Alaa Abdel-Fattah: Petition calling for Egyptian activist's release gets 1,000 signatures in one day

A petition calling for the release of Egyptian activist Alaa Abdel-Fattah has received one thousand signatures in the space of 24 hours, bringing its total to nearly 2,500.

The online campaign was started by the imprisoned blogger’s sister, Mona Seif, who urged people to help Abdel-Fattah "before it’s too late". 

The activist and writer, deemed a hero of the 2011 Egyptian revolution, was sentenced to five years in jail last December for "broadcasting false news" after sharing a Facebook post.

We just started this petition and we need all the help we can get

Sign it, share it with friends, send it directly to people you know would take on #FreeAlaa case and help with it
بدأنا العريضة دي ومحتاجين مساعدة كل حد: وقعوها وشاركوها مع دوايركم
💙

https://t.co/lxNmsQIM5Z

— Mona Seif (@Monasosh) August 26, 2022

Abdel-Fattah has been tortured and held in inhumane conditions while imprisoned, according to his family. 

For more than 120 days, Abdel-Fattah has been on a hunger strike to protest his detention. 

"We are terrified that he will die in there unless we get him out soon," Seif wrote.

"We believe that if enough people demand it, the UK can bring him home."

Abdel-Fattah obtained British citizenship earlier this year, from inside prison. 

His family have called on UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss to "work as hard as she can" to bring him home.  This follows comments from the Tory leadership frontrunner that her department was "working very hard to secure his release".

This week, Prime Minister Boris Johnson spoke with President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi and raised the jailed activist's case. 

Downing Street then issued a statement expressing "hope for swift and positive progress on the issue". 

Seif said of her sibling's plight: "I am carrying my brother’s hunger strike with my body, hoping that British officials I meet recognise the urgency of his situation and intervene on his behalf with the needed urgency and strength".