Imam Mahdi Bray is the Director of the Muslim American Society’s Freedom Foundation, the human and civil rights project of the largest grass-roots Muslim organization in the United States. He was in Cairo this week to express solidarity with Muslim Brotherhood detainees on trial before a military court and to call for an end to the crackdown on the Egyptian opposition. Bray sat down with Daily News Egypt to talk about his trip.
Daily News Egypt: What brings you to Egypt?
We are here to express our concern about the use of military tribunals in Egypt, as in the United States. Military tribunals should be used for members of the military, not civilians.
As human rights activists and Muslims, justice and human rights are universal moral and physical demands. We are here because injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere, because justice delayed is justice denied.
We live in a global society, and there is a great deal of discourse about the global economy, and global technology, but we hardly ever hear about global justice. The issue of global justice is what brings me here.
Why does the Muslim American Society object to the use of military tribunals?
These courts lack transparency. We tried to go to act as observers at the court but we were denied entry after waiting in the sun for four hours, as were most of the defendants’ own defense lawyers. Military tribunals are not designed to seek a just result. They are designed to guarantee the result already determined by the government or to seek an unjust result.
We are particularly concerned that these detained men were released four separate times by civilian courts because there was not enough evidence to convict them, but were then brought back to stand trial before military courts. We are also concerned because some of these detainees are quite ill and two have verified heart conditions.
What can be done on an international level to address the problem of human rights abuses in Egypt?
Well certainly there are a number of international treaties that Egypt is a signatory to that bring some symbolic pressure on the government. For example, the African Commission on Human Rights, which Egypt is a party to, states that military courts must only be used for offenses committed by members of the military, and that they can not be used under any circumstances for civilians.
But as human rights activists, the greatest pressure that can be leveraged is through the international media. We need to take this case from the military court, to the court of international public opinion. If the media can bring this case before the international community, then that is one way to resolve this matter.
What kind of human rights work does MAS Freedom do?
We’ve done work abroad in Sudan and in Ethiopia, as well as in the Balkans in Slovenia and Croatia. I myself lived in Somalia for several years in the 1980s when Siad Barre was president. Later on I moved to Kenya to work with Somali refugees on the border.
Because America has such global influence we do a lot of advocacy work around America’s international relations and foreign affairs. We were really concerned with the void on human rights coming from Muslim American community. Sometimes on human rights issues there is a conspicuous silence from the Muslim American community.
Part of our mission is to give the American Muslim community a sense of urgency when it comes to human rights around the world, and to educate people about the importance of global justice. It doesn’t matter if you have a religious or a secular agenda, if you are religiously observant or only pray during Ramadan. We need justice. The only thing that Allah has forbidden is injustice.
During the week you tried to enter the military courtroom and act as an international observer to the proceedings. What happened?
The trial is happening on a military base in the desert, on the outskirts of Cairo. When I went to the trial I had an invitation from the defense lawyers. I gave the soldiers my credentials and after about four hours in the sun we were told that we couldn’t go in and that only 10 of the defense attorneys could go in. Each of the 40 defendants has their own attorney so not everyone was able to have their lawyer present. I wasn’t surprised to be barred from the court because even in my own country I probably would not be allowed to attend a military tribunal. Only some of the lawyers and a few family members were allowed in.
Outside the court you spoke with several of the detainees family members. What did you learn from them?
Talking to the families of the men on trial really made me think of the American families I talked to after the raids in Northern Virginia after Sept.11, 2001. These men were all doctors, lawyers, professional people who were really active in their communities. Here some of them were members of Parliament.
The police come to their homes in the middle of the night. Their wives are not allowed to get dressed or cover themselves at all. The police took money and jewelry and beat people up.
One woman told me that these raids are like a violation of the values she is trying to teach her children – that she is trying to raise them to be good people and not to hate anybody, but that their homes have been invaded by anger and fear and anxiety.
