In the News Quotes Archive - Page 3 of 35

Seth Binder

Wall Street Journal,

September 16, 2023

“The regime has definitely entered a renewed and heightened phase of its repression as the presidential election approaches and the economy continues to falter.”

“[The $85 million withheld in military aid to Egypt] is an important reversal from last year. . . . But if the administration withholds less than it has the last two years it would in essence be saying to al-Sisi that it believe the Egyptian government has improved its rights record, which is just not true.”

Seth Binder

Washington Post,

September 8, 2023

“The human rights crisis in Egypt is a leading driver of the country’s instability and should therefore be a U.S. national security priority.”

The Washington Post,

August 19, 2023

“Just days before the US is set to determine if Egypt has made sufficient human rights progress to warrant conditioned military aid, these releases should be seen as a fig leaf designed to detract from the vast scope of the human rights violations,” said Andrea Prasow, executive director of the Freedom Initiative, which advocates for political prisoners in the Middle East and North Africa. “It’s a relief that [Douma] will be free,” Prasow said in a statement. “But he is just one of more than 60,000 political prisoners in Egypt.”

Sheridan Cole

The Media Line,

August 8, 2023

“The speed of [Zaki’s] release shows the effectiveness of this kind of continued, targeted, coordinated pressure on the Egyptian government on human rights by partner governments and civil society organizations. . . . I think it’s an important reminder that this kind of tenacious advocacy can yield results and impact the ongoing repression in the country.”

Sheridan Cole

The Media Line,

August 8, 2023

“Patrick [Zaki]’s case is emblematic of a slew of gross rights abuses that continue to be perpetuated by the Egyptian regime on a really broad scale.”

Tess McEnery

The Hill,

June 26, 2023

“I would argue that the administration needs to be more explicit about backsliding allies, practically recommitting themselves to fundamental freedoms and the respect for human rights as the basis for an evolving global order.”

Tess McEnery

NPR,

June 23, 2023

MBS is clearly engaging in these modernization efforts in order to not look like a brutal dictator. But he’s not going to make any reforms to the structure of Saudi society or the status of the human rights of women or marginalized groups or anyone else in Saudi Arabia if it threatens his power.

Tess McEnery

Los Angeles Times,

June 13, 2023

“The administration needs to abandon its behind-closed-doors approach to addressing human rights” in Saudi Arabia, said Tess McEnery, who served on Biden’s National Security Council until last year and now heads the nongovernmental Project on Middle East Democracy. “There need to be clear public costs to [Salman’s] repression. . . . For nearly a year [since the Biden visit], we’ve seen what a policy of appeasement looks like.”

Sean Yom

Al-Monitor,

June 11, 2023

“[The Public Investment Fund’s golf strategy is about both image and economics.] It’s both diversification and soft power projection. . . . It is now a more aggressive approach to simultaneously find lucrative, high-margin returns in the intermediate run simultaneous with elevating the image of the Saudi royal family, state emblems and nation in a global era defined by multipolarity.”

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