{"id":18504,"date":"2024-07-30T18:20:28","date_gmt":"2024-07-30T16:20:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/?p=18504"},"modified":"2026-10-09T00:58:27","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T22:58:27","slug":"elmaraya","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/elmaraya\/","title":{"rendered":"Bans, Confiscations and Tax Cases… How Are the Egyptian Authorities Targeting Al-Maraya Publishing House?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Late last Saturday evening, those running Al-Maraya for Culture and Arts<\/a> were surprised by a police force storming their premises. It conducted a thorough search before confiscating a number of books and publications, and arrested one of the house’s employees.<\/p>\n

According to testimony given by human rights lawyer and former presidential candidate Khaled Ali<\/a>, a seminar was held at Al-Maraya for Culture and Arts at seven o’clock on Saturday evening about one of its publications, the book “Talat Settat” (Three Women), attended by the authors Omar Said and Mohamed El-Erian and about 40 participants.<\/p>\n

Ali adds that after the seminar ended and all attendees had left, a force of investigations police raided the house’s premises and detained Ibrahim Mostafa, one of the administrative assistants and a student at the Faculty of Commerce, Ain Shams University, who was later brought before the Public Prosecution, which decided to release him pending investigations in case No. 5142 of 2024, Abdeen misdemeanours.<\/p>\n

According to the human rights lawyer, the force that raided the house was made up of the Abdeen police station investigators, the artistic works investigations police and the tax evasion investigations police, and it continued searching the place for nearly five hours, from ten in the evening until three in the morning. The artistic works police ended up seizing about 217 books and two computers, and the raiding force did not stop there; the tax evasion investigations police also seized files and financial documents belonging to the house.<\/p>\n

\n

Last Saturday, Al-Maraya for Culture and Arts organised<\/a> a seminar to discuss the book (Talat Settat: A Biography from Cairo Nights) by the writers Omar Said and Mohamed El-Erian. The book was published last January and was presented at the 55th Cairo International Book Fair.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Mohamed El-Erian<\/strong>, journalist and author of the book, gives his testimony on the recent events at Al-Maraya, describing what happened after the seminar organised to discuss his book. He tells us: “Five minutes before the end of the seminar, the security forces appeared. We were about to finish, and when we went out, the investigators waited until we had completely finished. At first there were only two of them. The director of the house was not there, and the student they arrested was present (here he means the house’s administrative employee who was arrested), along with some books and items they confiscated.”<\/p>\n

El-Erian adds: “I think this is targeting of the house based on the totality of its work, the latest of which was Douma’s poetry collection. It seems they are targeting the house because its voice differs from most other publishing houses; they have a different culture that the regime does not like, and they do not want it to exist or spread, so they fabricate cases as a pretext to restrict it. All publishing houses realise this, and it seems this is punishment for the different voice the house offers. We stand in strong solidarity with it and reject what happened.”<\/p>\n

El-Erian explains that other publishing houses are left without harassment because they do not conflict with the regime’s orientations, pointing out that the incident is not the first, as the security forces arrested Ayman Abdel Moati, the former director of Al-Maraya, who was held for more than two years in pretrial detention. He adds: “They constantly search devices and confiscate books and contracts. This is a kind of intransigence and fabrication of malicious charges, as punishment for the house for its different voice, which the regime does not like.”<\/p>\n

<\/svg><\/div>\n

Continuing Security Restrictions<\/h3>\n

Al-Maraya has been subjected to a number of security restrictions over the past years. In 2021, a deposit number was refused for the non-periodical “Al-Maraya Book” that the house used to publish, which included a number of cultural, political and artistic articles. In the same year, the security forces prevented<\/a> Al-Maraya from displaying the poetry collection (Curly) by political activist and poet Ahmed Douma, as the collection was banned from display at the Cairo Book Fair, and a security force came with a committee from the artistic works authority, which banned the collection and ordered it withdrawn from the international fair.<\/p>\n

In September<\/a> 2022, the security forces arrested the house’s director, screenwriter Yehia Fekry, after the artistic works authority filed a report including three violations: the titles of some published books differing from the contracts signed with their authors; publishing the magazine “Maraya” without a licence from the National Media Authority; and some books not published by the house being stored on one of the house’s laptops in PDF format. This came after a force of police and artistic works officers raided the house’s premises, spending about seven hours searching it and reviewing Al-Maraya’s papers and documents.<\/p>\n

\n

But the charge, which on the surface appeared to be related to artistic works, did not convince many of those following the activity of the house or its director, as the police raided its premises only about 24 hours after the house organised a seminar to discuss the book by political activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah (The Ghost of Spring), which chronicled events from January 2011 until 2021, and also documented Alaa Abd El-Fattah’s blog posts and his statements before the prosecution and in court during that period.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

On 19 July, the house<\/a> announced on its Facebook page the postponement of the seminar that had been scheduled to be held<\/a> to discuss the poetry collection (Curly) by poet and politician Ahmed Douma, the same collection that was banned from display in 2021, attributing the postponement to “reasons beyond everyone’s control”.<\/p>\n

Recommended reading:<\/strong> Ahmed Douma on His Collection ‘Curly’: I Wrote It in Prison to Escape Defeat or Explosion<\/a><\/p>\n

Yehia Fekry<\/strong>, executive director of Maraya, commenting briefly in his conversation with us, says: “It seems the house’s activity did not please them, or that it is not consistent with their orientations at present. We are facing two cases; the first relates to artistic works and the other to tax evasion. We will work to deal with these cases as best we can.”<\/p>\n

In the same context, Dina Kabil<\/strong>, publishing director at Al-Maraya, comments on the recent security raid on the house, which resulted in the confiscation of a number of books and the arrest of a university student. She tells Zawia3: “All our content is original and we comply with the official deposit procedures for all books. We do not know the reason for the raid or the type of charges we may face.”<\/p>\n

She continues: “Yesterday we contacted Farid Zahran in his capacity as head of the Publishers Association, and he was supportive of us, especially regarding the arrested young man, and we made a great effort to contact everyone to secure his release”, denying that she knows the reasons for the raid on the house; but she points out that the raid may have come because of Al-Maraya’s cultural activity and the type of its publications.<\/p>\n

At Zawia3<\/strong>, we tried to contact Farid Zahran, head of the Publishers Association, who promised to respond, to clarify the association’s position on the incident; but we had not received a response by the time this report was published.<\/p>\n

Al-Maraya<\/a> was founded in 2016. It introduces itself on its official website as a radical democratic, multi-activity cultural platform that produces diverse cultural, literary and artistic material, and adopts in all its products a democratic and progressive approach opposed to all forms of discrimination in society. Those running the house conclude their introduction by saying: “We seek to use various tools to achieve our goals, including: publishing and selling books; issuing a cultural magazine that serves as a platform for intellectual debate; producing documentary and feature films; organising training workshops on creative skills and progressive culture; organising exhibitions, seminars, conferences and competitions; and establishing a website.”<\/p>\n

Recommended reading:<\/strong> Have Publishing Houses in Egypt Started Evaluating Writers Based on Their Number of Followers?<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/svg><\/div>\n

Supportive Reactions<\/h3>\n

Historian and researcher Khaled Fahmy<\/a> says on his Facebook page: “A new attack on thought, opinion, culture and art. The regime, with its agencies, attacked Al-Maraya and fabricated the usual charges, such as finding a computer loaded with unlicensed software copies, and manipulating invoices for the purpose of tax evasion.” He stressed that by using the law the authorities aim to silence any serious voice of thought or free platform for creativity.<\/p>\n

He adds, describing Al-Maraya: “The house has proven itself within a few years, and has not been content with publishing books; rather, it turned its premises into a centre for art, creativity and thought, taking the initiative to hold seminars to discuss books, and launched an online portal presenting podcasts and videos in a professional and attractive way.”<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Mostafa El-Sayed<\/a>, professor of political science, commented: “I followed Al-Maraya’s publications, and Yehia Fekry invited me to write for it repeatedly, but neither time nor my many commitments allowed me, and I greatly appreciated this lofty intellectual project that stays away from entering political battles, so I was astonished by what happened, and I remembered the man who used to put his hand on the trigger of his pistol whenever he heard the word intellectual, culture or thought.” Feminist writer Rabab Kamal<\/a> commented: “Every day we declare solidarity with one of the wronged, and each awaits their turn. All solidarity with Al-Maraya.”<\/p>\n

At the same time, the Bread and Freedom Party (under formation) issued a statement<\/a> in support of the house, declaring its solidarity and saying that it “completely rejects all forms of intimidation, threats and repression to which opinion holders in Egypt are subjected, as this raid comes a few days after the arrest of journalist Khaled Mamdouh and cartoonist Ashraf Omar.”<\/p>\n

Amr Abdelrahman<\/strong>, director of the civil liberties unit at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, expressed regret over what Al-Maraya was subjected to, considering what happened regrettable but expected and not strange to the current authorities’ approach in dealing with independent publishing houses.<\/p>\n

He explains to Zawia3 that the authorities follow a method of fabricating cases, exploiting loopholes in some existing laws, or even exploiting bureaucratic obstacles to abuse independent publishing houses, which is “in line with their vision that everything must be subordinate to the authority, which runs it as it pleases.”<\/p>\n

Abdelrahman points out that Al-Maraya and other publishing houses have been subjected to much harassment, citing the banning of “Aseer Al-Kotob” from taking part in the Book Fair, and stressing that the protest was directed against the publishing houses themselves regardless of the titles they publish.<\/p>\n

He adds that what is happening to Al-Maraya proves that it is independent in its funding and independent in the titles it publishes, as it cannot be said to be biased towards one direction against another, but it certainly has progressive convictions and is biased towards human rights. He called on everyone interested in content creation and publishing in Egypt to stand in solidarity with the house, whether in the Journalists’ Syndicate or the Publishers Association, warning against leniency with this kind of violation, which may lead to unexpected consequences.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A police force raided Al-Maraya for Culture and Arts in Cairo late on Saturday, seizing books and computers and arresting a staff member.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":10174,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[390],"tags":[19054,19679,19684,19680,12350,19685,18622,19681,19683,19682],"kateb":[4583,695],"class_list":["post-18504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-human-rights","tag-ahmed-douma-curly","tag-al-maraya-publishing-house","tag-censorship-in-egypt","tag-dar-al-maraya-raid","tag-freedom-of-expression-egypt","tag-independent-publishers-egypt","tag-khaled-ali","tag-publishing-restrictions-egypt","tag-talat-settat-book","tag-yehia-fekry","kateb-manar-behary","kateb-raba-azzam"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/\u062f\u0627\u0631-\u0627\u0644\u0645\u0631\u0627\u064a\u0627.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18504","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18504"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18504\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18505,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18504\/revisions\/18505"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18504"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18504"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18504"},{"taxonomy":"kateb","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/kateb?post=18504"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}