Prominent Egyptian activist and journalist Israa Abdelfattah has told prosecutors that she was tortured and beaten during her arrest in Cairo this weekend, according to her friends and lawyers.

The death of nine civilians in an unidentified missile strike south of Bir al-Abd on Saturday night topped the news coming out of Sinai this week.

Media organizations received instructions from security agencies to attack the National Council for Human Rights and its head, following a statement it published criticizing recent police violations, media sources told Mada Masr.

Aisha Al-Shater has been in hospital for a week after her health seriously deteriorated following a second hunger strike in protest against her prison conditions.

Shortly after his arrest on September 29 from the Dokki police station, where he had been serving a probation sentence, activist and writer Alaa Abd El Fattah was blindfolded and taken to the maximum security wing of Tora Prison.

The head of The Egyptian Bar Association Sameh Ashour said on Friday that the Interior Ministry suspended two police officers in al-Mahalla al-Kobra city, Gharbiya, for physically assaulting a lawyer.

Egyptian authorities have launched the “biggest crackdown” under President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi‘s rule, according to Amnesty International, rounding up more than 2,300 people following a series of anti-government protests in late September.

Egypt’s Interior Minister Mahmoud Tawfiq reportedly ordered the release of those detained during a clampdown on anti-regime protests in September, Egyptian security sources said Monday.

Protests have broken out in parts of Egypt with demonstrators calling for the departure of President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi amid a high security alert.

While thousands of demonstrators gathered at the Unknown Soldier Memorial in Cairo’s Nasr City district to chant, dance and wave flags in a show of support for President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, small-scale scattered protests against the president emerged, amid heavily blocked and securitized roads across Cairo.