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After weeks of prayer and pressure, 18-year-old Egyptian Christian Bola Adel Naguib has been released, highlighting ongoing abuses against believers detained for expressing their faith online.

Persistence and prayers for Christians imprisoned for their faith bear fruit.

Young Christian, Bola Adel Naguib, is being released from an Egyptian prison almost two months after he was “forcibly disappeared” for preaching Christ and criticising Islam online.

Leaving his widowed mum and younger brother distraught, authorities detained Naguib after a midnight raid on his home in October.

As a Daily Declaration exclusive reported at the time, four vans with eight men in combat fatigues stormed the Christian home.

Once done trashing the property, the men confiscated Naguib’s phones, blindfolded and arrested him.

Tortured

Responding to lawyer concerns earlier this week, Egypt’s Islamist Supreme State Security Prosecution Fifth Settlement Branch (SSSP) decided to let the 18-year-old go.

Sources close to the case told the Daily Declaration that Naguib was in bad shape.

Relaying a message from Naguib’s lawyer, Saeed Fayez, they said video conferences with Naguib had clearly “shown evidence of exhaustion and ill health.”

Fayez then petitioned authorities to either release Naguib or “guarantee Naguib’s physical safety.”

Coptic Solidarity confirmed Fayez’s claims, stating that Naguib was tortured for three days while in the hands of the Islamic regime’s National Security Department.

Notably, CS asserted, “The prosecution refused to record his statements about the torture.”

They instructed Fayez to submit a formal protest instead, and he took them up on it.

Armed with evidence, Fayez’s spirited defence included,

“Two sets of documents containing official telegrams and medical reports confirming the deterioration of his health condition.”

Attached to this was “the urgent need to provide him with necessary medical care, in addition to requests to guarantee his physical safety at the place of detention.”

Thanks to Fayez’s persistence, the courts appear to have listened.

In their correspondence, his office described Naguib’s release as a “positive step.”

“Our office affirms that this decision reflects an important response to the legal requests submitted,” Fayez’s team remarked.

This “renews hope that similar release decisions will be issued for the remaining defendants in the same case in the near future.”

That case is a broad sword known as “Number 6954 of 2025.”

Atheists and Christians Targeted

As explained by the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), Naguib’s incarceration was part of a sweeping “arrest campaign that began in mid-September.”

Security agencies, EIPR implied, were actively targeting “atheists and Christians.”

“All were arrested for simply exercising their constitutional right to express their ideas and intellectual queries and curiosities via social media platforms.”

Further defending Naguib, Fayez recommitted his office to fighting for freedom of opinion and expression,” as is allowed under Egypt’s constitution.

They will also, he added, continue to work towards “guaranteeing the legal rights of those like Naguib, who are held in pre-trial detention.”

These rights “are firmly established constitutional principles that must be protected at all stages of investigation and trial, in order to achieve justice and uphold the rule of law.”

Ongoing Persecution

Hoping this was a sign that Saeed Mansour Rizk might also find relief, Fayez said that he was “hoping for their imminent release.”

Saeed remains in prison after an arrest in August.

His detention was extended in September without any real justification.

This has since prompted a formal petition seeking Saeed’s release.

Signed by 16 organisations and 17 individuals, the letter addressed to the Egyptian Ambassador in the United States, declared his continued imprisonment to be a “profound contradiction of constitutional guarantees.”

He’s been denied meetings with his lawyer, medical attention and fresh clothing, the letter stated.

Addressing the charge of terrorism for leaving Islam, the petition fired back, stating that “there is no evidence whatsoever that Saeed poses any threat to national security.”

His case isn’t isolated, the petitioners argued.

This is “emblematic of the plight of many Egyptians who are denied their fundamental right to freedom of religion or belief.”

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Church image courtesy of Unsplash.