Strange spy case unravels
Jailan Halawi looks into the puzzling case of a lawyer charged with espionage, on which a state security court will rule later this month
Both the prosecution and the defence presented their cases on Saturday morning at the downtown Bab Al-Khalq State Security Court, as the trial of a young lawyer charged with attempting to spy for Israel resumed its sessions. Thirty- year-old lawyer Walid Ahmed Hashim is charged with seeking to provide a foreign country [Israel] with information that harms the national interests of the state, in exchange for money.
Although espionage cases are usually high profile, there was no sign of the stringent security measures or media circus atmosphere that accompany cases of this sort. The two-hour session, presided over by Judge Adel Abdel-Salam Goma'a, began with State Security Prosecutor Sameh Abu Zeid describing the case as "unique in form and substance". Abu Zeid said Hashim was born and raised in Cairo's historic Al- Helmiya district, in a "modest" yet "respectable" family. A graduate of the public school system, he went on to receive a law degree from Cairo University, from where Egypt's most renowned patriots had also graduated, the prosecutor noted. Although Hashim grew up in a family "soaked" in law (his late father and four of his six brothers and sisters are lawyers), Abu Zeid said, the young lawyer chose to break the law by seeking to "work for a foreign country in a manner that jeopardises Egypt's national interests". The prosecutor said the penal code criminalises the intent to carry out a task that aims at harming the country's interests, even if the act was never executed.
Abu Zeid traced the roots of the case to a report provided by "secret" State Security Intelligence (SSI) sources regarding an individual who had repeatedly sent a fax, including documents with vital information about a military unit, to an unknown destination from a certain communications centre. The hand-written fax said the sender would provide more information upon receiving a sum of money, to be handed to him at a Giza cafe.
SSI investigations led to Hashim, and the fax number was identified as belonging to the Israeli embassy in Cairo. The prosecutor said the SSI also found out that the information provided in the fax corresponded with the military unit where Hashim served after graduating from law school in 1997.
Hashim was arrested at the Abu Nawas café in Giza on 23 October 2003, which the SSI said was the time and place Hashim thought he would be receiving a payment from the embassy's representative. He was taken to SSI headquarters, where he spent four days being interrogated, before being referred to the State Security prosecutor for further interrogation.
According to Abu Zeid, Hashim provided a detailed confession as soon as he was arrested and confronted with the charges against him. He said that while serving in the military, he obtained documents -- which he kept in his possession -- about the unit where he was stationed. In 2003, the prosecutor said, Hashim was going through a financial crisis and became "obsessed by what he referred to as a 'devilish idea' of selling these documents to the Israeli embassy."
At first, using public phones so as not to be traced, he tried calling the Israeli embassy in Cairo. He was always asked to come in person, and meet with the embassy's security officials. Afraid of being caught or monitored by the authorities, Hashim balked at the idea, and decided to send a hand- written fax to the embassy instead, including documents about the unit where he served, as a token of his good intentions.
Hashim said he would provide more information if they delivered $2,500 to the Abu Nawas café in Giza on 23 October. He said to leave the money with someone named Khaled.
Abu Zeid quoted a forensic lab report asserting that Hashim's hand-writing matched the hand- writing on the fax. Hashim "was [also] the one who led us to the original military documents he was hiding at his home", the prosecutor said. "The suspect betrayed his homeland, his colleagues, his brothers and sisters, and the witnesses who testified in his favour. He betrayed Egypt, the cradle of all civilisations, and hence should pay the price for his treason."
Raouf Qotb, Hashim's lawyer, denied all the allegations against his client. The prosecutor had failed to provide the court with any witnesses willing to testify that Hashim was the person who contacted the embassy or sent the fax, Qotb said. Further, argued the defence, the documents referred to by the prosecutor as containing secret military information needed to be examined and verified by armed forces officials.
"This case has been built on suspicion, and we should not slaughter this young man's reputation on mere suspicion," Qotb said. "It is impossible to believe that a lawyer who was raised in a family of lawyers would confess, upon his arrest, of being a spy. There is not a single true fact in this case."
Hashim's elder sister Hanan told Al-Ahram Weekly she had "faith in my brother's innocence. As a lawyer I can assure you that his case has no substance, and is clearly fictitious." Hanan described Hashim as a successful lawyer who is single and well off. She said her brother was an "extremely patriotic" person who participated in many a demonstration in support of the Palestinian people during his college years. Hanan said her brother was "religious, and his faith is keeping him strong in such strenuous times. Had he been a desperate loser as described by the press [in their initial reports about the case], he would have committed suicide by now."
Other courthouse spectators who spoke to the Weekly were equally baffled that a lawyer would put himself in such an inexplicable predicament. Many wondered whether the government was hiding something.
As the court adjourned, Hashim told the Weekly the case was "very irrational. I know I am innocent, so God willing I shall be acquitted."
The court is set to declare its verdict on 31 March.
