London
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Usama Ghanem learned the stifling censorship that shrouded public spaces in Egypt early in life, and still recalls criticizing the “stupid” regime under former President Hosni Mubarak in elementary school. Immediately, his teacher hushed him.
“Nobody was allowed to say anything,” Ghanem, now a 22-year-old student in London, told CNN in December. “When you are in opposition to the regime, everyone makes you feel that you’re a crazy person.”
A child of the Arab Spring, Ghanem grew up under the shadow of authoritarianism in Cairo. He remembers witnessing first-hand the “horrifying” Rabaa massacre in 2013 and says he was politically persecuted by…