Please take a few minutes and sign this petition (http://bit.ly/Egypt528) expressing your opposition to the mass death sentences recently pronounced in Egypt. This petition is sponsored by, among others, Amnesty International, which is especially eager to garner Arab-American and Muslim-American signatures for the petition to present to the Egyptian government:

Dear friends and family,
Please join me and take a stand against the Egyptian government’s human rights crackdown!
Sign the statement:
http://bit.ly/Egypt528
The Egyptian government is engaging in a massive crackdown on its critics. Thousands of people have been jailed from across the political spectrum. Now, a total of 1,211 people have been sentenced to death or life in prison in two mass trials that were fundamentally unfair.
Please join me in signing this statement opposing the mass sentences: http://bit.ly/Egypt528
During this difficult time, Arab Americans and Muslim Americans must stand in support of human rights in Egypt. These death sentences are the latest horrifying development.
Right now, the U.S. and other governments are debating how to respond. We need to be heard.
Please sign the statement here: http://bit.ly/Egypt528
Thank you.

The latest issue of al-Ruwaq al-`Arabi, a journal published by the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, is dedicated to the question of the future of the Muslim Brotherhood.  The entire issue (in Arabic) can be downloaded as a pdf from here.

More on Egypt’s economy: despite the massive aid package given by the axis of autocracy in support of the coup, there is still an extreme shortage of dollars, and the economy is no where close to stabilizing, much less achieving sustainable growth or a resumption of meaningful investment. The black market in hard currency, despite the best efforts of the Central Bank, appears to have entrenched itself for the near future as a fixture in the Egyptian economy, with all that implies for the fiscal health — or more accurately — the fiscal distress of the national economy.  

At my presentation yesterday at a conference hosted by Georgetown University, I was asked to speak on international law and the coup.  I spoke about the Statute of Rome, its definition of “crimes against humanity,” the standards for individual culpability, the risks that senior Egyptian officials could be indicted for their actions in the wake of the coup, and what that means for the possibility of democratization in the near or medium term in Egypt.  Here are my slides for that presentation.

This month’s issue of the Boston Review’s Forum was dedicated the question of what went wrong in the Egyptian transition.  I had  the honor of writing the principal piece, which elicited thoughtful responses from my colleagues, Ellis Goldberg, Andrew March, Nathan Brown, Akbar Ganji, Anne Norton and Micheline Ishay. Space restraints, of course, did not allow them a full response, nor me a response to their limited responses, but nevertheless, I thought the editors of the Boston Review did an excellent job putting this forum together. I would like to thank them for inviting me to write the piece, inviting these distinguished scholars to respond, and producing an excellent final version for the public. Finally, I’d like to thank Nader Hashimi and Danny Postel for inviting me to the University of Denver to lecture on Egypt’s transition. That lecture ultimately give birth to this forum.

Last week, The Boston Review published a short post by me on the significance of the Egyptian government’s decision to designate the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization. I was happy to find out that the same piece was picked up The Daily Dish and Informed Comment.

Their January/February forum will be dedicated to the question of Egypt’s failed democratic transition.  They graciously invited me to write the principal essay.   Respondents are Andrew March, Ellis Goldberg, Nathan Brown, Micheline Ishay, Akbar Ganji, and Anne Norton. It is scheduled to appear on the third anniversary of the January 25th Revolution.