drafting of the Constitution, and do you think that there is a transition back to democracy? 

Although I am not really sure after the coup what exactly democracy is in Egypt. But, as I said, when we were there we were told 

there was going to be this new Constitution, an election for a Parliament, and then an election for a President. 

And the—you expressed, I guess, disappointment or frustration 

over the fact that there has not—there has not been a justice system handling this oppression. Is the infrastructure there to do 

that? 

Dr. JASSER. That is a great question, Congresswoman Frankel. 

And I believe the infrastructure is there. They have the funds, 

some of which we give them, that we could tie to that and hold 

them accountable and show that if they have certain cases that we 

could identify, whether it is the Mohamed Hegazy case, who converted to Christianity and wants his I.D. to be able to show that 

or another case of an individual who wrote on Facebook criticism 

that Mohamed has been in jail for 3 years, or the case of a Shitte 

individual who was imprisoned because he did a ritual that wasn’t 

traditional, according to Islam. 

So there are ways that we could tie representations in their justice system that would show whether they genuinely are moving toward democracy and rule of law or whether it is continuing to be 

the same old system in Egypt and just shifting around of the chairs 

on the deck. 

Ms. FRANKEL. How are the prosecutors and the judges being appointed? 

Dr. JASSER. You know, the traditional way—I mean, oddly, 

Mansour came out of the Supreme Court system there. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Right. 

Dr. JASSER. It is very local oriented and a historical system in 

Egypt that is based on a very nepotistic tribal system. It is certainly not a balanced system. And this is one of the things we 

25

should look at, as Congressman Connolly was pointing out, is, do 

they have a balance of power? Do they have other aspects of democracy that we would hold as standards and should be part of their 

systems and have not been? But that is really beyond our mandate 

at the Commission. I think if you hold accountable standards of 

international religious freedom along with it, it will expose some of 

these aspects that have put into place and allowed longtime judges. 

One of the things the Brotherhood and President Morsi did do 

was start to put even more radicalization as far as some of the 

judges. And as he started to replace some of those judges was when 

you saw a rise of the people against him. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Weber. 

Mr. WEBER. Chairman, I am going to pass this time. 

Mr. SMITH. Chairman Rohrabacher. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. So here we are in this quandary that we 

want to make sure that a standard that is an honest standard, not 

just protection of Christians, but protection of the religious rights 

of all people of Egypt, are protected. And we have just gone 

through a phase where there was an expansion of repression and 

persecution. And we know that that phase was a result of a political move toward a certain direction. 

And those who thwarted that move and thwarted that effort are 

now in charge. And we, as you say, the timing, if we try to maintain that standard, the timing would have us being tough and perhaps withdrawing some of our support from the current group that 

actually stopped a bad trend. Maybe you could help us out on how 

we can get out of this quandary. 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you, Congressman Rohrabacher. I think the 

way to get out of it is to realize the Egyptian population is not a 

victim of basically worse and the worst. And the January 2011 revolution was against an era that was repressive and brought forth 

all of the things that had us designate them as a CPC in 2011. And 

we should have held them accountable to religious freedom standards at that time. And then it went even worse when democracy 

was a manifestation of simply elections and became mob-ocracy 

rather than principles of religious freedom. So to move forward, I 

think we have to be principled and link our funding to demonstrations on the ground, building civil society, having benchmarks that 

in every 90-day period that show that they are making progress in 

defending minorities, in protecting churches, in prosecuting those 

who burn down churches just as quickly as they prosecute free 

speech issues, which should stop and no longer limit free speech. 

So all of these things can be done. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Let me ask you, then, on this we are now 

selling spare parts to the military for equipment that we provided 

Egypt in the past. Just at a time when there is an expanding insurgency or a challenge to peace in the Sinai and elsewhere. 

Are we being, and will we be viewed as hypocrites about our beliefs and freedom if we provide those spare parts knowing that if 

this government goes down and those who succeed, and then these 

insurgency movements would impose harsher restrictions on the 

people, are we being hypocritical? 

26

Dr. JASSER. Well, I don’t believe so because I think that ultimately if we let the world create the narrative of what we are 

doing at every level, whether it is at spare-parts levels or at funding, then it will appear that way. But if we allow—if our President 

and our State Department constantly makes it clear what the 

standards of religious freedom are and what we link those who at 

every speech in the Rose Garden and every moment the Secretary 

has an opportunity to mention it, then it will be clear what our 

standards are. But if we let those go and we lose opportunities and 

come and make a statement on funding 3 months later after things 

happen, then the narrative will be that we are hypocritical. But we 

should set our own narrative on a daily basis, not on an every 

quarterly basis. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. I would hope that we don’t do anything that 

we weakens, like denying spare parts to the military. 

Dr. JASSER. Right. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Weakens their ability not to have even a 

worse regime come into power. And I would hope we do not do that. 

But I agree that the United States must really speak with an honest voice on these standards. 

Thank you very much for your testimony. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Chairman Rohrabacher. 

Mr. Meadows. 

Mr. MEADOWS. Thank you for being here. Thank you for your 

service to our country, not only here but in the Navy as well. 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you. 

Mr. MEADOWS. We greatly appreciate your insight. Three things: 

One is the inconsistency in terms of the Egyptian people and what 

they need to look to us in terms of that standard. I am very concerned that over time, the image of us supporting one regime over 

the other is very real to the Egyptian people. And in light of us trying to address these human rights violations now in terms of religious persecution, the image is out there that we supported the 

Morsi regime, we don’t support this one, when in actuality, it is 

more of supporting freedom in the respectful rule of law across the 

board. So how do we address that uniquely? 

I think the other one is, how do we have a respect for and a love 

for the Egyptian people and for many of them of a Muslim faith 

that—where it does not get viewed as we are trying to put Christianity and make a Christian Egyptian versus just trying to stand 

up for those that are being religiously persecuted? I think it is a 

dangerous tightrope that we walk, because the perception many 

times is that we want our democracy and our religion to be one 

that is placed on the Egyptian people. So if you could speak to 

those two things. And if we have time, I will come back to a third 

question. 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you, Congressman Meadows. This is so important, I think the paradigm has shifted from the old era in which 

diplomacy was based on the lesser of two evils. And as Secretary 

Rice said in 2005 in Cairo that somehow we were choosing trying 

to side with security over freedom, and we got neither. And I think 

ultimately the Commission’s purpose has been to highlight the fact 

that religious freedom when it is lifted up can then bring with it 

a more healthy society. And I think how we get our credibility back 

27

is to continue to lift that up repeatedly. And the problem is that 

is there is an opportunity right now. 

And, yes, there will be an image problem because of the lost opportunity in 2011, 2012, and now it appears that somehow our 

standards are to reinforce further authoritarianism. And when, in 

fact, what we are doing is laying that out as a course correction in 

democracy. And the only way we can do that is by siding with the 

people and siding with principles. Because regardless of the way 

the policy is manifesting from the State Department or from the 

White House, the bottom line is is the majority of Egyptians are 

not looking favorably at the U.S. these days. And that is because 

of the lack of clarity in principle and because we haven’t sided with 

the majority of Egyptians that went to the streets, that still have 

a problem not only with the Brotherhood, more so but still with the 

current government and are seeking the means to move forward. 

And we should tie some of that military aid to a civil society 

progress because it is going to take a generation, years to improve 

these things. It is not going to happen overnight. 

And the last point you made about the, sort of the sense that this 

is just a Christian issue for America. It is not. I think the religious 

freedom issues of the Copts is tied into the Bahais, is tied into 

Muslims who are targeted, from Bassem Youssef, who is the Jon 

Stewart of Egypt, who is targeted, to so many of the Shitte Muslim 

community that are called deviants by some of the clerics and 

judges when, in fact, they don’t have religious freedom to practice 

their own rites. And others, Muslim dissidents that are part of the 

majority, the millions that went to the street against the Brotherhood were 90 percent Muslim that did not want the Brotherhood, 

and we forget that, and our policy should articulate that. 

Mr. MEADOWS. Thank you so much. I yield back. 

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Cotton. 

Thank you, Mr. Meadows. 

Mr. COTTON. Could you elaborate just a little bit on the point 

about the majorities that have taken to the street, both under the 

Morsi regime at its end and also in the last 6 months since General 

al-Sisi and the military reclaimed power, and how much, if any, of 

the focus of those majorities is on the issue of religious freedom, 

religious liberty of minorities there? 

Dr. JASSER. Well, I think if you follow Facebook traffic, social 

media, a lot of them have looked at cases like the Asfour case, the 

Hegazy case, and others, and see these as individuals that are persecuted that are becoming—Bassem Youssef became an icon because he challenged. He was arrested because on his TV program 

he supposedly was insulting Islam, which they equated to insulting 

the President, President Morsi. 

This is a problem not only with the Islamists, but you are finding 

similar limitations in speech in the Mubarak era and maybe even 

in the current regime. So these things need to be highlighted and 

underscored as being one of the primary pathologies that need to 

be corrected. The majority of people, if you look at their social 

media and what brings them to the streets, is that they want these 

issues highlighted by leaders of the free world. 

Mr. COTTON. In the United States we have the First Amendment, 

and it is important, it is first, after all, and it includes freedoms 

28

of religion, speech, press, and assembly. And a certain level of 

those are all linked in man’s God-given ability to reason together. 

Is there a sense in those majorities in Egypt, in your opinion, that 

threats to the rights of religious minorities are actually threats as 

well to the political and the speech rights of the majority? 

Dr. JASSER. When we went to Egypt in February, we met with 

a number of different representatives from various religious minority groups, from civil society groups. We met with a very impressive women’s rights group. And all of them said how much they 

dreamed of an Egypt that would bring those principles forward and 

that for too long those principles have not been defended from their 

government and that they seek the means to change that. 

Now, the issue is, how does that transition, how do those principles on the ground transition in the infrastructure and the leadership? And I don’t think, if the U.S. takes a pass on being open 

about that, that that is going to happen. I think the West needs 

to be involved in that transition process and link some of our aid. 

Now, if we decrease our aid, will they get it from elsewhere? 

They may. But they still want Western help in doing this, American help, because they know the principles that we share in protecting minorities. 

And the rule of law is important, and this is why some of the 

cases are so important. What you articulated as our First Amendment respect, many in Egypt still for decades have not understood 

the respect of the rule of law. And that is why we have to tie our 

relationship to them to cases that respect the rule of law. 

Mr. COTTON. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Bilirakis. 

Thank you, Mr. Cotton. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate it. And 

again, thank you for allowing me to sit on the panel today as well. 

Dr. Jasser, thank you for all your good work. I really appreciate 

it. And of course thank you for your service to our country as well. 

Could you speak to how the United States, the State Department, prioritizes Coptic Christians in their approach to the U.S. 

policy to Egypt? And do you think more can be done by the State 

Department to urge Egypt to respect the rights of religious minorities? 

Dr. JASSER. Well, certainly when we have engaged the White 

House, NSC, and State Department, they certainly have expressed 

similar concerns about the targeting of Coptic Christians and in 

our meetings seem to respect that. Now, however, if you look at 

how frequently it is mentioned publicly and brought from statements from the President or from the Secretary of State, I would 

say that it is not enough. We sent a letter to the President in September talking about these things, and we have not gotten a response yet from the Secretary or from the President about these 

issues and our concerns of what happened in August to the Coptic 

community. 

So I would tell you, as an independent commission that seeks to 

highlight religious freedom concerns, we have not been as happy 

with the response from the administration as could be and this opportunity to use the plight of the Coptic community to set Egypt 

in the right direction for religious freedom, as they are moving 

29

away from the Brotherhood era, away from some of the mistakes 

they made after the revolution, but toward a better future rather 

than back toward what they had during the Mubarak era or some 

of the same problems that happened under the Brotherhood. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. Let me ask you a question. The Coptic community 

and the Christian community in general, of course we care about 

these issues affecting our brothers in Egypt. What can my constituents do? What can they do to influence this administration with respect to this and make it a top priority of this administration and 

the State Department? What would you suggest? 

Dr. JASSER. I think our constituents can do what we are trying 

to do here, what all of you by being here and listening have done, 

to continue to press our State Department, press our not only elected officials, our media, our universities to recognize what Pew and 

others have studied repeatedly, the linkage of religious freedom to 

healthy societies, the linkage of religious repression to sick societies. And that once we highlight that, and certainly there are so 

many other issues on America’s plate, but if we ignore this issue, 

societies like Egypt that are pivotal to American security, not only 

because of Egypt itself, economics, but the Camp David Accords 

and so many other things will fall apart in the Middle East if we 

don’t protect religious freedom in Egypt. And your constituents, I 

think, can have a much larger voice than all of us here by reminding their leaders, the media, and others to pay attention to religious freedom. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. Thank you very much. I agree 100 percent. Thank 

you so much. I yield back. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you so much as well. Thank you for your extraordinary testimony, your expertise and counsel, and we benefit 

always when you testify. 

I would like to now ask our second panel to make their way to 

the witness table, beginning first with His Grace Bishop Angaelos, 

who is the general bishop of the Coptic Orthodox Church in the 

United Kingdom, the ancient church of Egypt, and the largest 

Christian denomination in the Middle East. Bishop Angaelos was 

born in Cairo, Egypt, and emigrated to Australia during his childhood with his family. In 1990 he returned to Egypt to attend monastery, where he was consecrated a monk. In 1995 he was delegated to serve a parish in the United Kingdom with a pastoral ministry that spans almost 2 decades. The bishop travels extensively 

around the world to speak at various youth conferences and conventions and is the director of the Coptic Church’s Media and Communications Office in the United Kingdom and for all of Europe. 

We will then hear from Mr. Samuel Tadros of the Hudson Institute, a research fellow there for religious freedom and a professorial lecturer at the School of Advanced International Studies 

at Johns Hopkins University. His current research focuses on 

Egypt politics, Islamism, and the fate of religious minorities. Before 

joining the Hudson Institute in 2011, Mr. Tadros was a senior partner at the Egyptian Union of Liberal Youth, an organization that 

aims to spread the idea of classic liberalism in Egypt. In 2007 he 

was chosen by the State Department for its first Leaders for Democracy Fellowship Program in collaboration with Syracuse University’s Maxwell School. 

30

We will then hear from Dr. Morad Abou-Sabe, who is currently 

professor emeritus and consultant at Rutgers University. Previously he served as president and assistant chancellor for research 

and business development at Misr University for Science & Technology, a large private university in Egypt. In his public and community work he has served on many boards, nationally, internationally, and has served as a senior adviser to the Commerce 

Secretary of the State of New Jersey. In February 2001 he was 

nominated for a position in the Office of Secretary of Commerce, 

and he also has served as president of the Egyptian-American Professional Society and numerous other civic organizations. I had the 

distinct honor of meeting with the professor and a delegation several months ago, and his insights were very, very illuminating, and 

I thank him for that. 

We will then hear from Mr. Ted Stahnke, who is from Human 

Rights First, joined it in January 2008, and is the director of policy 

and programs. Prior to joining Human Rights First he served at 

the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, where he 

led the Commission’s effort to strengthen U.S. foreign policy to advance the right to religious freedom and belief. Mr. Stahnke has 

served on official U.S. delegations to human rights conferences and 

served as an expert in international human rights law, training officials from the U.S. Departments of State, Justice, and Homeland 

Security. He has authored and coauthored numerous scholarly publications. 

Your Grace, please begin. 

STATEMENT OF HIS GRACE BISHOP ANGAELOS, GENERAL 

BISHOP, COPTIC ORTHODOX CHURCH IN THE UNITED KINGDOM 

Bishop ANGAELOS. Chairman Smith, first of all, thank you very 

much for the opportunity, and I am thankful to all the members 

who are here as well. I must thank you all for braving the weather 

and coming regardless of all the impediments that you must have 

braved. I am also apologizing for this cold that I have, and I assure 

you it is not caused by your weather. It is definitely a British import which I bring. 

I am also very thankful for the witness that I have seen here because far too often people who walk these corridors, whether in this 

country or in other places, are accused of being self-interested, and 

they are accused of following a personal agenda. What we have 

heard today is a presence and a witness for those who are in need 

of support and are in need of that fraternal relationship. And I 

somehow feel that in light of the last hearing, that my presence 

here is quite superfluous because of everything I have heard and 

the insight that you have. 

Mr. Chairman, I have also submitted testimony for the record. 

Mr. SMITH. Without objection, yours and that of all of our witnesses will be made a part of the record, and any extraneous materials you want to add. 

Bishop ANGAELOS. Thank you. 

Christians, as everyone knows here, have been part of Egypt’s 

history for 2,000 years, since the establishment by Saint Mark. We 

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ity group, as indigenous people of Egypt. And as was mentioned 

earlier and as is absolutely right, the presence of the Christians in 

the Middle East, the birthplace of Christianity, is not only something we should encourage, but is actually of great importance, because it is a stabilizing factor in the culture of the Middle East and 

its identity. 

I don’t only speak here as a Christian, because that would be 

very un-Christian of me. We speak as Christians for everyone, and 

our view of human rights is for a human rights perspective that 

covers everybody. This hearing was postponed for various reasons, 

and it is only providential that it happens today, on this day which 

is set aside to remember human rights internationally. And I think 

that is the core of this testimony and the core of what we will be 

presenting today. 

The first attacks on minority groups in Egypt was not on Christians after the uprising, it was on Sufi shrines. We have seen Shiite Muslims killed in the streets, we have seen Baha’is treated unfairly, and so if we are looking at equality issues, we should be 

looking at equality across the board. 

During the last administration, of former President Morsi, one 

indication was that in April of this year the Coptic Orthodox Cathedral was attacked for the first time in known history, in the 

presence of police forces then looking, on while a few days earlier 

the headquarters of the Freedom and Justice Party was attacked 

and was actually quite substantially protected by the same police 

force. 

So it is this culture that we have seen in the past of an impunity 

that leads toward a lack of equality. There is a tendency of oversimplification as well, being either pro-military or pro-revolution. 

The presence of Christians is that we are Egyptians before anything else and that we want a country that actually proposes a 

movement for all. 

I issued a statement in August of this year warning that if incitement continued in Rabaa al-Adawiyah with the Muslim Brotherhood’s presence there, there would be widespread attacks on Christians and Christian places. I am not prophetic by any means, but 

unfortunately only a week later we saw the attacks on close to 100 

churches and Christian institutions in Egypt. That needs a new 

pragmatic and intentional movement toward democracy, not just 

majority rule, which we saw last time, but democracy that represents all, and the new Constitution hopefully will take us 

through that. It will be presented for referendum. 

What we need to address at the moment are issues of illiteracy 

and poverty that make constituents vulnerable when they vote and 

when they are indoctrinated, when they are manipulated either financially or in terms of ideology, and of course religion becomes 

part of that. What we also need is foreign investment to bring people to actually be able to have a livelihood and support their families. 

I have seen a lot of stick and far too little carrot when speaking 

about Egypt in that we are very clear on pointing out shortcomings, but this is a process that countries that have embraced 

democracy for centuries are still going through, and so there are 

steps forward. I have respectfully heard terminology of a military 

32

government, and the word ‘‘coup,’’ whereas this is perceived to be 

a civilian government; the word coup. We have also looked at the 

happenings of not only January 25, 2011, as well as June of this 

year, as an outcry of the Egyptian people, Christian/Muslim, secular/religious, man/woman, young/old, everyone in the streets. 

And so we are hopeful for a new Egypt as long as there is a pragmatic and proactive, intentional move toward equality. Cases like 

the Hegazy situation, where we are told there is freedom of religion, yet people cannot really freely choose their religion. 

We have a vested interest in Egypt moving ahead. We have a 

vested interest in Egypt for all Egyptians. We don’t just speak as 

Christians because that, as I said, would be un-Christian, but we 

speak as Egyptians who want a successful a nation as it has been 

for millennia. I would, even as a Christian clergyman, love to stop 

speaking about Christians and Muslims and start speaking about 

the spirit that we had on January 25, 2011, where there were 

Egyptian flags flying in Tahrir Square calling for a new Egypt. Unfortunately, those intentions and that dynamism were not capitalized on sufficiently. There were personal agendas brought in, and 

there was manipulation of that good spirit that then led us down 

a very, very dangerous path. 

Egypt has a second chance now, and that chance needs to be 

taken. If we see the same activities of the last Presidency follow 

again, I don’t know if we will have a third chance. We speak as 

Christians with hope. We have faced persecution far greater than 

this. We are still there as the biggest Christian denomination in 

the Middle East, and as the last actual bastion of Christian presence in the Middle East. But above all we stand as Christians for 

human rights for all and for equality, both of right, but also of accountability before a law that respects every person and brings the 

best out of every person for a nation that embraces every person. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Your Grace, Bishop Angaelos, thank you so much for 

your testimony and for your leadership. 

[The prepared statement of Bishop Angaelos follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Mr. Tadros. 

STATEMENT OF MR. SAMUEL TADROS, RESEARCH FELLOW, 

CENTER FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM, HUDSON INSTITUTE 

Mr. TADROS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and honorable members, 

for holding this hearing and inviting me to speak today. 

For the past 3 years Egypt has witnessed tremendous political 

change that has resulted in four different regimes ruling the country. Unfortunately, under those four regimes no improvement has 

taken place on the question of human rights. In fact, there has 

been a significant deterioration in human rights abuses in the 

country, especially or significantly regarding Coptic Christians, 

which will be the focus of my talk today. 

On the 28th of November, just a couple of days ago, two attacks 

occurred in two separate villages in the governate of Menya. In the 

first attack, a mob gathered after a rumor of a sexual relationship 

between a Christian man and a Muslim woman, which resulted in 

the burning of a couple of Christians’ homes, a couple of people 

being shot, and ransacking and looting of Christian businesses and 

houses. In the second village, the rumor was not of a sexual relationship, but the apparent crime was a Christian attempting to 

build on a piece of land that he owns that is viewed as part of the 

Muslim section of that village. As a result, again, we saw this attack, horrific attacks, pogrom-like attacks, where the mob moves 

from house to house searching for the people to kill and attack. 

In both cases we have seen a complete absence of the Egyptian 

police from taking any action to stop those attacks from occurring, 

nor is there any punishment for those that are responsible for 

them. We have seen again this habit of reconciliation sessions 

whereby the victims and those attacking them are put together in 

a room supposedly to solve their differences outside of the rule of 

law. 

Under the Mubarak regime, Christians in Egypt suffered from 

both official discrimination in terms of exclusion from the public 

sphere, from government positions, and the police absence to protect them, as well as violent attacks by Islamist groups, especially 

in the insurgency, Islamist insurgency in the south of the country 

during the 1990s. However, in the last years of Mubarak’s rule we 

have seen the increasing participation of ordinary citizens in those 

attacks, mob-like attacks again, that go completely unpunished and 

unprevented. 

After the revolution, those that had hoped that the situation 

would improve were shocked by the fact that things deteriorated. 

We have seen a reinforcement of previous patterns of discrimination as well as an emergence of new patterns, especially when we 

talk about the new phenomena of the blasphemy laws that were 

mentioned in earlier testimony, as well as the practice of forced 

evacuations where the entire Christian population of a village 

would be forced to leave as punishment for any affront that a member of the community is viewed as having done. 

Under the Morsi government, while the Muslim Brotherhood 

paid lip service to protecting Christians and to inclusion of everyone in the new Egypt, we have seen a Constitution that completely 

excluded Christians from the process of writing it, a Constitution 

40

that enshrined grave limitations on religious freedom, threats to 

religious freedom, as well as sectarian rhetoric done by officials in 

the government, specifically advisers to Mr. Morsi, and the Muslim 

Brotherhood, the ruling party, in their official Web sites against 

Christians, Christians being blamed for all problems of the country, 

from train accidents to the continuous deterioration in the security 

situation. 

As a result, we have seen an encouragement, this culture of impunity becoming the culture of encouragement to attacks on Christians, leading up to this massive attack on the Coptic Cathedral, 

unprecedented in Egypt’s history. After Mr. Morsi’s forceful removal by the military from power, the Coptic Pope was singled out 

as the one responsible for the coup. The coup in Egypt is described 

by the Muslim Brotherhood as the Christian coup, the Christians 

are the ones behind it, the Christians are the ones that are being 

presented as leading to it. As a result, we have seen increased incitement against Christians, again by Muslim Brotherhood Web 

sites, official Web pages, and in the Muslim Brotherhood demonstrations that have specifically targeted churches in their attacks, leading up to the massive attack of Christians on the 14th 

of August, which is the largest attack happening against churches 

in Egypt since the 13th or 14th century. 

The new regime’s attempt to give the Egyptian police a complete 

free reign in controlling the Islamist violence, in dealing with the 

Islamist question, has meant that the Egyptian police has returned 

to its practices and ability to deal with the Christian portfolio as 

they like, meaning a return to practices under President Mubarak. 

I wish to sum up by giving a couple of very clear points about 

what the situation is as we attempt to deal with it. Who is attacking the Christians? Unfortunately, it is ordinary people. It is no 

longer just Islamist organized groups that are attacking Christians, 

but it is now possible, it is now very likely that ordinary citizens 

are participating in those pogroms. 

Why are they attacking the Christians? The reasons vary. Sometimes it is the sexual rumor of a relationship between a man and 

a woman, sometimes it is the rumor that the Christians are attempting to build a church, sometimes it is an affront, insult perceived by a Christian member to Islam, sometimes it is just a land 

dispute. But whatever the reason, we get the situation of the mob 

gathering, attacking the Christians, going home to home, looting, 

burning, searching for people to kill. Now, with a deteriorating security situation, there is an increased resortation to or availability 

of guns leading to higher deaths in those situations. 

The government action, there has been no prevention attempt of 

stopping those attacks. Once the troops arrive, when they arrive 

late, there are inadequate troops to deal with the situation. They 

lack any established security protocol to deal with such pogroms or 

such attacks. They resort to random arrests of both Christians and 

Muslims, whereby they attempt to pressure both communities into 

those reconciliation sessions and attempt to remove the immediate 

trigger by, for example, stopping the Christians from building the 

church or removing the family that is viewed as insulting Islam 

from the village. 

41

The National Government has no political will at all to address 

the root causes of this violence in Egypt or to deal with the larger 

question. As an example to cite, on the 4th and 5th of July, 2013, 

a mob gathered in the village of Nagaa Hassan, Luxor, to start this 

attack on Christians. They went from house to house searching for 

the Christians, finally found them hidden in one house. They attempted to attack; the police arrived. The police, instead of saving 

those Christians from death, then negotiated with the mob and 

reached an agreement whereby the women and children would be 

saved and the men would be left to die. The women begged the police officers, they fell on the police officer’s legs, begging him to 

save their husbands. He said no, he had given his word to the mob. 

As the police was leaving the room, the men were butchered. Four 

men were killed in that house that day. 

When asked by Human Rights Watch later on, the head of the 

Egyptian security in the governate of Luxor, Major Khalid Hassan, 

replied as to what had happened that he saw nothing wrong with 

the police performance. According to him, and this is a direct quote: 

‘‘There was no reason for the police to take any special measures, 

it’s not [the police’s] job to stop killings; we just investigate afterward.’’

I would be happy to discuss what can be done about it in the 

question-and-answer session. Thank you very much. 

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Tadros, thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Tadros follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Mr. Abou-Sabe. 

STATEMENT OF MORAD ABOU-SABE, PH.D., PROFESSOR EMERITUS, RUTGERS UNIVERSITY (FORMER PRESIDENT OF MISR 

UNIVERSITY FOR SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY) 

Mr. ABOU-SABE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the 

opportunity to participate in this hearing, and I really appreciate 

getting that opportunity here. 

My emphasis in my statement is really not so much about Christians and the human rights abuses of Christians, because I believe 

that the Morsi government had actually abused the rights, the 

human rights of all Egyptians, and that is really I think something 

that should really be pointed out. So my focus is really more coming into U.S.-Egyptian relationships and, you know, the basis for 

which many of these things have happened. 

So I would say that the events of June 30, 2013, in Egypt, which 

resulted in the ouster of former Egyptian President Mohamed 

Morsi, were in response to the massive and unprecedented protests 

by the Egyptian people. Morsi’s overthrow was supported by and 

facilitated by the Egyptian military. Since Morsi’s ouster, the U.S.-

Egyptian relations have gone through abrupt changes that threaten and continue to threaten the special relationship between the 

two countries. 

Now, just for a short historical perspective on how we got this 

special relationship, one can only begin by crediting the late Egyptian President Anwar Sadat for the start of this relationship. When 

Sadat took his unimaginable and bold steps in the 1970s, which 

were essentially ending the Egyptian-Soviet relationship and expelling the Russian advisers on July 18, 1972, and then making his 

historic trip to Israel on November 20, 1977, no one understood at 

the time what he was doing or where he was heading. Sadat ended 

Egypt’s relationship with the Soviets at the time that he was preparing for the 1973 war with Israel. However, Sadat knew and was 

convinced that the Arab-Israeli conflict could only be resolved by 

the United States and that all that matters to the U.S. in the region were Israel and the flow of Middle East oil. 

Taking these bold steps, Sadat put Egypt in a most precarious 

position that resulted in his own assassination by the Muslim 

Brotherhood and the isolation of Egypt for many years afterwards 

from the rest of the Arab world. Since then, and especially after the 

signing of the Camp David Accord and a peace treaty with Israel, 

the U.S.-Egyptian relations, however, have been at their most cordial levels. This cordial relationship, as it may now have become 

clear, was particularly for keeping the Egyptian-Israeli treaty safe. 

It did not matter what the Mubarak 30-year dictatorship had done 

to Egypt or the Egyptian people as long as the peace treaty was 

safe. 

Now, with the January 25th revolution in Egypt, the U.S. administration aligned itself with the Muslim Brotherhood as the most 

organized group among all the political parties and political organizations in Egypt. The Muslim Brotherhood were deemed to have 

the highest likelihood to step in the governance of Egypt. This new 

relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood, especially after Morsi’s 

election to the Presidency, was further strengthened when Morsi 

48

was able to secure a cease-fire between Hamas and Israel on November 22, 2012. 

It can be assumed that in this close relationship the U.S. administration saw the possible venues for the resolution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, while the Muslim Brotherhood saw the possibility of moving forward with their renaissance project with the 

help of the United States. This view is supported by, for example, 

one, the unusual close relationship between the American Ambassador in Cairo and the Muslim Brotherhood organization outside of 

President Morsi himself, a matter that caused resentment among 

many Egyptians and political party leaders. 

It was most evident when the U.S. Ambassador took upon herself 

to meet with the Muslim Brotherhood officials who had no official 

status in the Egyptian Government. It further confirmed that 

Morsi was, in fact, a figurehead and that decisions came from the 

MB leadership office at Al-Mokattam district in Cairo. In the 

meantime, the Muslim Brotherhood and President Morsi were 

working on establishing legal rights for the Palestinians in northern Sinai to buy land and settle in the northern Sinai as a prelude 

to Hamas expansion into the Sinai. 

One of the vehicles for achieving that was to grant Egyptian citizenship to as many as 50,000 Palestinians in one stroke. Former 

President Morsi was able to do so by changing the Egyptian law 

that defined Egyptian citizenship, which applied only to all persons 

born in Egypt to Egyptian fathers. Morsi and the MB simply 

changed the law to allow all those born to Egyptian mothers to become Egyptian citizens, opening the door for thousands and thousands of Palestinians whose mothers were of Egyptian nationality. 

Simply it is not. Now the Egyptian Government is trying to review 

these newly acquired citizenships. 

Egypt, to Morsi, and the Muslim Brotherhood did not matter. 

There was no understanding of Egyptian sovereignty or defined 

borders. It was just land that they could deal and hand over to 

anybody they wanted. 

Now, the impact of the immediate position taken by the United 

States Government in response to Morsi’s ouster was to call it a 

military coup, and Congresswoman Frankel just continued to repeat that now. And based on that, the administration initiated the 

process of suspending U.S. military aid to Egypt. Such a response 

by the administration represented a clear departure from the U.S. 

longstanding position in support of Egypt. 

It also showed another side to the administration’s foreign policy 

toward Egypt. It showed the newly developed alliance between the 

U.S. and Muslim Brotherhood organization and the Morsi government, as I pointed out above. Such unlikely relationship was a 

great surprise and disappointment to all Egyptians who did not understand why the U.S. would partner with an Islamic group that 

has historically been implicated in the types of violence that are 

characteristic of al-Qaeda and its affiliates. 

On the ground, the U.S. administration condemned the military 

overthrow of Morsi and cautioned the Egyptian Government 

against the use of force in dealing with the peaceful protesters. Little did Washington know that the Muslim Brotherhood protests 

and sit-ins were actually militarized, not peaceful. There was no 

49

holdback by the Muslim Brotherhood leadership from issuing their 

numerous public threats from their own staged platforms and on 

live television of the dire results if any attempts were made to evict 

them. 

These were the peaceful protesters who were constantly reported 

by the New York Times and other U.S. reporters in Egypt. You 

could only see the contradiction between what the U.S. media reported and what every Egyptian, including myself watching from 

here, was viewing directly and live on Egyptian satellite television 

while listening to the MB’s threats. There was no hesitation on the 

part of the Muslim Brotherhood protest leadership to admit their 

role in the terrorism against Egyptian military and security that 

was taking place in the Sinai, as they continued to make pronouncements: If the Egyptian Government yields to our demands, 

all violence in Sinai would immediately stop. These were the peaceful protesters the administration was supporting and the U.S. 

media was reporting. 

There was also a human cost to the U.S. support of the MBs. 

Namely, it cost hundreds of Egyptian lives that were lost from both 

protesters, as well as the security forces, during the forcible eviction of the sit-ins. These lives could have been saved if the Muslim 

Brotherhood did not count on the U.S. support and would have at 

least allowed the 8-week mediation efforts by the international 

community to succeed. To this day, the MBs believe that they were 

the aggrieved rather than the aggressor and the cause of the violence that they perpetrated. They have continued to hold violent 

protests, block roads, and instigate the Egyptian people irrespective of their unrealistic expectation of Morsi’s return to office. 

In the meantime, former President Morsi was held in custody for 

several months before he was charged in court on the 4th of November and was subsequently remanded to prison awaiting trial, 

you know, slated for January 2014. Among the alleged charges 

against Morsi are incitement to murder and, more importantly, the 

charge of espionage, having colluded with international organizations against the interests and security of Egypt. There is currently 

a gag order on discussions of these particular cases. 

The conflicting signals by the administration with statements 

from the State Department holding on to the U.S.-Egyptian relations while at the same time other U.S. officials continued to call 

the ouster a military coup played a major part in the resistance of 

the MBs to any kind of mediation and resolution. Significant 

among those were the statements by Senator John McCain and 

Lindsey Graham, who visited Egypt in July and met with Morsi. 

After their meeting they came out and in a press conference once 

again called the ouster a military coup. In fact, Senator John 

McCain in his comments predicted a civil war in Egypt as a result. 

Luckily, this prediction has not happened, at least until now. 

These reactions and contradicting statements by U.S. officials 

simply confirmed the ambivalence of the U.S. foreign policy toward 

Egypt. Not only that, but it also implied that the U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East has changed and that a new agenda may 

be under development as we speak. 

The same ambivalence was demonstrated by the same U.S. administration after the January 25th revolution in Egypt which reVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:04 Jun 25, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00055 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131210\86002 SHIRL
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sulted in the resignation of the U.S. longstanding ally Mubarak. 

The unyielding question remains, why was a relationship with the 

Muslim Brotherhood and what was the purpose of aligning ourselves with a terrorist organization with a long-documented history 

that backs it up? What was our ulterior motive behind this relationship that we would undertake at the expense of an ally and a 

regional power like Egypt? 

On June 26, 2013, before Morsi’s ouster, a report signed by some 

20 human rights organizations was published by the Cairo Institute of Human Rights Studies assessing the 1-year rule under 

Morsi. The report was entitled ‘‘One Year Into Mohamed Morsi’s 

Term, Manifold Abuses and the Systematic Undermining of the 

Rule of Law.’’ In this report the many facets of human rights 

abuses were reported undertaken by the Morsi government in that. 

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Abou-Sabe, unfortunately we are going to have 

to leave the room at 11 o’clock because there is going to be a sweep 

of the room because Senator Kerry will be coming in shortly thereafter. 

Mr. ABOU-SABE. Okay. 

Mr. SMITH. If you could just sum up, and then Mr. Stahnke, and 

then we will go to some very quick questions. 

Mr. ABOU-SABE. Yes, sir. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, sir. 

Mr. ABOU-SABE. I will sum up essentially in just a couple of 

words. As Egyptian-Americans, we therefore call upon the President and the Congress to carefully examine our role in fostering 

peace and stability in Egypt. It is imperative upon us to take the 

lead in establishing a close relationship with the Government and 

the peoples of Egypt. We need to be mindful of the facts behind the 

events before jumping to conclusions and taking other drastic 

measures as those that have been taken. We also call upon the 

U.S. media to bring the truth behind the violence that is perpetrated by the terrorists and so forth. 

Thank you very much. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Abou-Sabe. Thank you very much for 

your testimony. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Abou-Sabe follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Mr. Stahnke. 

STATEMENT OF MR. TAD STAHNKE, DIRECTOR OF POLICY 

AND PROGRAMS, HUMAN RIGHTS FIRST 

Mr. STAHNKE. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman, Madam Chairwoman. Thank you for convening this hearing, for your leadership 

on human rights in Congress. Members of the subcommittees, 

thank you as well. We look forward to working with both subcommittees to try to advance human rights protections in an increasingly volatile Egypt. 

The rapidly deteriorating situation of Egypt’s Coptic Christian 

minority is an alarming symptom of an unresolved and worsening 

political crisis. If left to fester, this crisis could further destabilize 

Egypt and the region, as well as hold back the possibility of economic and political reform and the protection of human rights, and 

be profoundly harmful to the interests of the United States and our 

allies. 

As you have heard, there has been an unprecedented escalation 

in attacks against Coptic Christians since August 14th, when the 

military violently dispersed those protesting President Morsi’s ouster. Discrimination against members of religious minorities, incidents of sectarian violence that go largely unpunished, anti-Christian incitement, and anti-Semitism have, unfortunately, long been 

a feature of Egyptian life. But the political polarization of the past 

few months has taken violence against Christians to unprecedented 

levels. Many have been killed, well over 100 churches, homes, and 

other properties have been attacked. Perpetrators have not been 

brought to justice. In addition, members of other religious minorities have been attacked and continue to be persecuted, including 

Baha’is, Shitte, and Sufi Muslims. 

It is the great misfortune of the Christian Coptic community that 

they are pawns in a highly destructive zero-sum political game between the Muslim Brotherhood and the military-backed national 

security state. The Morsi government bears considerable blame for 

fueling a climate of anti-Christian intolerance when its rhetoric became increasingly paranoid and Christians were among the forces 

said to be conspiring against it. And following Morsi’s overthrow 

his supporters, openly blamed the Copts for it, claiming that Christian hostility to Islam and the idea of a Muslim Egypt led them to 

conspire with the military and hostile foreign powers like Israel 

and the United States. This demonization of Christians has made 

the community more vulnerable to the violence that has followed. 

At the same time, the military-backed government seems more 

interested in pointing to anti-Christian violence as evidence of 

Muslim Brotherhood extremism than in taking effective measures 

to protect Christians from attack. This posture of pointing to the 

violent excesses of Islamic extremists as an excuse to resist their 

own reforms is a familiar throwback to the days of Mubarak. 

Egyptian authorities under the SCAF, under Morsi, and under 

the current government have failed to protect the Coptic community and to hold accountable those who incite and commit sectarian 

violence. The current government needs to do so. It should also remove longstanding restrictions on religious freedom, such as abusive blasphemy laws and the decrees banning Baha’is and JehoVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:04 Jun 25, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00061 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131210\86002 SHIRL
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vah’s Witnesses. It should enact a nondiscriminatory law for the 

construction and repair of places of worship. 

But these recommendations alone, we fear, are inadequate as a 

response to the crisis now confronting Egypt’s Coptic community 

and, by extension, all Egyptians. The current government and the 

security apparatus are largely made up of the same people who 

have held power in Egypt for decades. They are unlikely to change 

their ingrained habits on sectarian issues and may even see some 

advantage in assaults against Christians continuing, because it 

supports their narrative. Thus, there needs to be progress toward 

a political solution in Egypt, one that includes movement toward 

political reconciliation as a first step. 

Teconciliation is a challenge, as the current government has engaged in a brutal and wide crackdown against the Muslim Brotherhood and its supporters and has also repressed non-Islamist critics 

and repressed fundamental freedom to speech and assembly. We 

detail the deterioration of the human rights situation throughout 

the transition period, and especially since Morsi’s overthrow, in our 

written statement. Government force is implicated in the mass 

killings of hundreds of protesters since August 14th, the wholesale 

roundup of Muslim Brotherhood political leaders and sweeping 

charges of involvement in violence or terrorism, intensifying restrictions on the media and harassment of government critics, the 

increased use of military trials against civilians, and incommunicado detention leading to torture. 

This is all familiar. The state security apparatus is back, promoting a climate of fear under the rubric of a war on terrorism. 

And to make matters worse, all this is taking place against the 

backdrop of a breakdown in the rule of law and the deterioration 

of state institutions which began under the SCAF and continued 

under Morsi. 

A polarized, increasingly violent Egypt is a serious problem for 

the United States. The White House says that they are undertaking a thorough review of Egypt policy, and we welcome that. Indeed, supporting repressive governments in spite of its abuses has 

failed in the past, and a major shift in U.S. policy is needed to one 

that puts Egypt’s commitment to human rights and democratization at its core. We set out several recommendations for U.S. policy 

blueprints, published last week, but let me end by suggesting a few 

of those recommendations. 

Working with its donor partners, the United States must establish sizable sustained economic incentives for Egypt’s leaders, including IMF loans, which should be conditioned on Egypt adhering 

to human rights standards. The administration suspended some 

military aid following the coup, and they are right to set human 

rights conditions on full resumption of aid to Egypt. If it wishes to 

benefit from a close cooperative relationship with the United 

States, the Egyptian military must use its power to move Egypt 

back onto a path of peaceful, inclusive, civilian-led governance, and 

this necessarily entails some form of reconciliation. 

Some supporters of President Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood 

should be let back into the political process. Credible Islamist leaders need to condemn violence against religious minorities, and 

there is a reduced incentive to do so when thousands are in jail, 

57

frozen out of the political process, and indiscriminately labeled as 

extremists and terrorists. We shouldn’t ask Egyptians to accommodate Islamists who espouse violence or hatred, but leaving the 

large part of the Egyptian electorate that wishes to support an 

Islamist political party in elections, leaving them disenfranchised is 

not a recipe for stability. The United States should publicly promote reconciliation and continue to try to initiate a process to advance it. 

And finally, the State Department and USAID should increase 

their efforts, bilaterally and/or multilaterally, to fund independent 

civil society organizations with the capacity to monitor government 

institutions and expose official wrongdoing, as well as promote religious pluralism and intolerance. There are many influential voices 

in Egypt who are suspicious of the U.S. Government’s commitment 

to democracy. The Embassy in Cairo needs to continue to show 

that, in Washington they need to continue to show it, Congress continues to need to speak out about it, and the U.S. should be working with other like-minded governments to bring about a successful 

political reform in Egypt. Thank you very much. 

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Stahnke, thank you so very much for your testimony. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Stahnke follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Again, we are going to have to leave the room shortly 

because of the security sweep in anticipation of Secretary Kerry’s 

trip, so what I thought, all of us on the panel will go through a 

few questions, and if you could take notes, we will do it all at once, 

and then you answer those questions as you see fit. 

Bishop Angaelos, if I could just say, you mentioned the kidnapping of Coptic Christian girls, which is an issue that I chaired 

three hearings on, and Congressman, the chairman, Ileana RosLehtinen, was there at each of those hearings. We did not get good 

answers back from the administration. As a matter of fact, they 

failed to raise those issues in any substantive way. Could you 

speak to that very briefly? And there are many other issues I 

would like to ask you, but time does not permit it. 

Dr. Abou-Sabe, you mentioned the close relationship with the 

Muslim Brotherhood. Who advised the administration, if you know, 

to do that? I remember when you briefed me in my office several 

months ago, you went to great historical lengths to tell me and my 

staff what the true underpinnings of that organization are and the 

hostility that they bear to so many, including other Muslims. If you 

could speak to that. 

If I could, you mentioned, Mr. Stahnke, about the suspicious nature of many toward the U.S. Government. It didn’t help that when 

the President spoke at the United Nations he talked about our core 

interest including Camp David Accords and counterterrorism and 

no mention, as far as I could tell, whatsoever of human rights. So 

if you could speak to that as well. 

And, finally, the forced reconciliation issue that, Mr. Tadros, you 

spoke to, it seems to me that law enforcement should be all about 

enforcing the law. Somebody commits a murder, a rape, burns 

down somebody’s house, you arrest, you prosecute, and then you 

jail based on the evidence. You don’t force a Coptic Christian or the 

victim into a ‘‘reconciliation.’’ If you could elaborate on that. 

Mr. Connolly. 

Mr. CONNOLLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I want to thank 

our panel for their testimony. Many of these issues are 

heartwrenching issues. And as my friend Ileana Ros-Lehtinen 

knows, I was a Senate staff member for 10 years, and every time 

President Mubarak appeared before our committee—I worked for 

Claiborne Pell at the time—we forcefully tried to make the case on 

behalf of minorities, especially Coptic Christians in Egypt, and the 

house arrest of Pope Shenouda and other issues. It is a little bit 

troubling that those same issues haven’t changed. In fact, maybe 

have gotten worse. 

I will say, however, human rights are human rights, whether you 

are a Copt or a Muslim. The fact of the matter is hundreds, if not 

more, of Egyptians have been slaughtered on the streets of urban 

Egypt since the military coup. I had a constituent come to see me 

last week. He had to pick up his brother. He is an American citizen, he had to pick up his brother back in Cairo. He was shot in 

the head, one bullet. He went to visit the morgue. There were dozens of bodies from protests, street protests. Shot in the head. And 

interestingly the death certificate said died of natural causes. And 

it is an elaborate process to get the police to redo the death certificate if you want the body. And if you are a Muslim that is a big 

71

deal. If you are a Christian, too, but there are time limits. Very 

elaborate process to go to the police and get them to admit this was 

homicide, not a natural cause. The trauma is extensive. 

And I say that both Muslims and Copts and others in Egypt are 

suffering today. And I would hope, Bishop Angaelos, that in the 

Christian view you and I share it encompasses the violation of the 

human rights of Muslims as well as Copts, because in your safety 

is also theirs and in theirs is also yours. And I wonder if you might 

comment a little bit about that from your perspective. 

And, Mr. Stahnke, I thank you so much for acknowledging those 

points, because I think as we move forward in the United States 

we have got to deal with the political reality of how do you put together a coalition that can work moving forward, that encompasses 

all of the points of view of Egypt. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SMITH. Madam Chair. 

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Two questions, one on the draft Constitution and the second on 

the NGOs. As we know, Morsi rammed through a Constitution that 

severely restricted all rights, women’s rights, religious rights, ethnic rights. And although the referendum passed, it only had a 33-

percent voter turnout. Now we have got this draft Constitution. In 

theory it recognizes the rights of Jews, Christians, and Muslims, 

but leaves other religious minorities, such as the Baha’i community, unprotected. What can we do to ensure that the new Constitution would not restrict the fundamental rights of any Egyptian and 

that real progress is made, not just in theory but in practice? 

And on the NGO convictions, they still have not been overturned. 

The draft NGO law that is proposed will have many of these NGOs 

still fearful if they continue operating in Egypt. What can we in the 

U.S. do to ensure that the Egyptians have what they need to build 

the capacity, foundation for a strong democracy? What do you think 

that the future of the NGOs will be? Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SMITH. Ms. Frankel. 

Ms. FRANKEL. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

First, I just want to say that, for me, I say freedom of religion 

is like the H2O of human rights. What water is to the body, for 

many people freedom of religion is the water for their soul. So I 

want to emphasize that. And so when I was in Egypt, I think I 

mentioned that we met with Coptic Pope Tawadros II. He shared 

stories with us of the burning of the churches and the oppression, 

showed us photos, and so forth. 

My first question is, do you believe that this concept of freedom 

of religion is recognized universally in Egypt? Is it something that 

most Egyptians even know or feel? 

And then the other issue I would like you to comment on, and 

I think it was raised by Mr. Rohrabacher, I think he was getting 

there, which is, you know, there is a concept called ‘‘first, do no 

harm.’’ And so my second question would be really is, what about 

Israel, the stability of the Middle East? There has been some suggestions of us perhaps withdrawing support or having certain conditions for support of the military. I would like you to comment on 

that. 

Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

72

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Weber. 

Mr. WEBER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. If I could get these questions answered, to my staff, I guess. They are not going to comment 

later. Is that right, Mr. Chairman? We are out of time? Oh, they 

are going to comment, okay. 

For each of you, what do you view as the greatest hope of the 

Jews, the Christians, and the Muslims? What is their greatest 

hope? And how do we reconcile those differences? And that is pretty simple, isn’t it? And I yield back. 

Mr. SMITH. Chairman Rohrabacher. 

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Thank you very much. 

Here we are stuck with trying to figure out whether we are going 

to use our heads or whether we are going to use our hearts, and 

whether there is a contradiction in America’s soul about these very 

questions that we are talking about today. We must obviously be 

committed to our ideals, and yet we must also understand if we do 

not have a commitment to a practical policy we could end up bringing the world and bringing ourselves to the opposite of where our 

ideals would have us go. 

So I would suggest that finally where does this all land us for 

this hearing? And that is, and I would just like to state and get 

your opinion on it, denying spare parts to the Egyptian Army at 

this moment would not lead to a better world and to a better situation in Egypt, and that is my analysis of it. What is your response 

to that? 

Mr. SMITH. And Mr. Meadows. 

Mr. MEADOWS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I will just ask each of you to submit for the record, if you would, 

where the Egyptian people view five inconsistencies in U.S. foreign 

policy. Inconsistencies. And so where do the Egyptian people see 

where we are saying one thing and doing another? If you could do 

that. 

And I yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SMITH. Your Grace, if you could begin, and each of our distinguished witnesses. 

Bishop ANGAELOS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. On the view of the 

kidnapping of those, of course, as has been mentioned numerous 

times, there is an inequality before the law, and so the way that 

the matters are investigated sometimes depends on who is on the 

receiving end of the alleged criminal action. And so I think what 

we have seen is in times there have been forced conversions. There 

have been forced kidnappings. At those times, security forces have 

been reluctant to investigate. Even if the outcome of the investigation is that it was an intentional action, or it was a personal choice, 

the investigation needs to be transparent, needs to be honest, and 

we haven’t seen those. What we have seen is where calls have been 

made in particular cases that have been proven to be forced. They 

have been set aside because they have been designed not to cause 

offense to particularly majority Muslim areas where that could 

cause trouble for the security forces. 

So there are, just as in the case where people were attacked in 

their homes and this deal was struck, sometimes similar things are 

done to ensure that there is some sort of equilibrium kept at the 

expense of the Christian community there, of course. 

73

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Tadros. 

Mr. TADROS. A couple of on the general questions. I think there 

are definitely huge abuses of human rights in Egypt, not only to 

Christians, as the honorable Member pointed out, the massacre of 

Muslim Brotherhood supporters was probably the largest such 

massacre in Egyptian history, and it is an extremely polarizing 

event. I know it is easy to talk of the Egyptian people, but there 

are divisions within those people. The Muslim Brotherhood continues to have supporters. Exact figures are hard to tell, of course, 

because we didn’t have an election. Street demonstrations are hard 

to count and hard to determine who has more supporters on the 

street, so there is a continuous polarization today in Egypt, and 

there is no plan on how to solve that situation. 

Egypt is not transitioning to democracy. There is an attempt to 

rebuild authoritarian regime with some changes as to different 

shaping just from what was under Mubarak, but there is no attempt to create a serious democracy in Egypt at all. People have 

a lot of anger—both sides in Egypt have a lot of anger toward the 

United States, and part of it is simply conspiracy theorizing and 

active propaganda by the various groups, whether it is the Muslim 

Brotherhood or the Egyptian military to paint the United States as 

an enemy and to use that as an attempt to shore support for the 

various sides. 

Specifically, to the rule of law, I think there has been a lot of 

focus on general words. We need to have a general situation where 

people in Egypt are all treated equally. These are all nice words, 

but the important things, the specifics that can deal with that situation, I would like to suggest a few. 

First, identification. It doesn’t take a genius to identify what are 

the most vulnerable villages in Egypt that are likely to witness attacks. Experts on the situation of Christians in Egypt could have 

told you before the 14th of August that the governorate of Menya 

was likely to have the most attacks. So, a process needs to be there 

where the 100 most vulnerable villages can be identified. The 

Egyptian Government should be urged to do that. The U.S. might 

be able to help, giving resources to help that process to happen;, 

it is important to prevent those attacks from happening at the first 

place. 

Secondly, the Egyptian police needs to have a security protocol 

to deal with mob violence. Again, if this situation has been repeating itself one time after the other, there needs to be a clear security 

protocol on how to deal with those specific incidents. 

Thirdly, a crisis office in the Egyptian Presidency that has actual 

power to deal specifically with that issue so that it is not an issue 

left to each local governor or local police station to deal with, but 

there is a headquarters that deals with it. 

Fourthly, a rapid response unit whereby once the situation is created in one of those villages, and that office immediately sends a 

rapid response unit to deal with that situation in the village. 

Fifth, the reform of the legal system in terms of having actual 

punishment, giving up on those reconciliation sessions, punishing 

those people that attack the Christians. 

Lastly, a localized reward and punishment system. Again, if the 

governorate of Menya witnesses the most attacks on Christians 

74

and the local authorities there are not willing to protect the religious minorities or the worst violators of human rights, then probably the governorate of Menya should not be receiving U.S. funding 

through USAID. Perhaps the governorate of Sohad, which has a 

better performance on those issues would get more USAID funding 

of that regard, so localizing both punishment and rewards for the 

governorate in an attempt to enforce the local governors and the 

local authorities to deal with those specific issues. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you. Thank you. Dr. Abou-Sabe. 

Mr. ABOU-SABE. Thank you. The first question—I thank you, Mr. 

Chairman. Your first question is about what was behind this, and 

I don’t really have any particular evidence, but what the news 

media in Egypt have reported on throughout early this year, essentially that there may have been some sort of an agreement of sorts 

for, more or less, annexing a portion of the northern Sinai with 

Gaza for the benefit of the solution of the Palestinian-Israeli problem, and in essence, that that portion of the Sinai was going to be 

used to allow additional Palestinians, to come in, and that really 

was—so the Muslim Brotherhood was essentially the entity that 

came in the right time that would allow that to happen because of 

its close relationship with Hamas and all that, and the idea was 

essentially to establish an arc of ‘‘moderate Islamic states,’’ essentially, you know, between Egypt, Gaza, and Turkey, and obviously 

that all was really very, very incorrect and bad. 

In terms of the U.S. foreign policy, the question, the question 

that was asked about U.S. foreign policy, I think it is important 

that—there is a whole feeling in Egypt among the people that, you 

know, people are like, you know, conspiracies, in essence, that 

there is a fear that the U.S. may be, as well as other countries, 

may be embarking on a redefining of the Middle East, and I think 

Secretary Condoleezza Rice had publicly stated in many situations 

that we are redrawing, we are going to create some chaos and some 

havoc and there will be some instability, and out of this instability 

we might end up with some democracy and maybe with the democracy that we get, then we need to really redraw the map of the 

Middle East in the way that we can actually have an impact on the 

outcome itself. 

So, I mean, it is a very long story, but the suspicion is there. And 

I am not in agreement to people that say that the aid is an essential part for Egypt. I think it is not. It is really the relationship and 

the support for the development of the country, allowing the country to utilize its resources, allowing it to use its human resources 

is very, very important in Egypt. 

And the last point that I will say essentially, religious freedom, 

the question I was asked about religious freedom. Islam came to 

Egypt 1,400 years ago, and until the Muslim Brothers came into 

the picture last 11⁄2 years or 2 years, everybody in Egypt had the 

full opportunity to practice his religion, whatever it was. I grew up 

in Egypt, and when I was in the grade school and high school, most 

of my friends were Christians, and actually I had a Jewish friend 

as well, Eliahu Cohen, and never had any difference. My name is 

Morad, which is not an Islamic name. 

I was many, many times confused that I was also a Copt, so it 

was not an issue until the Muslim Brothers came in, and that is 

75

why it is important to really recognize that. Freedom of religion in 

Egypt is there always, has always been there. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you. Mr. Stahnke. 

Mr. STAHNKE. Thank you. Well, Mr. Chairman, I think it was 

unfortunate that the President did not mention human rights in 

his U.N. speech. That was a missed opportunity to be clear about 

what the United States stands for, and this administration and 

previous ones have shown an ambivalent relationship to promoting 

human rights and democracy in Egypt and in the region, and we 

are hoping that the policy review that the administration says that 

it is undertaking will make it clear and actually reorder U.S. priorities to focus more clearly on democratic and human rights developments. 

Now, the President’s comments do, I think, get a little bit to 

what the question Mr. Rohrabacher had about in terms of our head 

and our hearts. But in my view, there is a difference between spare 

parts and aid for the Egyptians to conduct counterterrorism and 

border security and even some of the specific things that Mr. 

Tadros mentioned about protecting civilians. 

The difference between that and sort of prestige weapons systems, some sort of false sense of balance of military power, I think 

that the US aid relationship can be looked at and reformed and reordered to bring about a mix of carrots and sticks, conditions, but 

also the promise for significant economic development. I think the 

Bishop mentioned that, you know, that the country is in dire need 

of economic development, and you know, the Saudis can give cash, 

but the West can bring about investments. Stability can help bring 

about tourism again in the country. This is the type of economic 

development that the country needs and that the United States 

and its Western partners and the IMF can bring about, but they 

should do it in a phased way in response to serious reforms on 

some of the human rights issues that Mr. Connolly mentioned as 

well as the religious freedom issues that we are talking about 

today. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Stahnke. 

Again, because of the sweep that is pending for Secretary Kerry’s 

testimony, the hearing is adjourned. I would ask everyone if they 

could leave the room immediately so they can come in and do the 

sweep, and I thank you so much for your tremendous insights and 

for your expert testimony. Hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 11:15 a.m., the subcommittees were adjourned.] 

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