Egypt filmmaker arrested, beaten as crackdown persists
A Western journalist saw Egyptian prison guards beat and threaten to kill filmmaker Hossam al-Meneai, who remains behind bars.
CAIRO — Sometime after 5 p.m. on Jan. 22, a group of Egyptian State Security officers took the eight-story elevator ride to an apartment where Hossam al-Meneai, Jeremy Hodge and Nizar Manek were living.
The Egyptian filmmaker from El Arish, the American translator and the British journalist were in a block of flats full of diplomats, but after a few hours Hodge and Meneai were taken away, later accused of "spreading false news" to foreign countries and "threatening the stability of the state." Similar charges have been leveled against professional journalists. According to lawyers, investigators are concerned by the fact Meneai had footage of the 2011 revolution and last summer's Muslim Brotherhood sit-ins on his laptop and camera.
