Middle East and North Africa
Middle East and North Africa
DECEMBER 9, 2025
CIVICUS Monitor data shows continued repression and arbitrary detention across Middle East and North Africa
- Middle East and North Africa most repressed region on Earth
- Israel and Oman downgraded in annual ratings
- Prolonged, arbitrary detention of human rights defenders and journalists defining feature of political repression in the region
The CIVICUS Monitor announced in a new report Tuesday that the Middle East and North Africa is the most repressed region on Earth. Across the region, prolonged and arbitrary detention of human rights defenders and journalists is a defining feature of political repression by governments and armed groups. Numerous countries also weaponised their judicial systems, including by using the death penalty to try to silence human rights defenders.
The annual data and ratings report, People Power Under Attack 2025, finds that out of 19 countries in the Middle East and North Africa, ten are rated “Closed,” seven “Repressed,” and two “Obstructed, making it the only region in the world with no countries rated as “Open” or “Narrowed.” Two countries’ ratings changed in 2025, with both Israel and Oman downgraded.
“The civic space picture in the Middle East and North is extremely bleak,” said Sylvia Mbataru. “As more governments and armed groups clamp down with arbitrary arrests, prolonged imprisonments and brutal weaponisation of judicial systems, it is becoming harder and harder for people to speak out and participate meaningfully in public life.”
Israel dropped from the middle tier “Obstructed” to the second lowest tier “Repressed” following government moves to undermine civic freedoms and democratic checks and balances. Authorities restricted civil society, eroded judicial independence, and silenced opposition to the ongoing genocide in Gaza, while repressing and threatening Palestinian citizens of Israel for social media activity and banning the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees from operating in Israel.
Israel’s genocide in Gaza continues. Over the past year, Israel has killed and detained journalists and humanitarian workers, bombed and destroyed civilian homes and infrastructure, engineered a systematic starvation policy and enforced a policy of arbitrary arrests and detention, torture, ill-treatment and enforced disappearance of Palestinians from Gaza. Civic space in the Occupied Palestinian Territories had already been classified as “Closed” following years of Israeli control.
“The genocide in Gaza is first and foremost absolutely devastating to the Palestinian people, but it is also fuelling worsening repression within Israel itself,” said Sylvia Mbataru. “Meanwhile, Omani authorities have further tightened their grip, cementing the Gulf’s reputation as the most repressed part of the most repressed region on Earth.”
Oman downgraded from “Repressed” to “Closed,” joining the majority of the Gulf states at the lowest level. A new broadly-worded citizenship law gives authorities the power to revoke people’s citizenship for acts that are deemed offensive to the sultan or sultanate without any avenue for judicial remedy. Even before this new law, Omani authorities had tightly restricted dissent by retaliating against critics with imprisonment and politically motivated job dismissals.
More than half the countries in the Middle East and North Africa arbitrarily locked people up for their views or for expressing themselves.
In the UAE and Saudi Arabia, dozens of activists languish behind bars, as does Moroccan journalist Hamid El Mahdaoui and Yemeni poet and writer Oras Al-Eryani, who was abducted in September 2025 by a Houthi-affiliated armed group. In Iraq, journalist and activist Omed Haji Fatah Baroshki received a six month sentence for a social media post calling for the release of other prisoners of conscience.
Another top tactic of repression in the Middle East and North Africa is judicial harassment including long or unfair cycles of criminal litigation via fabricated charges, adding new charges against imprisoned activists to prevent their release, re-arresting, undue delays in trials, and unfair trials.
Victims of this harassment include Algerian human rights defender Abdallah Benaoum, Kuwaiti minority rights advocate Mohammed Al-Barghash and Qatari activist Umm Nasser.
The most egregious weaponisation of judicial systems in the region is the use of the death penalty as a tool for political repression.
Saudi Arabian authorities carried out executions at record levels, reaching at least 300 in the first ten months of 2025 alone, including peaceful protesters and at least one journalist.
In Iran, women’s rights and labour activists have particularly been targeted by what rights groups have described as an “execution spree.” At least 113 executions were reported in the first 25 days of May 2025 alone to crush dissent and intimidate the population, with several women human rights defenders facing imminent execution after their death sentences were upheld.
“It is hard to find much that is positive in terms of civic space in the Middle East and North Africa,” said Sylvia Mbataru. “Governments must loosen their chokeholds on their populations. The status quo cannot continue.”
Notes to the Editor:
The CIVICUS Monitor is a global research platform that assesses the state of civic freedoms—including freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly—across 198 countries and territories. Drawing on verified reports of civic space violations from a network of 20+ research partners worldwide, the Monitor tracks incidents including protests, censorship, the detention of activists and more. Each country is assigned a score from 0 to 100, reflecting the openness of its civic space, with higher scores indicating greater respect for civic freedoms. Based on these scores, countries are classified into five categories: Open, Narrowed, Obstructed, Repressed, or Closed.
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