ON THE afternoon of Jan. 24, a young Egyptian poet and political activist joined other members of the secular Socialist Alliance Party in peacefully attempting to lay flowers in Cairo s Tahrir Square in memory of those killed in the 2011 revolution. According to witnesses and videos, masked police fired birdshot into the group from behind at close range; Shaimaa al-Sabbagh , the mother of a 5-year-old, died in the arms of a friend.

Shaimaa el-Sabbagh, a 31-year-old mother and a poet, was shot by masked riot police officers on Jan. 24 while laying flowers in Tahrir Square. She and other activists had come to mark the fourth anniversary of the start of Egypt s Arab Spring uprising. Attempts by friends and bystanders to save her life failed. Ms. Sabbagh s funeral the next day in Alexandria drew crowds of mourners. Ms. Sabbagh has become a symbol of the Egyptian authorities intolerance of protest.

Egyptians have returned to Tahrir Square to rally against the military junta's reactivation of Mubarak-era emergency laws, and Amnesty International has described the move as the biggest threat to human rights in the country since the revolution of 25 January.