The widow of senior Al-Azhar holy man Emad Effat, who was killed this weekend in festivities between security forces and anti-government protesters, appeared in a YouTube video on Sunday in which she said her husband had been protesting outside the Cabinet building in downtown Cairo when he was shot in the chest by military personnel attempting to break up the ongoing sit-in by force. Her testimony included a refutation of rumours claiming that Dar Al-Ifta, in which he worked on religious edicts, had said Effat had not taken part in the protest but rather was killed while passing through the area.Nashwa Abdel-Tawab, Effat's widow and Ahram Weekly journalist, said in the video that her husband had been participating in popular demonstrations since Egypt's January uprising.
"During sit-ins at Tahrir Square, he would go to work in the morning and spend the night in the square," Abdel-Tawab recalled of her husband. "He wasn't able to join the Cabinet sit-in, but when he saw [the violence], he couldn't just stand and watch people dying, so he went down to the protest."
"He didn't advocate violence," she added. "He was there to show solidarity with the protesters."
Effat, senior clerk at Al-Azhar's influential Dar Al-Ifta religious authority, died on Friday of a gunshot wound sustained when military police attempted to violently dispersed the sit-in.
Effat's funeral was held on Saturday in the presence of thousands of mourners, including Al-Azhar officials, political activists and Coptic-Christian figures, including prominent Coptic priest Felopateer Gamil and members of the "Maspero Youth" Coptic activist group.