Alaa Abd el-Fattah knows about hunger strikes. When I was locked up in a cell next to him in Cairo’s notorious Tora prison in early 2014, he and I would stride the exercise yard discussing Egyptian politics, history, political reform, and – yes – forms of protest and resistance, including starving yourself.

Hunger strikes, he explained, are the ultimate tool of the powerless. When all other forms of agency are stripped away, all that remains is to exercise control over the one thing left: your own body. That would become my first lesson in strikes.

Alaa is Egypt’s best-known political prisoner. He was one of the young, social media-savvy activists who helped move millions of Egyptians on to the streets in the revolution of 2011. Because of his popularity, charisma and capacity to mobilise people, he also has the dubious distinction of being locked up by every regime since he’s been alive (including several that lasted barely a year).

Soon after I arrived at Tora, Alaa and a group of other activists launched their own hunger strike to force the prison to respect our rights. We were only allowed two hours of exercise a day, and one family visit every two weeks; both in clear violation of Egypt’s own laws that said prisoners in pre-trial detention were entitled to four hours of exercise and weekly visits. They had already smuggled out letters to the press announcing the strike.

At mealtimes, trays of food would clatter to the floor in the corridor outside the strikers’ cells as they shouted their demands. At times it got heated, with the guards insisting they were weighing the food and knew the prisoners were secretly eating (they weren’t). But in the end, after a week of rancour, Alaa and his colleagues won. The prison authorities backed down, fearing a ferocious public backlash should any of the prisoners die.

And that’s........

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