Many thanks to Jonas Virdalm, Henrik Alexandersson, Henrik Bejke, Magnus Andersson, Rola Brentlin and everyone else who participated in or helped promote the rally in Stockholm, Sweden! Here are some pictures:

Jonas informs us “One of the speakers, Rola Brentlin, had written a letter of protest to the Egyptian Embassy that she gave to the staff at the embassy.”

Thanks to everyone who was involved in this rally, and for making sure that the embassy staff receives the message.

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Many thanks to Pieter Cleppe and Philippe De Backer for making this rally possible. According to Philippe:

6 different organisations were involved in the rally, including Jong VLD and LVSV, Jeunes MR and FEL, Jong SPirit and with the support of Amnesty International Belgium.

About 30 people took part in the rally, which was held before the Egyptian embassy in Brussels. We have send out a dutch and French press release, which was picked by our newspaper media.

We would like to thank everyone who helped organize or attended this rally! Here are some pictures:

Thanks to everyone who was involved in this great rally!

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Despite the horrible weather, Jessica Wright, Wolfgang Müller and Oliver Knipping from IUF Berlin led a wonderful rally. Thank you very much for all of your efforts!

Pictures below:

Delivering the petition:

Amazing rally made possible by amazing people. THANK YOU!

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Many thanks to Miriam Asnes, Galit Gun, Constantino and others who showed up to this rally! Here are some pictures:

Miriam writes about the rally:

Free Kareem demonstrators received at Egyptian Consulate, NY

There is a lot for all of us to think about after our very small but controversial demonstration today to ask that Kareem Amer’s sentence be shortened. The most interesting thing that happened was when, at Galit’s suggestion, we went up to the second floor of the set-back building to let the consulate know that we were downstairs. As we prepared to walk out the door, the receptionist motioned to me.

“Would one of you please come and meet with someone?”

Which is how I ended up in the office of Mohammad Khalil, an assistant to the Egyptian consul. He was very polite and wanted to know all the details of Kareem’s case. “What is he charged with?” he asked me in Arabic. “Writing incendiary comments about the president and the religious establishment,” I told him, and then was quick to point out that the Free Kareem campaign isn’t about his views, but about the appropriate response to someone criticizing the government or Islam. He promised to look into the matter and I gave him my email address so he could follow up. This might mean that I will have a very interesting time at border control next time I visit Egypt

However, the argument that the issue is not the content of Kareem’s posts but rather freedom of speech got us into a heated argument on the street. It started quite innocuously; two gentlemen who had been at the consulate on personal business pointed out that I had misspelled the phrase “Utluqu Sirah Kareem Amer” as “Utluqu Sira3 Kareem Amer” (I do so much writing about “Al-sira3 al filistini” that I mistakenly wrote the word for “struggle”.) It turned out that Mr. Spellcheck had taken a personal interest in Kareem’s case and knew all the details. “You know, it was all completely legal, according to the laws. Not an emergency law or anything,” he said. “He got a year for criticizing the president, and okay, this I think is wrong. But criticizing Islam? He is threatening the fabric of society. He is threatening the values that we teach our children. He should be put in jail; this is the law in Egypt.”

We respectfully disagreed, saying that there should not be limits on free speech and that surely he agreed that Islam was powerful and respected enough in Egypt to withstand some dissent. But his comments did bring to light something I didn’t quite realize beforehand as a newbie to the Free Kareem campaign; technically, this is a campaign that is saying that the Egyptian laws by which Kareem was sentenced are unjust and therefore it is a legal reform campaign directed at Egypt. If I am mistaken on this point, please do let me know.

The second gentleman was really a piece of work. He claimed that America was run by “the Jews” and that they were the source of his own personal woes (getting rejected for a license by the school board) as well as America’s foreign policy. “The majority of the businessmen, the majority of the government are Jewish,” he told me. People like this are always in complete disbelief to learn that Jews account for under 2% of the US population.

“This is bad for Egypt,” he yelled at us. “Not at all,” I tried to tell him. “We like Egypt. We know that Egypt wants to respect people’s rights. We’d like to help her do that.”

And then, as usually happens, even the most bigoted and obnoxious heckler sometimes has a point. “If you are standing here for Kareem,” he told us, “then you must also demonstrate for everyone who is experiencing injustice from the government here.” I bowed my head. How many times did I go out and demonstrate against the illegal detentions after 9/11 or the current detainees of my own government in Guantanamo? I’m much more likely to run a program like the Middle East Community Outreach Panel series we founded at UMich than show up with signs and a megaphone. Is that preference or cowardice?

For me, the best moment of the afternoon happened as I left the consulate. The receptionist who had managed to get us an audience with someone on staff stood as I walked out the door.

“Thank you,” I said.

“No, thank you” he said sincerely. I could tell then that he had probably heard of Kareem Amer.

Excellent recap of the rally. Thanks to everyone who was involved.

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Bureaucrash, the freedom activist network, features a blog post about the DC rally by Anca who is one of the organizers:

November 9th , known as World Freedom Day, marks the fall of the Berlin Wall and is a day of celebration for freedom lovers around the globe. But November 9th also marks the sad one-year anniversary since Egypt imprisoned freedom of speech. What is for some World Freedom Day is for others Egypt Freedom Restraint Day.

One year ago Egypt chose to celebrate World Freedom Day by taking away Kareem ‘s freedom of movement because he stood up for freedom of speech. Today, joining a world wide effort, an enthusiastic and outspoken group of freedom lovers gathered in front of the Egypt Embassy Cultural Office to show our support for Kareem.

We might have been the last Free Kareem rally considering the time zone but I would say we came in first in terms of enthusiasm and commitment. In spite of cold and wind, under the paternal watch of the fierce US Secret Service we managed to convey our message of freedom to passers-by and drivers who enthusiastically responded to our request to honk for freedom.

We spoke freely to show Egypt they can not silence free speech. We spoke about our credo to prove to Egypt that they can not imprison principles. We expressed our views to the press present on location to prove to Egypt that the war of ideas can not be won by force but by reason and arguments. And neither the lack of reaction from the Egyptian authorities nor the chocolate we shared for lunch managed to sweeten our outrage.

We stood up for the sake of freedom of speech and we stood up for Kareem, we did last year, we did this year and we would do it again …our hope is that it won’t be necessary and we will celebrate the next World Freedom Day having Kareem free amongst us.

Pictures of the rally (also below):

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The Coalition is proud to thank Jason Talley, Richard Morrison, Erin Wildermuth, Joey Coon, Andrew Perraut, Anca Bogdana Rusu and many others for all their amazing work on setting this rally up (or attending it!) Here are some pictures:

Many more here!

Our deep thanks to everyone who helped organize and participate in this rally.

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ALL RALLIES TO BE HELD ON FRIDAY THE 9TH OF NOVEMBER:
If time is set to “TBA,” please e-mail the organizer of the relevant rally on Thursday to check the exact time. We will update this as soon as we are informed.

London rally:
Organizer: Debi Chakrabarty
E-mail: debi.chakra(at)gmail.com or click here
Place: Egyptian Embassy, 26 South Street, Westminster (Map)
Time: 3:30 PM - 4:30 PM
[Rally participants will be meeting at the Green Park tube station at 3 PM so that they can walk over together.]

Washington, DC rally:
Organizer: Anca Bogdana Rusu
E-mail: anca_bogdana_rusu(at)yahoo.com or click here
Place: Egyptian Embassy Cultural Office, Egyptian Embassy Cultural Office by DuPont Circle, 1303 New Hampshire Ave. NW (Map)
Time: 12:00-1:00 PM
Further information: Facebook Event Group

New York City rally:
Organizer: Mimi Asnes
E-mail: mimi.asnes(at)gmail.com or click here
Place: Egyptian Consulate, 1110 2nd Avenue, New York (Map)
Time: 12:00 - 1:00 PM

Rome rally:
Organizer: Eleonora Bianchini
E-mail: eleonorabianchini(at)blogosfere.it or click here
Place: Egyptian Embassy, Villa Savoia - Via Salaria, 267, Roma (Map)
Time: TBA

Berlin rally:
Organizer: Jessica Wright, Institut für Unternehmerische Freiehit
E-mail: jessica(at)iuf-berlin.org or click here
Place: Egyptian Embassy, Stauffenberg Str. 6-7, 10785 Berlin (Map)
Time: 1:00pm

Amsterdam rally:
Organizer: Tori Egherman
E-mail: tori.egherman@gmail.com or click here
Time: 12:00pm

Stockholm rally:
Organizer: Jonas Virdalm
E-mail:
Place: Egyptian Embassy, Strandvägen 35, 11451 Stockholm (Map)
Time: 12:00pm
Further information: Speakers will include Henrik Alexandersson (Frihetsfronten), Magnus Andersson (CUF), Rola Brentlin (MUF) (h/t, Johan Norberg)

Prague rally:
Organizer: Amnesty Czech (amnesty.cz)
E-mail: lamiskhalilova(at)gmail.com or click here
Place: Egyptian Embassy, Pelléova 14, Praha 6 - Bubeneč, 160 00 (Map)
Time: TBA

Rio de Janeiro rally:
Organizer: Pedro Sette
E-mail: psette(at)ordemlivre.org or click here
Place: Egyptian Consulate, Rua Muniz Barreto, 741 (one block away from the subway station.)
Time: 10AM

São Paulo rally:
Organizer: Magno Karl
E-mail: mkarl(at)ordemlivre.org or click here
Time: TBA

Athens rally:
Organizer: Fotis Perlikos, Liberal Alliance
E-mail: perlykos01(at)yahoo.gr or click here
Place: Egyptian Embassy, 3 Vasilissis Sofias Av., 106 71 Athens
Time: TBA

Bucharest rally:
Organizer: Olga Nicoara
E-mail: olga.nicoara(at)cadi.ro or click here
Place: Egyptian Embassy, Dacia Boulevard 67
Time: 12pm - 1pm

Mexico City rally:
Organizer: Armando R.
E-mail: aregil(at)cato.org or click here
Place: Embassy of Egypt in Mexico City, Mexico - Alejandro Dumas No. 131, Polanco, Mexico, D.F.
Time: TBA

Brussels rally:
Organizer: Pieter Cleppe, Jong VLD
E-mail: pieter_cleppe(at)yahoo.com or click here
Address: Egyptian Embassy, Avenue de l’Uruguay 19, 1000 Brussels (Map)
Time: TBA
Further information: View flyer

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Confirmed cities so far:

1- Brussels
2- Rome
3- Stockholm
4- Washington DC
5- New York City
6- Prague
7- Bucharest
8- Berlin
9- Amsterdam
10- London
11- Athens
12 - Mexico City
13 - São Paulo
14 - Rio de Janeiro

Interested in organizing a rally in a city that is not yet listed here? Contact us!

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For those in the DC area, below is the confirmed information concerning the Free Kareem rally to be held. Please show your support and attend it if you’re anywhere close to this area!

Date: Friday, November 9, 2007
Time: 12:00pm - 1:00pm
Location: Egyptian Embassy Cultural Office (Dupont Circle)
Street: 1303 New Hampshire Ave NW
City/Town: Washington, DC

View Map

Message from the organizers:

Regardless of whether you agree with Kareem, we can all agree that no one should be imprisoned for voicing their opinions. We ask only that you join us during your lunch hour to support Kareem and free expression.

Facebook event group.

For more information, please contact Anca or Andrew.

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(Updated)

We have 10 confirmed cities so far that will take place in the worldwide Free Kareem rally on Friday, the 9th of November.

1- Brussels
2- Rome
3- Stockholm
4- Washington DC
5- New York City
6- Prague
7- Bucharest
8- Berlin
9- Amsterdam
10- London
11- Athens
12 - Mexico City
13 - São Paulo
14 - Rio de Janeiro

We are aiming for much more, so if your city is not listed here and you would like to organize one, please contact us!

If you live in any of the above cities, please attend a rally! We will post detailed information concerning exact times, location addresses and the organizers’ contact information. This is just an entry to give you some time to plan ahead.

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