At an open fast-breaking meal outside the sit-in protest for ‘Umar ‘Abd al-Rahmān at the US Embassy, Hassan Khalīfah shed tears of joy as he concluded his ten minute speech.

In the picture: Hassan Khalīfah

‘I apologize for going long, but forgive me, it has been nineteen years that I have been in prison,’ he said.
On June 21 President Muhammād Mursī issued a pardon for 572 prisoners convicted in military trials. Of these, 25 were members of al-Jamā’ah al-Islāmiyyah or Islamic Jihad, groups still designated as ‘terrorist’ by the United States. Hassan Khalīfah, now in a wheelchair, had been sentenced to death.