ID
S
EVIDENCE REPORT
No 158
Sexuality, Poverty and Law

Sexuality, Development and Non-conforming
Desire in the Arab World: The Case of Lebanon
and Egypt
M.S. Mohamed
October 2015

The IDS programme on Strengthening Evidence-based Policy works across seven key themes. Each theme
works with partner institutions to co-construct policy-relevant knowledge and engage in policy-influencing
processes. This material has been developed under the Sexuality, Poverty and Law theme.
The material has been funded by UK aid from the UK Government, however the views expressed do not
necessarily reflect the UK Government’s official policies.
AG Level 2 Output ID: 240

SEXUALITY, DEVELOPMENT AND NON-CONFORMING DESIRE IN
THE ARAB WORLD: THE CASE OF LEBANON AND EGYPT
M.S. Mohamed
October 2015
This is an Open Access publication distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted
use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are clearly credited.
First published by the Institute of Development Studies in October 2015
© Institute of Development Studies 2015
IDS is a charitable company limited by guarantee and registered in England (No. 877338).

Contents
Abbreviations

2

1

Introduction: connecting sexuality to development

3

2

Historical background
2.1
Reversing roles

6
7

3

Methodology

8

4

Egypt and Lebanon: post-independence to present
4.1
Lebanon
4.2
Egypt

9
9
11

5

Conclusion

17

References

18

1

Abbreviations
CSO
ILGA
LGBT
LGBTIQ
LGBTQ
MSM
NGO
SGNs
UNAIDS
US

Civil Society Organisation
International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association
lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender
lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual/transgender, intersex, queer/questioning
lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer
men who have sex with men
non-governmental organisation
sexual and gender nonconformists
Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS
United States

2

1

Introduction: connecting sexuality to
development
[W]e have a lot of problems here – torture, violations against street children, we are
full of problems… To come in and talk about gays and lesbians, it is nice, but it’s not
the major issue. It’s like I’m starving and you ask me what kind of cola I want. Well, I
want to eat first. Then we can talk about cola! It’s a luxury to talk about gay rights in
Egypt.
(Negad El Borai, in an interview with Azimi 2006)

In many developing countries, sexual rights are commonly depicted as trivial concerns
pertaining to wealthy citizens of a ‘developed’ Western world. The ‘developing’ world is often
thought to have more pressing problems to deal with, such as poverty, violence and
corruption. As the prominent Egyptian attorney and human rights activist, Negad El Borai,
pointed out in the preceding statement, it is ‘nice’ to talk about gay and lesbian rights in
Egypt, but the matter is ranked low in a hierarchy of critical human rights issues. Indeed, it is
sometimes not considered to be a human rights issue at all.
While it is important, when analysing Borai’s statement, to consider his precarious position as
a human rights activist in what was, at the time, a long-standing dictatorship,1 such
skeletal/unfamiliar representations of sexual rights risk obscuring the gradually emerging
links between sexual rights and other aspects of human development. In his statement, Borai
does not reject the pertinence or question the efficacy of a ‘globalized narrative on sexual
identity’ in Egypt (Cornwall 2014: 427) – something we will discuss later. Rather, he attempts
to play down the gravity of the Egyptian state’s acts against ‘sexual perversion’ by
dissociating it from other ‘major issues’ in the country. Providing an alternative perspective
on the matter, Armas (2007) elaborates on the links between sexual rights and development
by examining the relationships between sexual rights and the right to health (mental and
physical), education, political participation, work, and migration. He argues that their
interdependence is testament to their indivisibility as basic human rights.
Subscribing to the latter perspective, this report focuses on the rights of sexual and gender
nonconformists (SGNs) in Egypt and Lebanon. It explores the somewhat similar social
attitudes towards sexual and gender nonconformity and follows the divergent trajectories of
both countries with regards to sexual rights activism. The report attributes this divergence to
differences in socio-political conditions in each country that have allowed for the
development of a somewhat organised, selectively functional sexual rights movement in one
context, while encouraging the open oppression of almost all forms of sexual dissent in
another.
As well as contributing to the existing literature on sexual rights in Egypt and Lebanon and
informing future sexual rights activism in both countries, this report refutes the argument that
supports a hierarchy of values in development by demonstrating the indivisibility of sexual
freedoms from other, more popular, development issues.
Egypt and Lebanon’s work with the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS)
illustrates this point quite well, with respect to health as a development concern. Having
identified men who have sex with men (MSM) as one of several groups that are ‘most at risk’
of acquiring and transmitting HIV (UNAIDS 2008), one of the main challenges facing
By 2006, when Borai’s aforementioned statement was published, Mohamed Hosni Mubarak had been president of Egypt for
approximately 25 years. Mubarak’s reign ended a few years later, following the Egyptian uprising in 2011.
1

3

countries where same-sex sexual practices are prohibited/frowned on is reaching out to
MSM. Even where HIV/AIDS prevention and care services are made available to MSM (e.g.
distribution of condoms/lubricants or provision of counselling and testing services), stigma,
violence, discrimination, or fear thereof prohibit many people from accessing them (Egyptian
Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) n.d.). The 2012 UNAIDS report states that ‘less than 5%
of MSM globally have access to HIV prevention, treatment, and care services’ (UNAIDS
2012a: 10).
With respect to Lebanon, the report cites Article 534 of the Penal Code, which prohibits
sexual intercourse that is ‘contrary to nature’ (Abbani n.d.), as an obstacle to the country’s
ability to reach out to MSM. The risk of being persecuted or stigmatised discourages MSM
from seeking help, affecting Lebanon’s ability to provide care services and raise awareness
of prevention practices to a vulnerable group at high risk of contracting HIV.
Egypt’s UNAIDS reports in 2012 and 2014 mention similar challenges. But they attribute
discrimination/stigma more to cultural and social barriers and Egyptian society’s ‘inherently’
negative attitudes towards at-risk populations – rather than assigning the responsibility to any
specific law. In fact, the 2012 report explicitly states that ‘homosexuality is not prohibited but
is socially and culturally rejected’ (UNAIDS 2012b: 19).
The 2014 report acknowledges the low utilisation of medical and legal services offered to
MSM in Egypt, but traces this back to a ‘fear of stigmatization or discrimination related to
their sexual identity’, without explicitly mentioning the source of discrimination (UNAIDS
2014b: 33). The same report mentions unidentified ‘legal barriers’ that are said to obstruct
efforts by non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and civil society organisations (CSOs) ‘to
distribute prevention tools such as condoms and clean needles, which could be wrongfully
used as evidence of illegal behavior’ (UNAIDS 2014b: 29). These cases challenge Borai’s
aforementioned statement by demonstrating the critical relationship between sexual rights
and development. Furthermore, both Lebanon and Egypt illustrate how legal or social
exclusion on the basis of sexual activity connects to the more highly valued right to health,
affecting not only those who are being excluded, but society at large.
Data linking sexual rights to HIV/AIDS in Egypt and Lebanon are relatively easily accessible
even though both are still considered to be low prevalence countries. Country-wide interest in
HIV/AIDS is not necessarily due to a genuine concern for the wellbeing of people who are
HIV-positive, or even the most at-risk groups; rather, it is more likely due to fear over the
safety of the ‘general population’, and an interest in eliminating what is potentially a national
threat. On the other hand, data linking sexual rights in either country to education, work,
political participation or the economy as a whole are almost impossible to come by.
One possible reason for this is that the potential effects of ignoring those links are
indeterminable and relatively uncertain, even unrelatable to wider society. Having little
knowledge of the actual size of the stigmatised population in either country contributes to our
ignorance of the gravity of ignoring those links. Moreover, social stigma and discrimination –
whether culturally or legally motivated – make it almost impossible to determine the size of
those populations in either country, adding to the sense that it is a ‘trivial’ and ‘foreign’
problem. Attempting to credibly convey the economic costs of discriminating against people
on the basis of sexual/gender nonconformity,2 for example, would require knowledge of the
size of the persecuted population to be able to produce verified statistical information. The
precarious position of SGNs in the Arab world complicates efforts to do so.

2

Just to highlight the economic components of homophobia rather than suggesting that homophobia is primarily an economic
problem.
4

From the outset, it is important to clarify that this report is mainly concerned with an already
existing act of discrimination, its victims, and its consequences. To avoid misrepresenting the
report’s main subjects through imposing foreign identities or any type of unwelcome
descriptive categories on them, I have opted to rule out terms such as ‘lesbian, gay, bisexual,
transgender, queer’ (LGBTQ) and ‘homosexual’ and their Arabic translations. This is not to
suggest that these terms are unheard of or unused in the Arab world; it is rather an attempt
to avoid the fallacy of introducing Western conceptions of sexuality in a context where they
do not necessarily belong. Furthermore, the use of sexual identities would be exclusive of
sexual/gender nonconformists in Egypt and Lebanon who might not fit under these identities.
Given the controversies surrounding these labels,3 I have opted to use the more tedious
designation ‘sexual and gender nonconformists’ (SGNs) to refer to the main subjects of this
report, and ‘sexual and gender nonconforming behaviour’ (SGN behaviour) to refer to the
socially and/or legally prohibited actions of SGNs. The terms ‘LGBTQ’ and ‘homosexuality’
(in all their variations) will occasionally be used to refer only to the people and organisations
that openly identify themselves using these terms.
The broader aim of this report is to contribute to the slowly expanding study of the everchanging attitudes towards sexuality and, more specifically, ‘queer desire’ in the Arab world.
The choice of Egypt and Lebanon owes to the ongoing contrasting changes in attitudes
towards gender and sexual nonconformity in both countries. As Lebanon witnesses what is
being hailed as a ‘landmark ruling’ with regards to its law on ‘unnatural’ sexual relations
(Dera 2014; Rainey 2014), Egypt has – exaggeratedly – been referred to as ‘[possibly] the
worst place in the world to be gay right now’ (Michaelson 2014). While both countries share
vaguely worded laws regulating sexuality that date back to the colonial era, and both are
reported to be largely homophobic societies, Egypt and Lebanon’s trajectories regarding
gender and sexual nonconformity are steadily diverging. By examining certain social, political
and legal developments in Egypt (past and present) in juxtaposition to Lebanon, this report
aims to identify a set of factors that have contributed to this divergence, informing future
efforts to advocate for sexual rights in either country.

3

For more information, see Massad (2007); El-Rouayheb (2005); Mourad (2013); and IDS (2015b).
5

2

Historical background

El-Rouayheb (2005) and Ze’evi (2006), writing about the history of sexuality in the early
Ottoman Empire vis-à-vis Europe, use European and Arab travelogues to showcase the
distinctive stances on sexuality in each region. Contrary to the present situation, Middle
Eastern societies of the 1600s to 1800s were seen, by European travellers, to be shamefully
adventurous when it came to sex. Memoirs written by several European travellers condemn
the unabashed expression of pederastic love and general lasciviousness in ‘the orient’
(El-Rouayheb 2005). Similar ‘accusations’ would later be echoed by Arab intellectuals who,
besides having their own reservations regarding some European socio-sexual practices,
lauded them (the Europeans) for their rejection of same-sex attraction/desire (Massad 2007).
So, what was behind this seemingly radical change of perspective?
In recounting the story of the British occupation of Egypt in 1882, Pollard (2005) described
the use of ‘domestic images to classify non-Western subjects’ as a tactic that was frequently
used by the British colonial forces (in Egypt as well as other occupied territories) to justify
their need to intervene and remain in the colony. By ‘domestic images’, Pollard was referring
to (sometimes exaggerated) culture-specific domestic and familial practices in those targeted
societies, which were not in line with Victorian domestic values. These included, for example,
polygamy and harems in Egypt,4 and sati (widow burning) and child marriage in India. This
deviance was taken to be a sign of backwardness and political ineptitude, necessitating the
replacement of the Egyptian ruling elite with concerned British forces. It is therefore not
surprising that, in reaction to that rationale, demonstrating the existence of ‘modern’,
Victorian-style families in Egypt became somewhat of a national mission – a call for
independence and a sign that Egyptians were qualified to lead their own country (ibid.).
Pollard (2005) emphasised that the transformation in domestic values in Egypt had started
prior to the British occupation, in response to political and economic reforms that took place
throughout the Mohammad ‘Ali dynasty. Massad (2007) recounted similar events, adding that
it was Arab politicians and intellectuals who, in their panic over the supposed deterioration of
Arab civilisation in the eighteenth century and their desire to establish a new, anti-Ottoman,
Egyptian national identity, started adopting Western domestic values in response to Western
assessments of Arab culture – values that relied, in part, on sex/sexuality as a means of
appraisal.
These intellectuals readily accepted European appraisals of Egyptian culture and started
pushing for an adherence to Victorian ethics as a means of advancing the country. Among
the denounced practices was the Arabs’ perceived inclination toward same-sex sexual
relations, a reputation that was mainly based on the popularity of Arabic poetry that was
‘pederastic in tone’ (El-Rouayheb 2005: 1). Such ‘ungodly’ practices that did not conform to
the ‘heteronormal’ religious (Christian) values that had started to dominate European morality
circa the seventeenth century had to be eliminated to make way for a modern/civilised
national identity deemed conducive to progress and worthy of independence.
Hopwood (1999) described these practices as being part of a set of generalisations that
informed European beliefs about the Orient at the time. Imprinting irrationality,
backwardness, and lasciviousness on the East as a whole helped justify the West’s
perceived need to control the region. Hence, despite being under French control, Lebanon
did not fare much differently than Egypt.

4

According to Pollard (2005), Egyptians had already started to phase out polygamy and Europeanise their domestic practices
before the British occupation.
6

Hanssen (2006) discussed the strong link that came to be emphasised between what were
regarded by the French as backwardly social practices and disease-inducing hygienic failure
in Lebanon and Syria. ‘“[I]rregularities” of the sexual behavior and individual habits reflected
larger deficiencies of the social organism’, deficiencies that necessitated French intervention
to restore the natural order (Hanssen 2006: 78). This anxiety about hygiene is thought to
have been driven by a fear for the safety of the European community in Beirut, whose
residences were not segregated from the local community in this particular colony. While
fears of cultural degeneracy were shared by local intellectuals in Beirut, the locals’ criticism
of the prevailing cultural/social norms is believed to have been a genuine attempt to advance
society rather than undermine Lebanon’s autonomy as the French did.

2.1

Reversing roles

Constructed scenarios of cultural degeneracy in European colonial conquests gave new
weight to moral conduct in Lebanon and Egypt pre- and post-independence (Pollard 2005).
Sexual restraint and chastity would continue to be defining characteristics of Arab culture,
even after losing their potency among the French and the British. A newly developing sense
of nationalism, with people striving for a distinct national identity post-independence, also
helped cement those qualities. In fact, the development of sexually restrictive laws in Egypt
and Beirut under colonial rule is arguably thought to have been done out of appeasement to
nationalists and the more conservative elements of both societies (Human Rights Watch
2004; Abbani n.d.).5 These elements were not only fighting against European immorality, but
against the idea of colonialism as a whole.6
While neither the Lebanese nor the Egyptian laws explicitly mention same-sex sexual
relations among the list of prohibited sexual practices, the laws are written vaguely enough to
allow for the inclusion of a wide variety of practices if needed. Article 534 of the Lebanese
Penal Code prohibits ‘Any sexual intercourse contrary to the order of nature’ (Al Farchichi
and Saghiyeh 2009), while Article 9(c) of Law 10/1961 in Egypt punishes ‘whoever habitually
engages in debauchery or prostitution’ (Human Rights Watch 2004). Neither ‘nature’ in the
Lebanese article nor Egypt’s ‘debauchery’ are defined, making it possible for the state to
include any practice that it deems unfavourable.7 Until very recently, any form of SGN
behaviour would have easily qualified for either charge.8
Amid present-day representations of the West as the global guardian of ‘LGBT people’
(Anderson 2015), and the common misconception that their prohibition in the Arabo-Islamic
World stems from religious or cultural influences, it is important to bear one point in mind.
That is, the (arguably major) role played by the West in promoting ‘acceptable sexual
practices’ and introducing the idea of criminalising unacceptable practices in the first place
(Makarem 2011). This is not meant to suggest there was complete tolerance of SGN
behaviour in the Arab world prior to colonisation – El-Rouayheb (2005) discusses other
standards that were used to judge/determine the acceptability of ‘non-heterosexual’ relations9
– but rather, to identify one of the important influences on the current social/legal status of
SGNs in the Arab world.

5

It has also been argued that this theory stands only in the case of British colonies, as the French Penal Code of 1791
decriminalised consensual sodomy between adults (i.e. before the French mandate in Syria and Lebanon in the 1900s). See
Han and O’Mahoney (2014).
6
In Egypt, this manifested as a call by secular nationalists and the Muslim Brotherhood to shut down licensed brothels (Long
2004).
7
For example, an article in Youm7 online newspaper reports the arrest of six female dancers on charges of ‘incitement to
immorality and debauchery’ (Abd-Alrady 2015). Lundqvist (2008) speaks of Article 534 not being used ‘in its full capacity, but
primarily [being] used to violate the privacy of LGBT persons’.
8
Recent developments in Lebanon, discussed later in this report, have challenged the viability of continuing to classify
homosexuality as unnatural.
9
El-Rouayheb considers ‘homosexuality’ to be an anachronism when discussing Arabic/Islamic history. The term conflates
several sexual and non-sexual practices, some of which were more acceptable than others in previous eras (e.g. same-sex anal
intercourse was thought to be forbidden in Islam, while non-penetrative sex was less frowned upon).
7

3

Methodology

The sensitivity of this topic and the particularly sensitive conditions facing sexual and gender
nonconformists (SGNs) at the time of writing this report (especially in Egypt) has ruled out
the option of conducting full-scale primary research. As I explain later, rumours of ongoing
mass surveillance of social media in Egypt have, understandably, made many people
unwilling to openly participate in this research. Fortunately, because most forms of SGNrelated sexual rights activism are digital in Egypt (and digitised in Lebanon), the information
required to cover that aspect of the report was found on social networking sites (namely
Facebook and Twitter). This information was in the public domain at the time the research
was conducted and had already been publicised by its authors. Since most of the content
used was either posted anonymously or under pseudonyms (by unofficial organisations),10
this eliminated the threat of revealing too much about the creators’ personal identities.
Information on Lebanon was more easily accessible given the institutionalisation of its sexual
rights movement. The official website for HELEM, a Lebanese organisation supporting LGBT
rights, provides a wide range of studies (in English and Arabic) about Lebanon’s LGBT
movement. The Lebanese non-profit ‘Raynbow’ provides up-to-date information on a wide
range of issues (through news, blogs and events) on the Lebanese LGBT Media Monitor
page on Facebook. I was also able to use interviews conducted with two Lebanese activists
as part of the field research for a forthcoming IDS study by Yasamin Alkhansa and Elizabeth
Mills on the connections between sexuality laws and poverty; these interviews were
conducted in 2014 and 2015, and excerpts have been included in discussion with the study’s
authors given their interrelated focus.
Given this report’s concern with contemporary socio-political changes in Lebanon and Egypt,
online newspapers and blogs served as an important source of information. Many academic
journal articles and books were used for information on (and analyses of) events relating to
SGNs in both countries. Access to books and digital libraries was provided by the University
of Sussex Library and the British Library for Development Studies.

10

With the exception of information on Ramy Youssef’s queer activism locally and internationally.
8

4

Egypt and Lebanon: post-independence to
present

Post-independence, social and political conditions in Egypt and Lebanon were drastically
different. While Lebanon struggled with a weak state and demographic tensions over the
growing social, political and economic inequality among its religiously diverse population,
culminating in a 15-year civil war (1975–90), Egypt went through a series of dictatorships and
managed to maintain a relatively harmonious populace as it engaged in physical and political
wars with external enemies (such as Israel and the United States (US)). Both countries
retained colonial-era laws used to prosecute people suspected of engaging in sexual and
gender nonconformist behaviour.
Until today, these kinds of behaviour are still largely considered to be harmful and deviant.
Eliminating such behaviour is portrayed as a way to protect society and preserve Arab
culture and masculinity (Human Rights Watch 2013b). Religious views on sexual and gender
nonconformity – widely thought to be unfavourable in both countries – are often used to
reinforce social and state hostility towards SGNs (Berkouwer, Sultan and Yehia 2015; Sobhy
2014b; HELEM n.d.a).
The previous section reviewed historical attitudes towards sexual and gender nonconformity
in the Arab world and Europe, and how they came to influence social and legal attitudes
towards SGN behaviour. This section reviews the subsequent developments in both
countries under the influence of laws such as Article 534 of the Lebanese Penal Code, which
prohibits sexual intercourse that is ‘contrary to nature’, and Article 9(c) of Egypt’s ‘Law on the
Combating of Prostitution’, which prohibits the habitual practice of debauchery. The aim is to
track events that suggest a change in attitudes towards SGNs in both countries.

4.1

Lebanon

One could argue that in Lebanon, the civil war and its resultant transformations played a
crucial role in allowing the creation of ‘queer space’, the introduction of an LGBT politics of
human rights, and the subsequent organisation of a small LGBT community (Merabet 2014;
Moussawi 2013; Gagné 2012). While the Lebanese state had already been weak before the
war,11 a decade and a half of conflict completely undermined its power, eventually rendering
it unable to provide for the basic needs of its citizens. This necessitated the presence of
strong CSOs in Lebanon. The state’s perpetual weakness helped CSOs operate freely and
with little government intervention.
Moreover, the emigration of hundreds of thousands of people from Lebanon during the war
(some of whom returned after it ended) is thought to have aided the introduction of foreign
lifestyles/identities to Lebanon. ‘Lebanese who had moved to the US or Europe for safety
also returned, often with teenage families who had grown up abroad and acquired a Western
lifestyle’ (Whitaker 2011: 48). ‘[W]ar weariness’ had allegedly elicited a general tolerance of
diversity in Lebanon (ibid.), helping these new subjectivities to become accepted (albeit
selectively). It was under these conditions that Lebanon’s pro-LGBT movement emerged.

11

The Lebanese state had been weak before the war, possibly due to rampant clientelism, which has a very long history in
Lebanon. The benefits afforded to political leaders by such a system are thought to have strengthened their interests in
alienating the state, which was seen as a competitor. (See Najem 2012 for various theories regarding the collapse of the
Lebanese Government.)
9

Azzi (2011) and Makarem (2011) – both cofounders of HELEM, the Arab world’s first and
leading ‘LGBTIQ’ organisation (HELEM’s own terminology)12 – recount the history of
Lebanon’s LGBT movement, starting with the early efforts to amass and communicate
online. In a context where ‘unnatural intercourse’ is legally punishable and socially
unacceptable, the internet served as a private and secure medium through which Lebanon’s
SGNs could ‘[create] spaces to satisfy their needs’ (Makarem 2011: 102). Azzi (2011)
mentions one of the more popular online groups, gaylebanon, which eventually turned into
an underground society, Club-Free, which would later register with the Ministry of Interior
under the name HELEM (in 2004).
In the early 2000s, these small formal and informal groups started organising events to
highlight the struggles they faced and to spread awareness on issues of sexuality and
gender identity – thereby confirming the emergence of an LGBT community in Lebanon (Azzi
2011; Makarem 2011). Their demands would soon be echoed by other, more wellestablished Lebanese human rights organisations such as the Multi-Initiative on Rights:
Search, Assist and Defend (MIRSAD) and Hurriyat Khassa (HELEM n.d.a.). Realising their
shared interest in fighting the state’s obstruction of the right to privacy and freedom of
expression, many more CSOs joined the fight against Article 534 for its capacity to infringe
upon those rights.
The mere factor (sic) that Article 534 exists means that, as an LGBT individual you
are a second-class citizen, a criminal, and you cannot seek protection from police if
you get harassed, if your family specially is harassing you or if you are facing any
kind of blackmailing, which are realities of day-to-day lives of a lot of LGBTI
individuals in Lebanon.
(Azzi 2015)
The establishment of HELEM and its increased visibility through ‘LGBTIQ’ activism and
service provision brought more negative attention for SGNs in the media (Azzi 2011). But its
growing network, which included regional and international organisations, eventually led to its
recognition by local and governmental structures, hence facilitating its dealings with the
police (Dabaghi, Mack and Jaalouk 2009).
In 2005, HELEM started collaborating with the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health to raise
awareness of HIV/AIDS among local SGNs. The Ministry would later become the first
governmental agency to call for the decriminalisation of homosexuality in Lebanon in 2008 as
part of its strategy for combating HIV/AIDS. In 2012, the Lebanese Order of Physicians
denounced anal tests, occasionally used as evidence of sodomy,13 rendering them
ineffectual and a form of torture (Human Rights Watch 2012). That same year, the Lebanese
Minister of Justice joined in by publicly announcing his opposition to anal tests (Littauer
2012). In 2013, the Lebanese Psychiatric Society released a statement declaring that it does
not consider ‘homosexuality’ to be a mental disorder (LebMASH 2013), does not recommend
its treatment, that homosexuality itself does not result in any mental defects, and that it is not
a consequence of ‘disturbances in the family dynamic or unbalanced psychological
development’ (Littauer 2013).
The Lebanese judiciary has yet to follow in these footsteps by adjusting or eliminating Article
534 of the Penal Code. In fact, the arrest of 28 people at a Turkish bathhouse in 2014 saw
additional criminal charges used to penalise SGN behaviour (i.e. Articles 531 and 532,
HELEM is an acronym for ‘Lebanese Protection for Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transgenders’ (HELEM n.d.b). The
organisation’s official Facebook page refers to it as an ‘LGBTIQ organization’ (HELEM n.d.c), hence my reference to it as an
LGBTIQ organisation. LGBTIQ is an acronym for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual/transgender, intersex, queer/questioning.
However, HELEM’s website states that the organisation also stands for the rights of ‘persons with non-conforming sexuality or
gender identity’ (HELEM n.d.b). The term ‘helem’ itself is the Arabic word for ‘dream’.
13
Introduced by Forensic Study of Assaults Against Decency, a French medical book published in 1857.
12

10

sanctioning acts that infringe on public morals and ethics) (Wansa 2014). Saleh and Qubaia
(2015) also mention Article 521,14 which is used to harass and arrest people who fail/refuse
to comply with the male/female gender binary, especially ‘transwomen’.15
However, two recent judicial rulings have worked to undermine Article 534. In 2009,
Lebanese judge Mounir Suleiman voiced his objection to its ambiguity during the trial of two
men who had been suspected of engaging in same-sex sexual relations. Suleiman pointed
out that not only does the definition of ‘nature’ change by time and ‘according to the mood of
a society’, but that humans are an element of nature and their behaviour should, therefore,
not be considered contradictory to it (Human Rights Watch 2013a: 11).
More recently, in 2014, a ‘transsexual’ woman who had been accused of violating Article 534
by engaging in ‘acts of sodomy’ and group sex (The Legal Agenda 2014) was acquitted by
Judge Naji Dahdah on the grounds of insufficient evidence and not meeting his interpretation
of the Article. In his ruling, Dahdah used the ambiguity of the Article’s phrasing (i.e. the lack
of an official definition of what constitutes ‘sexual intercourse that is contrary to the order of
nature’) to conclude that ‘the issue [is left] to the discretion of the judiciary on a case-by-case
basis’. Dahdah conceded that although gender dysphoria might deviate from the norm, it
should not be considered unnatural (Makhlouf 2014).
Despite a steady increase in the number of pro-LGBT organisations16 and public figures in
Lebanon, sexual and gender nonconformity continues to be criminalised and widely
stigmatised. While few SGNs are being indicted, police harassment of this population group
– encouraged and legitimised by the web of anti-SGN laws – is alive and well (Lundqvist
2008; Zeidan 2014). While local and international pro-LGBT organisations provide some
social and legal backing for some SGNs in Lebanon, it is important to note that people’s
access to such protection often depends on various factors, including their socioeconomic
class, ethnicity and nationality. While the particularities of such complexities are beyond the
scope of this report, suffice to say that pro-LGBT organisations in Lebanon only manage to
provide protection to a limited number of their constituents (Benoist 2014). In fact, Massad
(2007) believes that they have, on the contrary, contributed to the hardships faced by SGNs
– pointing to their alleged role in prompting the social estrangement of, and resistance to,
SGN behaviour in the Arab world by introducing and promoting foreign sexual identities,
lifestyles and sexual epistemologies.
A 2013 study estimated that 80 per cent of the Lebanese population do not think that
homosexuality should be acceptable (Pew Research Center 2013). Lebanese police and
judiciary continue to target SGNs, particularly those from the most disadvantaged parts of
society (Littauer 2014; Makarem 2011; Human Rights Watch 2013a; Azzi 2015), arresting
and detaining them over unsubstantiated charges (Human Rights Watch 2013a). However,
some of Lebanon’s SGNs can now count on the social and legal backing of a steadily
growing pro-SGN circle.

4.2

Egypt

Following the complete withdrawal of British troops from Egypt in 1956, the country
underwent a series of dictatorships, which started with President Gamal Abdel Nasser in
1956 and is continuing – arguably, and to a lesser extent – under al-Sisi in 2014. Nasser’s
use of the state as a ‘tool for structuring and controlling the population’ (Russell 2013) is a
practice that was continued long after his death. This was made possible by the relative
14

Article 521 of the Lebanese Penal Code forbids men from dressing up like women and entering areas that are designated for
women only.
15
‘Transwoman’ is an abbreviation of transgender woman.
16
e.g. Meem, an offshoot of HELEM for LBTQ women; The Arab Foundation for Freedoms and Equality; Marsa, a sexual health
centre that started as an initiative by HELEM; and Proud Lebanon, a non-profit organisation that advocates and provides legal
and medical services to ‘marginalized groups’ in ‘Lebanon and the region’ (Proud Lebanon 2014).
11

stability of Egypt’s central political authority compared with Lebanon, possibly because of the
relative homogeneity of Egypt’s population. This, however, has allowed for the centralisation
of power in the hands of the state and the application of laws that restrict civil society groups,
and specifically those that challenge the authority of the state.
Agati (2007) points out that the antagonistic relationship between the state and CSOs in
Egypt only started to develop when CSOs diversified their activities beyond apolitical
philanthropy, under the rule of Nasser. Agati describes a sort of ‘social pact of development’
between the citizens and the state, which authorised the disregard of democracy as long as
the state was able to provide for its citizens in a basic way.
One aspect of this pact was Egypt’s Emergency Law, enforced during the Arab-Israeli war in
1967, suspended temporarily during Anwar Sadat’s rule, then re-imposed after his
assassination and throughout Mubarak’s rule. The law suspended constitutional rights and
expanded the powers of the police, allowing for the unwarranted arrest of citizens and the
restriction of non-governmental political activities. Naturally, this strongly hampered the
formation and operation of many CSOs, particularly those the state did not approve of. Just
as with laws that were used to prosecute ‘debauchers’, Mubarak-era laws governing CSOs
were phrased ambiguously enough to allow the state to obstruct the formation/operation of a
broad range of groups (Agati 2007).
Moreover, the country’s political make-up since the Mubarak era is thought to have played an
important role in its stance towards SGN behaviour. In attempting to explain the logic behind
the Egyptian state’s acute targeting of sexual dissent post-2001, several scholars have
referred to it as a case of a pseudo-secular autocratic state that is fending off a fairly
influential Islamist opposition whose claim to power is reinforced by their claims to piety. The
persecution of SGNs is thought to be an easy way to gain religious credentials17 and to
distract people from the state’s other failures (Bahgat 2001; El Menyawi 2006b; Pratt 2007).
Like Lebanon, Egypt still retains its colonial-era laws regulating sex. Although Egypt’s ‘antidebauchery’ law had originally been introduced with the intent of outlawing sex work –
historically a legal practice in Egypt – the introduction of the Arabic term fujur (i.e.
debauchery) in the process of revising the law was allegedly meant to emphasise the fact
that the law covered commercial sex between men too (Human Rights Watch 2004).18
However, the broadness of the term and its detachment from commerciality allows for its
current interpretation, which penalises commercial as well as non-commercial sex between
consenting adult males. It is interesting to note that, unlike the situation in Lebanon, Egypt’s
legal position on female same-sex sexual practices is ‘unclear’ (Itaborahy and Zhu 2014: 33)
and arguably non-existent.
In its 2014 report on state-sponsored homophobia, the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual,
Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA) lists several other clauses that are sometimes used to
prosecute men suspected of deviant sexual practices in Egypt. Among these are: Article
98(f) of Law 58/1937, which prohibits, among other actions ‘[Exploiting] religion in advocating
and propagating by talk or in writing, or by any other method, extremist thoughts with the aim
of contempting (sic) any of the heavenly religions’; and Article 296 of the same law,
punishing ‘Whoever is found on a public road or a traveled and frequented place inciting the
passersby with signals or words to commit indecency’ (Itaborahy and Zhu 2014: 33).
Although Egypt’s Constitution does not explicitly prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual
orientation or gender identity (Mouzourakis n.d.), the state’s harassment of SGNs clearly
17

While most Muslim-majority countries consider Islam to be prohibitive of same-sex sexual relations, it has more recently been
argued by – mostly Western – scholars that such interpretations of Islam are a product of homophobic cultures rather than an
objective reading of the script (see Kugle 2010).
18
Da’ara, the Arabic word for sex work, was erroneously thought to mean female sex work only.
12

contradicts Articles 58 and 57 of the current constitution,19 guaranteeing respect for the
private lives of citizens and the sanctity of their homes respectively. In addition to that,
Human Rights Watch (2004) pointed out how such behaviour conflicts with several terms in
the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), an international agreement
to which Egypt is a signatory.
Perhaps the most prominent incident of state-led abuse of SGNs was 2001’s Queen Boat
trial, in which around 5220 allegedly ‘gay’ men were arrested on suspicions of ‘sexual
perversion’ from various streets, homes, and a club located on the Queen Boat (Pratt 2007).
The men were subjected to severe verbal and physical abuse while in detention (Massad
2007; El Menyawi 2006a), a practice that was not uncommon with many prisoners in Egypt
at the time (Amnesty International 2001). Similar to their counterparts in Lebanon, the
suspects reported undergoing anal testing, supposedly to confirm their culpability (Massad
2007). The men were tried in an Emergency State Security Court, a structure that had been
established in 1981 to deal with cases that threatened national security after the
assassination of the Egyptian president, Anwar al-Sadat.21 The men were tried twice; once
starting in July 2001, and the second time around May 2002 after the then president,
Mubarak, ordered their retrial (Pratt 2007). Around half the men were found guilty of ‘habitual
debauchery’, while one defendant (who was not present on the Queen Boat) was charged
with ‘contempt of religion’ (Pratt 2007: 132).
The prominence of this case does not stem so much from the nature of the ‘crime’ or the
number of suspects implicated, but has more to do with the unanticipated level of media
attention the trials received. State-controlled media published several fabricated accounts of
what had taken place on the Queen Boat, sometimes including the names, addresses,
workplaces, and pictures of defendants prior to the verdicts. This made life after the trial
difficult for many of the men involved (Pratt 2007; Whitaker 2011; Human Rights Watch
2004). Also, the (supposed) novelty and exoticism of the ‘phenomenon’ were emphasised,
sometimes linking its emergence in Egypt to non-Muslim, non-Arab countries like the US and
Israel.
A 2004 report published by Human Rights Watch claims that 179 men have been arrested or
detained in Egypt under the charge of debauchery since 2001. Human Rights Watch
concedes that, ‘in all probability’, its records represent ‘a minuscule percentage of the true
total’ (Human Rights Watch 2004: 1). And even though Egypt’s campaign against ‘sexual
perversion’ seemed to fade out between 2004 and 2013, possibly due to pressure from
international organisations like Human Rights Watch (Azimi 2006), erratic arrests continued
during that period. For example, in 2008, Human Rights Watch reported the arrest of more
than 24 men in Cairo and Alexandria (between 2007 and 2008) on suspicion of being HIVpositive, which was sometimes taken to be evidence of ‘homosexuality’. On testing positive,
the men would be chained to their hospital beds and eventually convicted of engaging in
habitual debauchery.
In 2011, following the overthrow of Mubarak’s 30-year dictatorship, hopes were high for a
new democratically elected leadership that would bring to fruition the main demands of the
revolution – ‘bread, freedom, and social justice’. However, initial enthusiasm quickly
collapsed with the military’s assumption of power following Mubarak’s removal in 2011,
maintaining the status quo. The near domination of executive and legislative power by the
Muslim Brotherhood (an Egyptian religious, social, and political movement) between mid2012 and 2013 made the prospect of sexual liberation seem less likely.
Article numbers used here correspond to Egypt’s current constitution. Same articles could be found in the 1971–2011
constitution which was operative during the Mubarak era (Articles 10 and 11).
20
The exact number differs from one source to another.
21
Mubarak, al-Sadat’s successor, allowed for the continuation of the unconstitutional ‘state of emergency’ in Egypt, allowing the
state to arrest citizens without due process.
19

13

However, it was after the Brotherhood’s forceful removal from power by former army chief
Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, and his subsequent assumption of power, that the state’s attention was
reverted back to morality policing. The result was heightened surveillance and penalisation of
SGN behaviour (comparable to 2001–04 attitudes), specifically men practising same-sex
sexual relations and ‘transgender’ women (Alga’fary 2014; El-Sayyid 2014; Sobhy 2014a;
Trew 2014). This was part of a general crackdown on many forms of political and social
dissent in the country during that time as a means of protecting the nation:
The absence of morals from the present-day scene has allowed some people [to
stoop to] this level of baseness. This burdens us with a great responsibility towards
our religion, our nation, and our traditional cultural values, which reject perversion and
perverts, delinquency and delinquents, those who deviate from the society’s values,
customs, and established traditions; and those who promote obscenity, promiscuity,
and debauchery under any designation… [actions which] any honest patriot… would
refuse to engage in. (Own translation) Egypt’s Minister of Religious Endowments,
Mohamed Mokhtar Goma’a.
(Abd-Elrahman 2014)
Amid largely unfavourable views on ‘homosexuality’ in Egypt (Pew Research Center 2013),
Egyptian human rights organisations are most often reluctant to get involved in cases for fear
of aggravating their already insecure standing. However, recent assaults and rumours of
heightened online surveillance – part of a war on terror and debauchery – have elicited
organised online responses by anonymous ‘LGBT’ activists (Malone and Shiloach 2014). In
April 2014, Facebook and Twitter campaigns were launched in protest against discrimination
on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in Egypt. The creators of the events
claim that in the span of almost one year ‘the police has arrested more than 80 people for the
“crime” of being gay or transgender’ (Stop Homophobia & Transphobia in Egypt 2014). The
campaign, the name of which translates to ‘Homosexuality is Not a Crime’, encouraged
people to blog and tweet for two consecutive days, using an Arabic hashtag that translates to
‘Against Imprisoning Homosexuals’.
A similar campaign was run in September 2014 in an attempt to draw wider attention towards
the unjust treatment of Egypt’s ‘LGBTQ’ community and prompt an international ‘solidarity
protest… To tell both, the society and the Egyptian government, that people with diverse
sexualities and gender identities can’t be punished for who they are’ (Tan 2014). The
campaign would soon expand to include a protest against Blue Coat Systems. The
California-based internet security firm stands accused of selling the Egyptian Government
the programme that is to be used for its (allegedly more extensive and proficient) internet
surveillance – a claim that the government and the company deny (Iaccino 2014).
A self-proclaimed non-profit organisation that goes by the name Solidarity with Egypt LGBT
(SELGBT) claims to be responsible for organising both campaigns (SELGBT 2014). The
number of people involved and their identities are difficult to confirm given the warranted
anonymity of such organisations. Mada Masr, an independent Egyptian online newspaper
that carried an interview with SELGBT, claims that the ‘members are Egyptian but wish to
remain anonymous’ (Magid 2014). However, not all activists opt for anonymity. In 2013,
Egyptian gay rights activist Ramy Youssef, ‘the first Egyptian to come out on Twitter’,
organised a similar campaign in response to rampant homophobia on social networking
websites (Carr 2013). ‘[T]housands and thousands of people were tweeting against
homophobia using this hashtag’, Youssef claimed, while giving a speech at Amsterdam Gay
Pride in 2014. ‘That’s exactly when I knew that LGBTIQs in Egypt [no longer wish to] stay
silent’, he said (RNW 2014).

14

Although some of these campaigns have succeeded in attracting international attention (see
Tan 2014; Lopez 2014; Magid 2014), their reach in Egypt has been fairly limited thus far.
The general unpopularity of SGNs tends to marginalise them from other segments of society
and discourage opportunities for overt cooperation and support, leaving them an easy target
for state abuse.
In explaining the factors that contributed to the success of LGBT activism in Lebanon as
opposed to Egypt, Azzi (2015), in an interview with Yasamin Alkhansa, said:
Media played a key role in changing police practices [in Lebanon]… Police had to
take a step back and explain themselves… because of the aggressive reaction from
the media. If I want to compare that with what is happening in Egypt… the media was
actually encouraging the police to do more work and clean the society from LGBT
individuals, which increased the number of arrests and entrapment via social
applications.
Moreover, the continued existence of prohibitive laws in Egypt and their frequent abuse by
the state inhibits the formation of an SGN community, as has happened in Lebanon and the
West, that can work towards protecting its own rights or accessing services crucial to the
development and safety of their own members (such as healthcare, education and
employment) as well as other people.
Take the example of Nesma, a 23-year-old woman who was designated as male at birth
(DMAB),22 one of six DMAB women who were arrested in an apartment in Cairo in May 2014,
accused of running a sex work operation (Samir 2014). The following exchange occurs
between Nesma, an interviewer from the Egyptian newspaper Al-Youm Al-Sabi’, and an
unidentified man who is most likely a police officer at the detention centre:
Interviewer: Have you had a [sex change] operation?
Nesma: I want to have an operation, of course, but the operation…
Man: No! They are all male. All male.
Interviewer (addressing the officer): [According to the] ID card?
Man: [According to the] ID cards, they are males. [They have] male genitalia
Interviewer (addressing Nesma): Continue
Nesma: I consulted with a doctor for some time. I took hormones so I can get a [sex
change] operation. The operation is not carried out in Egypt, it’s carried out in
Thailand. It is very costly. That is all.
…
Interviewer: Where are your parents?
Nesma: My parents are still here,23 but they have completely rejected me.
…
Nesma: I can’t get an honourable job. They will ask for my ID and papers… If I gave
them my papers, they would think they’re forged.
…
Interviewer: Have you had an education?
Nesma: No, I left school due to [verbal] abuse and these kinds of things
(Own translation) (Samir 2014)

Popularly referred to as ‘transwomen’. The Arabic newspaper reporting this incident refers to Nesma as a ‘Mukhannath’
(Samir 2014). Mukhannath is the Arabic word for ‘effeminate’. It is sometimes used to refer to effeminate men (Lagrange 2000)
and is commonly used to refer to transgender women.
23
i.e. alive.
22

15

This case perfectly highlights how sexual rights and the rights to education, work, and health
intersect. The stigma attached to sexual and gender nonconformity, reinforced by the law,
obstructed Nesma’s access to education as a child and to ‘honourable’ employment later in
life; it limited her access to healthcare, and forced24 her to pursue a profession that is illegal
in Egypt, leading to her subsequent arrest.
Due to the current shortage of information on similar cases in Egypt, it is not possible to
determine how many other people face the same fate as Nesma. However, it is not
unreasonable to assume that other Egyptian DMAB women go through similar experiences.
Saleh and Qubaia (2015), in their study on the struggles of ‘transwomen’ in Lebanon, report
similar difficulties. The stigma attached to nonconforming gender identity and expression
limits the ability of Lebanese transgender women to navigate the city freely or access the
same jobs as other citizens. ‘[M]any transwomen are pushed [into] outdoors sex work’, which
is illegal in Lebanon, and some have reported being sexually abused by police and judges
following their arrest. HELEM’s Director of Fundraising and Strategic Planning, Tarek Zeidan,
reports a similar story:
… when a transwoman would like to get a job somewhere and her official
documents say male, good luck getting a job. So a lot of them end up being sex
workers. And once you get an indictment for being a sex worker or for having
drugs, you should forget about any embassy repatriating you, you can forget about
receiving any form of assistance outside grass-roots movements, like HELEM.
(Zeidan 2014)

24

At some point during the interview, Nesma informs the interviewer that, had she been given the option of not being a sex
worker, she would have gladly taken it (Samir 2014).
16

5

Conclusion

Neither Egypt nor Lebanon can be said to offer social or legal environments that are
supportive of sexual and gender nonconformists (SGNs) – at least not at the present time.
With the exception of restricted local efforts, there are no signs of an imminent change to the
social or legal standing of SGNs in Egypt. In Lebanon, the emergence of pro-LGBT
organisations has been a crucial step in their fight for social and legal rights and can be said
to have led to a shift in attitudes towards some SGNs. This shift is interpreted as a product of
socio-political factors that have been favourable to the introduction and emergence of new
subjectivities in Lebanon.
LGBT activism in Lebanon has allowed organisations like HELEM to provide legal and health
services for SGNs. But these services have arguably only succeeded in protecting a limited
number of individuals, typically the more affluent members of society, while ignoring – and, in
some cases, even harming – those from marginalised and disadvantaged groups, who either
do not or cannot identify with the ideas promoted by LGBT organisations (Makarem 2011;
Benoist 2014). Scholars such as Massad, for example, would argue that it is foreign and
foreign-funded organisations (like ILGA and HELEM respectively) that are helping create gay
communities in Lebanon by promoting Western sexual epistemologies and identity
categories. This, according to the author, problematises SGN behaviour and subsequently
elicits further intervention to support those communities (Massad 2007, 2015).
The discrimination experienced by SGNs in both countries has proven detrimental to the
wellbeing of the individuals concerned and the broader societies in which they live. But
promoting safety and freedom for SGNs that relies on their conflation with SGNs in the West
– or representing SGN behaviour as antithetical to long-established cultural and religious
values – is likely to give an inaccurate representation of SGNs in the region and their
struggles (see Borai’s statement at the start of this report). This, in turn, overshadows the
harms caused by discriminating against SGNs and further alienates them from society. This
is not meant to discourage local and international efforts to support and protect SGNs or hold
local and international activists fully responsible for the current conditions; rather, it suggests
the need to encourage them to adapt to the non-Western environments in which they
operate.
Furthermore, it is important to invalidate the hierarchical view of development, which
obscures the close links between sexuality and other, more popular issues. Doing so will not
necessarily spur on CSOs to adopt the issue of sexual rights – largely due to unfavourable
state and societal attitudes towards SGN behaviour. But it will, at the very least, refute
opinions suggesting an irrationality and impracticality in working simultaneously on various
pressing development issues, and highlight the need to start a serious national discourse to
address the issue.

17

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