Sister of jailed activist Alaa Abdel-Fattah appeals to Biden ahead of his meeting with Egypt’s leader: “Don’t fail us, please”

The sister of imprisoned Egyptian rights activist Alaa Abdel-Fattah, who began refusing even water after more than 200 days on a hunger strike at the start of the COP27 climate conference, has pleaded directly to President Biden for help saving her brother’s life. Ahead of Mr. Biden’s meeting on Friday with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, Sanaa Seif said the American leader could, “make the difference here.”

“President Biden, you said no more blank checks. You showed that you care, and that you’re at least better than your predecessors, and this is really critical,” Seif said in a statement to CBS News. “You can make the difference here. You can save Alaa, and you can show that there is some hope and potential for common sense, freedom, democracy. Don’t fail us, please.”

The White House expressed “deep concern” over Abdel-Fattah on Thursday. The jailed activist, who is a dual Egyptian-British citizen, was an important figure in the pro-democracy “Arab Spring” movement more than a decade ago. He has been imprisoned in Egypt for virtually the entire tenure of el-Sisi, Egypt’s current authoritarian president, since 2014. His family and human rights groups call the charges against him politically motivated and spurious.

“We have been in high level communication with the Egyptian government on this case. We have deep concern about it. We would like to see him freed,” National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters on Thursday.

“I’m scared. I’m panicking,” said Seif, who is also a rights activist and has been jailed several times in her home country. She is attending the U.N. climate conference in Egypt’s resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh in a bid to pile pressure on international leaders gathered there to secure her brother’s release. 

U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz both said they had raised Abdel-Fattah’s case directly with el-Sisi on the sidelines of the conference, and French media reported that el-Sisi told French President Emmanuel Macron that the activist’s health was “preserved.”

On Thursday, Abdel-Fattah’s family was told that he had been given “medical intervention,” but they have not been allowed to see him or communicate with him, and they don’t know what the “intervention” involves. His lawyer said he was turned away from the prison despite finally being granted a permit for visitation on Thursday, as it was issued for the wrong date. 

“We’re being intimidated, and they keep giving us different information… One moment they acknowledge he’s on hunger strike, and then they decide, ‘no, he’s eating,’ and nobody is acknowledging the water strike and, I don’t know. I am imagining that he’s in a hospital somewhere, handcuffed to his bed and put on IVs, and I’m hoping that nothing has happened against his will,” Seif told CBS News.

Mr. Biden is scheduled to speak at COP27 on Friday, and he was to meet with el-Sisi on the sidelines of the summit.