TERRORIST
ACCUSATION AT EGYPTIAN GAY TRIAL
The ongoing Cairo trial of 52 Egyptian men accused of engaging in gay sex took an unexpected turn Oct. 10 when prosecutors accused the lead defendant, Sherif Farhat, of being a member of the Islamic terrorist organization Jihad.
Jihad, which has links with Osama bin Laden, waged a terrorist campaign against tourists and the Egyptian government in the 1990s.
The 52 men are charged with committing immoral acts and/or forming a group that exploits Islam to propagate extremist ideas. Police say they were arrested in and around a gay club on May 11. They have remained jailed at Tora Prison since then.
According to the International gay Muslim organization Al-Fatiha, prosecutors on Oct. 11 also inadvertently revealed that the prosecutions are a sham.
" [ The defendants' lawyers ] pointed out that four of the defendants had given false names and addresses to the police, and the 'investigation reports' that were cooked later stated that the subjects ( with the false names ) had been under police surveillance for a while, at those false addresses," Al-Fatiha said.
"These four defendants stated their real names and addresses in the courtroom, after which the prosecution asked that the names be changed on the pretext that these false names were really their aliases. However, the prosecution was unable to explain the matter of the false addresses that had allegedly been under surveillance."
According to the International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission, many of the defendants were not even at or near the gay club that was raided.
"Out of the 52 defendants, 19 were arrested elsewhere," IGLHRC said. "Some of the other detainees were picked up by police for minor violations: one reportedly was a street vendor arrested for selling watches without a license at a teahouse, another was cleaning his motorcycle on the street without his ID, and still another was initially arrested for having a fight with an off-duty police officer. After their arrests, they were placed in the ranks of suspected 'homosexuals' by police eager to stimulate a scandal."
Verdicts are expected to be handed down on Nov. 14. Since the trial is taking place in an emergency state security court, there is no possibility of appeal.
The sentences could be as high as five years in prison.
BOOK: HITLER
WAS GAY
A new book by a respected German historian says Aldolf Hitler was gay and hung out with a gay clique in Munich in his younger days, though proof that he engaged in gay sex is only circumstantial.
Hitler's later persecution of homosexuals was an attempt to insulate himself against blackmail, according to "Hitler's Secret: The Double Life of a Dictator" by University of Bremen history professor Lothar Machtan.
"We can say that Hitler had several homoerotic friendships up through the 1920s," Machtan told Die Welt newspaper. "Many of them would be described by people today as homosexual."
Machtan says Hitler's later relationship with Eva Braun likely was only for show and probably was never consummated.
Ernst Rohm, the gay leader of Hitler's Storm Troopers, tried to blackmail Hitler by threatening to reveal his sexuality, Machtan said. For that, Hitler had him killed, the book says.
The book reportedly quotes several men and male prostitutes who claim to have had sex with Hitler. The quotes come from published accounts, service notes and police files.