The Egyptian government is cracking down on bloggers and writers who cover sectarian issues, journalist and website owner Hossam El-Hamalawy has said.

“To be frank, all the bloggers who have been arrested from their houses have been detained for [touching upon] religious matters. If other, [more politically oriented] bloggers are arrested, they are arrested at demonstrations," Hamalawy, whose blog is called 3arabawy (www.arabist.net/arabawy), told The Daily Star Egyp .

"[The government] lets people say what they want, but when they talk about sectarian issues, such as oppression of Coptic Christians or Islamic fundamentalist [rhetoric], they go nuts.”

El-Hamalawy mentioned numerous cases of bloggers who were arrested for commenting on sectarian issues, whether to highlight discrimination against Copts or, in one case, an Islamic fundamentalist who posted an anti-Coptic rant on his blog.

He added that in the case of political bloggers, they usually receive “phone threats … and intimidate you as in the case of Wael Abbas (a blogger who recently posted pictures of the alleged sexual attacks in downtown Cairo).”

On Monday, Abdel Karim Suliman Amer, also known as "Kareem Amer," a student blogger, was detained by state authorities and is being held in custody pending prosecution for his secular online writings in which he criticizes Islam, his lawyer told The Daily Star Egypt

The prosecutor’s office has remanded him for a further 15 days.

More, from the Daily Star. Here for Egypt blogs.