A new weekly series about Egypt (Saturdays)

The author of this series "Egyptian Frescoes" André Dirlik was born in Egypt and spent the first twenty years of his life in Cairo, then moved to Beirut where he studied at the American University. He later completed his studies at Mc Gill University, in Montreal. 

André's long career as professor exclusively at the "Collège Militaire Royal de Saint-Jean" was only interrupted when that institution closed it's doors in 1995. 

Egyptian Frescoes part (13 of 19) issued with the permission of the author. 

Egyptian Frescoes (13): The Lonely Minority.

They were the majority of the population of Egypt when the Arab conqueror of the City of Babylon, on the Nile, 'Amr ibn il-'As, pitched his tent, his fustat, outside its walls. Fustat became the new capital of the Land of the Kuft, as the Arabs of the Peninsula called it, the Land of Aigaiou Huptios, below the Aegean, as the Greek geographer, Strabo (64BC-24AD) referred to Egypt. The Arabs had wrested the country from the Byzantine who had conquered it from the Persians who had expelled the Romans who had defeated the Ptolemes who had ended Pharaonic rule once and for all.

Old Coptic church

The Copts aided in the defeat of Emperor Heraclius. They were well rewarded in return by their new Muslim masters who reduced their taxes substantially and brought in major improvements in infrastructure. Most spectacular was a canal from the Nile to the Red Sea which, when completed, improved trade with as far as the Land of Bharat, India. It was named Nahr Amir al-Mu'minin, after the Commander of the Faithfull, the First Caliph, Abu Bakr; the more ambitious waterway to link the Red Sea with the Mediterranean was abandoned, 1300 years before the Suez Canal.

The Copts were also encouraged to administer their land. For a long period of time, script and language of administration remained Copt, meaning in the speech of the Pharaoes. In a relatively short period of time, however, as was the case with the conquered populations of Syria, Mesopotamia and North Africa, the peasantry converted to the religion of the Conqueror and to his language. Egypt was Islamized and Arabized. Today, around 10% of the population of Egypt adheres to the Coptic Religion although the entire population, Muslim or Copt, speaks Arabic. The Coptic language, which is a form of popularised Ancient Egyptian, has persisted in the rituals of religion and assisted Egyptologists who deciphered the Hieroglyphs to pronounce their reading of ancient texts correctly. Conversions were, at first, motivated by tax exemptions which Muslims enjoyed. The Coptic clergy did not reach the Fallah on his field. Islamic practice was simple and straight forward. And, as is the case in India with the Untouchables after the invasion of the Muslim Moghuls, converting to the Faith of the conqueror allowed for upper mobility. In time, the Muslims were pitted against Christians and society became divided against itself similarly to the period of Akhnaton, between 1348BC and 1338BC, when the God Amon was displaced by this Pharaoe's favourite Aton. 

A Lonely Minority, the title of Edward Wakin's book on the Copts, well describes how this community fared under Muslim majority rule. It is a moving and partisan book. Written in 1963, it is still pertinent today as the Coptic population dwindles as a result of conversions caused by strict Church laws against divorce: for a Copt to convert to Islam enables him or her to obtain an immediate separation. One other reason for the shrinking of the Christians is that they are emigrating to America, Canada and Australia in significant numbers. The Copts have suddenly resented their minority position in a land they consider to be their own inheritance. The story of their faith tells of a folk who constantly had to cope with insurmountable challenges. Instances of this story are to be related here and now.

Saint mark

Who are the Copts? Upon being converted by the Apostle Saint-Mark in 42AD, the subjects of Pharao rapidly distinguished themselves from other Christian converts in the Middle East and in Europe over the question of the Nature of Christ. Was this problem deeply rooted in their pre-Christian beliefs? Most probably, if one recalls the Story of Osiris. A theological controversy erupted at the Council of Chalcedon in 451 over the question as to whether Christ, during his lifetime and until his resurrection, was Son of God or simply Man. The Coptic Monophysite position, that he was Son of God and Son of Man at the same time, led to a schism among Christians with the Monophysites at loggerheads with the ones who became known as Duophysites. The Patriarch of Alexandria declared himself Pope. His following extended as far south as Ethiopia. For a while, at least, the Coptic Church was assigned by all other churches to calculate annually the date of Easter, the Day of Resurrection, an assignment that had been reached at a previous council, at Nicea, in 325. This was in recognition of the Coptic Church having been amongst the first to come into existence. The Coptic Church had also introduced monasticism to Christianity. And, finally, Saint Mark the Evangelist was buried in Alexandria. When Byzantium occupied the Roman Province of Aegyptus, in 395, the Copts, however, were systematically abused by Constantinople for their heresies. Such abuse increased their ethno-religious identity. The invadors from Arabia, only four thousand strong, could therefore occupy such a vast land with the assistance of the Copts and they launched their raiders south into Nubia and west as far as the shores of the Atlantic, as a result.

The Copts have, in general, not fared well in fourteen centuries of Muslim domination although they had good times as well as bad ones. True, the Umayyads, who ruled Egypt from 661 till 750AD from Damascus, lived up to the earliest political commitments towards the People of the Book, Christians, Jews and Sabeans. The Shari'ah, the Divinely Inspired Law, defined the rights for all in the 'Ummah, the Community of Believers. These were never equal rights. They remained favorable, though, to Christians for a long while.

During Fatimi and 'Abbasi times, there was prosperity in the land and Copts benefited. Even when the foreign Mameluks dismantled Arab rule over Egypt, after 1258, the Copts had their limited rights protected. That was until the founders of Modern Egypt came to power in the 19th Century. The issue of citizen rights in a modern state was now being raised as West met East on the shores of the Mediterranean. During the Seventh Crusade, Saint Louis, King of France, landed in Egypt in 1249 with his Knights. A Coptic Monk remarked, in his chronicle, that the Franj, the foreigners that is, were not welcome in his Land. Louis IX was captured in Mansurah until ransom was paid for his release to Shajar al-Durr, the Armenian widow of al-Malik al-Salih that same year. Under Muhammad 'Ali Basha, the Jiziyah, the poll tax traditionally imposed upon the Copts since Islam conquered Egypt, was abolished. The Pasha allowed Copts to serve in his armies. The future appeared bright for Egyptian Christians who took advantage of the opportunities offered to them in education and in the public service during the nineteenth and well into the twentieth centuries. 

In 1908, Butros Ghali was called upon by Khedive 'Abbas Hilmi to head the government.

Boutros Ghali

He was the first Copt to reach such high office. In 1910, unfortunately for him, he was assassinated, most probably because he was a Copt. Muhammad 'Abduh urged calm and worked for a rapprochement between Muslim and Copt. The major bone of contention between the two religions was the Christian Creed that Jesus was Son of God. To Muslims, this was an unforgiveable act of blasphemy. Egypt's Muslims were, also, convinced that they were descendants of the Arab invaders. In the long process of Islamization, the non-Arab had to become a client of a Muslim from Arabia. The Mawalis, as they were referred to, adopted the name of their sponsor, as did the African slaves in America. The neophytes claimed they were ethnically Arabs. Two intellectuals, Lutfi al-Sayyid (1872-1963), a Muslim, and Salama Musa (1887-1958), a Copt, argued that all Egyptians were descendants of Pharoe. That was before a DNA analysis would demonstrate that all Egyptians were not Semites. Some suggest that Egyptians are Hamites instead. To the amateurish observer, one could point to the statue of King Khesekhewy of the First Dynasty, who founded Memphis in 2890BC. He sits peacefully in the Cairo Museum. His features resemble those of anyone one may cross on the streets of Cairo. On the bas-reliefs of the Temple of Hwt-Ka Ptah dedicated to the God Ptah, in Memphis itself, more Egyptians one rubes elbows with daily must have their fathers and brothers carved on the graffiti, the stellae, the limestone murals of that ancient temple or on any other temple wall in Upper or Lower Egypt so strong is the resemblance between Ancient Egyptians and the present population of Egypt. And, in the Coptic Museum which was founded in 1910, one could almost recognize the portrait of Husni Mubarak on some icon representing Saint Mark the Evangelist. Last but not least, the Seated Scribe which welcomes one at the entrance of the Egyptian Museum in Berlin would well have been the twin of my childhood friend, Adham, who lives in Hawaii. So much for the physiognomy of Homo Aegypticus.

Egyptian Scribe

In 1919, a second Copt, Yusif Wahba (1853-1934), became Prime-Minister. He was a friend of Muhammad 'Abduh. A British commission whose aim it was to introduce special privileges which would be based on ethnicity and religion, the Brunyate Commission for Judicial Reform (1917), was rejected by Wahba Basha. The purpose of the British was then to divide and rule. Some Copts understood that and resisted their efforts. Yusif Wahba was a learned lawyer. He translated the Code Napoleon into Arabic. He was the first Egyptian judge to sit in the Mixed Courts, which placed him in contact with European jurists. In 1882, he created the Maglis Milli, the first secular Coptic Council to manage the affairs of his community outside the control of the Church. His example was encouraging young Copts to move from their rural stronghold in Asiyut and Bani Suwayf, Gibli in the South, to join schools and the university in Cairo.

Makram Ebeid

In 1936, yet another prominent Copt, Makram 'Ubayd (1879-1961) who had become a follower of Egypt's Nationalist leader, Sa'd Zaghlul, was appointed Secretary General of the Wafd Party that demanded the British evacuate the territory. Like many other prominent members of the Coptic Community before him, and like many more after him, Makram 'Ubayd stood fast with Muslims for the good of his nation, Misr.

It is remarked that Colonialism which brought much good as well as much bad to the colonized peoples resulted from the Soldier, the Merchant and the Missionary working hand in hand for the interests of the Colonial Power. The Coptic Church which had developed throughout the centuries, thus building a string of monasteries, seminaries, churches and schools, was now threatened by French Catholic priests and British and American missionaries who chipped at the Coptic community and raided its members. In the early twentieth century, a Coptic Catholic Church and Coptic Protestant churches came about. During the Arabization of Egypt, Copts had adopted Arabic first name, although names after Saints were retained: Mor'os, Girgis and so forth. Now, first names such as Maurice or William appeared. Significantly, also, Pharaonic names like Isis and Ramsis lingered on...

The Copts have fallen on hard times since the 1952 Coup. Their hopes for a secular state faded when the 1956 Constitution was drafted. Article Two of this document explicitly stated that Islam is the Official Religion of the Land. This signified that all laws should be inspired by the edicts of the Qur'an. In practical terms, men and women rights were not equal. Neither were Muslim and non-Muslim, according to the Law. After the political union of Egypt with Syria whose Christian population plays an important role in that country's affairs, the 1958 Constitution of the United Arab Republic, as the new state came to be known, Article Two was dropped to the dismay of many Muslims in Egypt. When the new republic was ended by Syria's unilateral withdrawal, the 1964 Constitution of the Egyptian Arab Republic re-instated Article Two. This meant that the Copts would remain a diminished community. It also suggested to the rising Islamists that more had to be done to give constitutionality to a state whose religion was Islam. The Secular State remains, in the meantime, a mirage in this land of deserts and mirages. It leaves the Copts with three choices for years to come: further conversion is taking place, emigration to the West is on the rise, and Coptism, which appears to be the reply to Islamism, an ideology which is dogmatic, uncompromising and militant, appeals to the young. The majority of responsible Egyptians appears totally impervious to the fate of the Copts. It has, moreover, forgotten the contribution of members of this community to the development of Egypt.

A new weekly series about Egypt (Saturdays)

The author of this series "Egyptian Frescoes" André Dirlik was born in Egypt and spent the first twenty years of his life in Cairo, then moved to Beirut where he studied at the American University. He later completed his studies at Mc Gill University, in Montreal. 

André's long career as professor exclusively at the "Collège Militaire Royal de Saint-Jean" was only interrupted when that institution closed it's doors in 1995. 

Egyptian Frescoes part (12 of 19) issued with the permission of the author. 

Egyptian Frescoes (12): The 1952 Coup d'État.

When the late Yusif Shahin presented his epic movie, Saladin, to Arab audiences, was he suggesting that Gamal 'abd il-Nasir march on Jerusalem? By the time the movie hit the screens in 1965, the colonel who, on July 23rd, 1952, had staged a coup against King Farouk and his government, had risen to the greatest heights in the eyes of all

Gamal Abdel Nasser

Arabs. It was therefore reasonable that he be represented as the heir to the Great Ayyubid whose descendants already had ruled over Egypt for almost a century, from 1171 to 1266.

Gamal 'abd ul-Nasir (1918-1970) grew up as a boy in Alexandria and, later, as an adult in Cairo, in an Egypt in turmoil.  

His father was a postman, meaning that he could read and write. The family was exposed, through the newspapers, to the times of Sa'd Zaghlul and the 1919 Revolution. Such times made one cope with the humiliating Anglo-Egyptian Treaty. The nation stood helpless as an autocratic ruler emasculated parliament. In secondary school, Gamal participated in demonstrations against the British. The street battles between the various coloured shirts were, also, a daily occurrence. And, Hasan al-Banna was a rising star prior to the War. In 1936, the British induced the King to open the military academies to sons of the Lower Middle Class. The British were anticipating 1939 and they encouraged the Egyptian military to rise to 50.000 soldiers strong.

Egypt's armies had gone a full circle, from the time when Muhammad 'Ali Basha instituted a fighting force whose officers were Turks and Albanians whom the French trained and whose foot soldiers were from the Fallahin, to the time of Khedive Isma'il where officers now were sons of the Egyptian landed aristocracy, to post-1936 when the recently urbanized could send their sons to fight and die in the Infantry. The Cavalry, later to become an Armoured Unit, the Navy and the recently created Air Force were led by members of the Egyptian plutocracy.  And so was it that 'abd ul-Nasir entered the School of Infantry along with others who would rise in rank and eventually plot to topple the monarchy.

Egypt's Modern infantry 1940's

During my school years on Malika Nazli Street, every morning, officers reported to the 'Abbasiyyah Barracks. I could notice that officers from the upper classes drove themselves to their units. Infantry officers were driven by lorry to their respective units. At the time, the Infantry, was not mechanized: like Napoleon's infantrymen who reached Russia on foot, the Mushah, as infantry was called, walked and walked and walked. Another childhood memory happened when, one afternoon, my mother took me to Groppi's for hot chocolate and pastries. Next to our table sat an Egyptian cavalry major and his wife. At my age, I knew all about. And, although they all wore the same kahki battle dress, I had come to identify physical features and their language with the name of the regiment they belonged to: for instance, here, on both upper sleeves, one read Poland; the face and the spoken words became associated in my mind. There were Australians whose symbol was a kangaroo, New Zealanders and Maoris and their kiwi badge, South Africans, Sikh and Rajput or Pundjabis, Kenya Riffles, Free French and Jewish Brigade, Gurkas and, last but not least, the bearded ladies of the Black Watch Regiment. Came in a Welsh captain and his Khawagayyah date. They sat next to our table and the Welshman immediately requested from the British Military Police that the Egyptian cavalry major, his superior in rank, be evicted from the premises. To my mother and to me, this was shocking. It appeared, we later learnt, to be standard practice in British India. Not so in Egypt. And yet the MPs obliged.

King Farouk of Egypt

I was coming to understand that there were inequalities among those who were sent to die in the desert, in the Egyptian Forces and between Egyptians and Brits in uniform. Inequality would breed resentment and bitterness, on the nationalist front and when, on May 15th., 1948, the Egyptian Army was thrown into battle in Palestine. Haydar Pasha, the Commander-in-Chief, was ordered by the King to hastily prepare for war. Second World War Italian weapons and ammunition were acquired which, on the battle field, proved defective. The war involved mostly infantry. Officers from other combat units were being spared. It has been reported that, after the Siege of Falujah, in the Neguev, where an Egyptian unit was surrounded and later surrendered to the Israelis, the younger officers around  Captain Gamal 'abd il-Nasir started plotting against the civilian leadership in Cairo.

Infantry 

Meanwhile, 1952 was an eventful year in the country: on January 25th. of that year, the British in Isma'liyyah, in an armed confrontation with the police, the Buluk Nizam, disarmed them. There were casualties on both sides and the confrontation was hailed as a victory for the Egyptians who had held their ground. The very next day, riots in Cairo, caused the European quarters to be set aflame:

the Shepherds Hotel, stores owned by Jews, the Turf Club frequented by British were looted and set ablaze. We were sent home from school and I bicycled from one hot spot to another to watch. The forces of order could not stop the rioters. It was a cold January day but the fires had raised the temperature of the air for everyone.  

Before sunset, that day, the Army was called upon to restore order and imposed a curfew. The next morning, my father and I walked towards Norton Pharmacy. The streets were littered with debris and the stench from burnt paint filled the air. Robert Hughes, had been looted and torched. So was Lappas and Ben Zion. Norton's was spared when, it was explained to us, the Egyptian staff convinced the rioters its owners were neither English nor Jewish but Turks. The city was later cleared of rubble and life appeared to return to normal. Rumours circulated that the Communists and the Ikhwan were the major culprits behind the burning of European Cairo and many rioters were arrested and admitted their crimes under torture. 

Old Shepherd's  Hotel Cairo

The Communist-led trade-unions called for workers to strike and were sent to jail. In my family's immediate circle, daily routine was back although one friend was often being cited: as early as the end of the First Palestine War of 1948-1949, he had chosen to leave Egypt and advised my father to do the same. He belonged to the Shawam Community. My father had called his decision crazy when he chose to leave this Land of Plenty. The exchange rate of the Egyptian Pound was higher than the Pound Sterling at the time. The gentleman in question settled in Monaco and bought much property in and around Monte Carlo. He never stopped after that pointing a finger of I-told-you-so to us whenever the opportunity arose.

Meanwhile, our family prepared to go to Lebanon for our annual summer holidays. We were at home, in the Shuf Hills, on July 23rd., when news reached us that there had been a Coup back home. One General Muhammad Nagib, had arrested the King who was in his summer palace in Alexandria. Also, under house arrest were the members of his Cabinet. The country remained quiet and the bulk of the population appeared to favour the change. The King would not be tried, after all, but instead went into exile. The popular ‘Ali Mahir would head a new civilian government. Everything seemed to return to what one was used to and we remained in the Hills till September, my father included, as there was no urgency for him to interrupt his summer break.

It is during this very period that a fundamental question was being raised by the Egyptian tourists to Lebanon whom we frequented: were the events of the end of July a simple change at the helm with a general replacing a king or was this the beginning of a revolution? The question had been brought about by developments which left people perplex. The first was the immediate dissolution by the Military Council of all existing political parties except the Muslim Brotherhood.

General Mohamed Naguib

The second was the promulgation of an Agrarian Reform Law, on September 11th, which, in effect, expropriated the Royal Family and the Landed Aristocracy of its wealth and power. When the real leader of the Coup appeared to replace General Nagib, Colonel 'abd il-Nasir, the Bikbashi, as he was known amongst his Free Officers, was showing his true social colours. His infantrymen had won the day against the Navy, the Cavalry and the Air Force. Amongst the prominent members of the Free Officers, meanwhile, it was being reported that Anwar is-Sadat was a member of the Ikhwan. At the other end of the ideological spectrum was Colonel Khalid Muhiyi al-Din, a Communist, both representing the have-nots. At the same time, one slogan of the New Regime was offering hope for the future: al-Din lil-lah wa al-Watan lil-Gami', Religions belong to God but the Nation is the property of All. Were we witnessing the rise of an Egyptian Mustafa Kemal Atatürk?

A new weekly series about Egypt (Saturdays)

The author of this series "Egyptian Frescoes" André Dirlik was born in Egypt and spent the first twenty years of his life in Cairo, then moved to Beirut where he studied at the American University. He later completed his studies at Mc Gill University, in Montreal. 

André's long career as professor exclusively at the "Collège Militaire Royal de Saint-Jean" was only interrupted when that institution closed it's doors in 1995. 

Egyptian Frescoes part (11 of 19) issued with the permission of the author. 

Egyptian Frescoes (11): The Question of Palestine.

Long before the Question of Palestine and the Jewish Question became intimately related in the minds of the Arabs in the Twentieth Century, the geography of the Near East and the position of Egypt, at the juncture of three continents, constantly projected that country into the limelight. One simply has to visit the narrows of Nahr al-Kalb, north of Beirut, to gage the importance of this passageway to the armies of Pharao, to Asssyrians and Babylonians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs from the Peninsula, or French and British, in the modern era.

The City of Jaffa 

The invaders all left their autograph. The Land of Palestine, south of the Ancient Lycus River, the River of the Dog mentioned above, stood as a buffer or a gateway to fertile Egypt. In our times, Napoleon Bonaparte headed north from Cairo along the Mediterranean coastal road till Jaffa. The plague and the Ottomans stopped his cavalcade towards Nahr al-Kalb in 1799. One Nathan Schur suggested, in his Napoleon and the Holy Land, that the young general had planned to proclaim, once he reached Jerusalem, the creation of a Jewish State. His aim was to establish an allied European entity in Palestine which would consolidate his hold on Egypt, the main object of which was to threaten the road to India for the British.

Napoleon

That was well before the opening of a Suez Canal and before the West struck oil in Mesopotamia, in Persia and in the Arab Gulf. It was well before Theodore Herzl (1860-1904), the Austrian journalist, covered the Dreyfus Trial and, as a result, wrote, in 1896, Der Judenstaat. It was also long before Adolf Hitler embarked upon his policy of extermination of the Jews of Europe. One will have to wait until preparations for the First World War came about to reckon with European objectives in the Middle East. These objectives were facilitated by the alliance of the Young Turks with Germany and Austria, the losers of the war. As the British and French battled the Ottomans in the Eastern Mediterranean, the Sykes-Picot Agreement, which would divide the Arab spoils of war between England and France, and a Balfour Declaration addressed to Baron Rothschild, which allowed European Jews to set their home in Palestine, were on the drawing board. At the Paris Peace Conference, both these documents were tabled and the Arabs discovered that all promises made to Sharif Husayn would not be honoured. Moreover, a system of mandates and protectorates would be imposed on all Arab territories, except Saudi Arabia. Finally, the gates to Palestine would be open to Jewish Immigration from Europe whose percentage of the entire Palestinian population rose from less than 1% after the war to 17% in 1931, and 27% in 1935.

Al-Sharif Hussein

The Europeans had not considered the damage which the creation of a Jewish State would do to their interests and reputation in the long run. When Theodore Herzl visited 'Abd ul-Hamid II, the Sultan-Caliph, in Istambul, in 1901, he requested permission to establish Jewish colonies in Palestine against the settlement of the entire Ottoman Debt by European Jewish financiers. Jerusalem was the third holiest city of Islam after Makkah and Madina. The Sultan-Caliph is reported to have replied that He would rather be skewered than lose the Holy Land. Herzl then negotiated with the Egyptian Authorities, through Joseph Chamberlain, Secretary to the Colonies, that land in and around al-'Arich, in Egypt proper, be granted to him for his pet project of an Alteneuland. The Egyptians rejected the idea. The British Mandate over Palestine and the Balfour Declaration, made in 1917, opened the way to the eventual creation of Israel in 1948.

Joseph Chamberlain

In the meantime, Palestinians had been rioting against immigration of Europeans to their lands. The Nabi Musa Riots of 1920, outside Jerusalem, were followed by the 1929 Riots and the more serious ones which started, in 1936, in Jaffa, outside Tel Aviv, spread to the rest of the Mandate and lasted till 1939.

The rioting in Palestine had received much attention in Egypt. Everyone seemed to pay lip service to the cause of the Palestinians. Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, the close collaborator of the Prophet and father of his daughter, 'Aisha, had been quoted as saying: ma min ummatin tarakat al-Jihad illa wa duriba 'alayha al-dhull, only Jihad, holy war guaranteed against humiliation. As the Second World War approached, an Eighth British Army was being assembled in Egypt, to defend the Canal. British tanks rolled towards 'Abdin Palace and forced the young King Faruq, whose sympathies for the Axis Powers were known, to appoint Mustafa al-Nahhas, leader of the Wafd Party, to form a government and join in the war effort on February 4th, 1942. All political parties were being compromised by the occupier. Only the Ikhwan stood fast against the British. This made them the most popular nationalist force in the country.

Mustafa El-Nahaas Pacha

The Ikhwan were also having access to light weapons and ammunition which were either stolen from the British or else, after 1942, when Field-Marshal Rommel was defeated by Montgomery at al-'Alamayn, were being traded by the Bedouins of the Western Desert. The Ikhwan learnt to use these weapons with the assistance of a few officers of the insignificant Egyptian Army. The Ikhwan had now opted for armed struggle against those whom they defined as enemies of Islam. On the Jewish Palestinian side, terrorism had appealed to extremist factions of society as well. It is not clear if Irish freedom fighters assisted the Ikhwan although it is known they did Jews against the British when Lord Moyne, who did not favour the creation of a Jewish State, was assassinated in Cairo, on November 6th, 1944, by members of a Jewish terrorist organisation. In 1945, on February 24th., Ahmad Mahir, the Prime Minister, who opposed Ikhwan participation at elections, was gunned down. In 1948, on December 28th., yet another Prime Minister, Mahmud al-Nuqrashi, was also assassinated. The membership of the Brotherhood had been estimated that year at 2 million strong and King Faruq was worrisome. 

Hassan El-Banna

On Feburary 12th., 1949, the King had Hasan al-Banna murdered. His party was also banned and simply went underground.

In the meantime, the British Mandate over Palestine had ended on May 15th., 1948 and the six member states of the Arab League, which came into being on 22 March 1945, marched armies into Palestine. The Ikhwan partook into the conflict by providing irregulars. All were confronted by better equipped, better trained Jewish combatants and the Arabs called for a truce. Amongst the Jewish combatants were members of the Jewish Brigade which Haïm Wiseman (1874-1952) had formed in Palestine to fight alongside the Eighth Army during the Second World War. I was a boy when units of this army paraded in Cairo in celebration of King Georges VI's birthday. They marched along Kasr el-Nil street, across Midan Soliman Pasha. My Jewish schoolmates cheered. Back at the Lycée de Bab el-Louk during my last year, Jews in class had espoused Zionism and talked of moving to Israel to build the new state. On a camping trip we undertook to Marsa Matruh, I recall one evening when we talked passionately around the campfire. The Communists amongst my Jewish childhood friends were also Zionists. We could not understand then how Internationalism and Nationalism, or Religion and Nationalism could become one and the same. My Jewish friends, of course, felt the threat of Muslim Brotherhood terrorism and so did the Khawagat. Mr. Moseri, the owner of the Egyptian Cement Factory had not explained to his son how Egyptian humiliation in Palestine would inevitably inflict woes upon the interests of the Jews of Egypt. And Jacques Mizrahi, an Egyptian Jew as his name, Mizrahi, from Mizr, indicated, had not considered how Schwarte and Schlechte would mix in the land east of Eden.

Lycée Français du Caire

 Over the Ikhwan, I had befriended Mahmud Fathi Sa’id, an active member of the Brotherhood who, at the eve of the Military Coup of the 23rd of July 1952, came out of the cupboard when the government lifted the ban on their activities. I once asked Fathi while we hiked in Wadi Digla, in the desert east of Ma’adi, if it was true that the Brotherhood really intended to slaughter all of us Khawagat once they assumed power. He looked me straight in the eyes and replied: kullukum illa inta ya Andreyyah, all except you..

A new weekly series about Egypt (Saturdays)

The author of this series "Egyptian Frescoes" André Dirlik was born in Egypt and spent the first twenty years of his life in Cairo, then moved to Beirut where he studied at the American University. He later completed his studies at Mc Gill University, in Montreal. 

André's long career as professor exclusively at the "Collège Militaire Royal de Saint-Jean" was only interrupted when that institution closed it's doors in 1995. 

Egyptian Frescoes part (10 of 19) issued with the permission of the author. 

Egyptian Frescoes (10): Hasan al-Banna and the Ikhwan Muslimin.

The transition from a traditional to a modern society, from one that is rural to an urban one, from illiteracy towards becoming exposed to an array of ideas, this transition is both slow and stressful anywhere. In Egypt, it brought change as the War of 1939 approached. In the world at large, it caused nations who thought the First World War to be the last war to now prepare for another. The Age of Liberalism was in confrontation with an Age of Totalitarianism.

In 1929, a Great Depression which caused massive unemployment spread fast across the planet. Egypt's economic development, which had become closely associated with that of Europe since its modern sector operated in the cash economy, was severely affected. This sector, although still infant, collapsed in the 1930's. Social ills afflicted mainly the towns and cities along the Valley of the Nile. Only the subsistence economy was spared that would now be expected to sustain the entire Egyptian population. Egyptian society was ripe for new ideologies which, instantly, sought to sooth, explain and promise remedies.

Communism and Zionism fascinated mainly the Jews in Egypt. Fascism spoke directly to the Italian Khawagat. Amongst Egyptians, Blue Shirts from the Wafd Party battled in the streets the Green Shirts of Ahmad Husayn, a demagogic orator who took his lead from Mussolini and Hitler, starting in 1930. His party, Misr al-Fatat, Young Egypt, was disbanded in 1938 by the authorities who charged him with inciting violence against the State. The al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin did not wear any particular colour of shirt; they grew a beard instead, the mustache having been shaven off in the manner of the Sahaba, the Compagnons of the Prophet.

The Ikhwan had been formed, in 1928, by one Hassan al-Banna 

Hassan al-Banna

Al-Banna was born near the provincial town of Damanhur. His name tells of a recent ancestor who must have been a bricklayer, a "builder". His father was a watchmaker who, most probably, learnt the trade from an Armenian whose apprentice he may have been in his youth. Hasan's father studied at al-Azhar. Father and son were pious Muslims. More significant, Hasan's father belonged to the Hanbali Madhhab, one of four schools of Islamic law which was the least prone to compromise with change. More on this later in this frescoe. Suffice it to say that Hasan al-Banna's world view was determined, in its formative years, by the trade he learnt while he assisted his father, the watchmaker: as one who had become familiar with watch repairs, he could fathom the interdependence of each single part with the whole. The trade demanded, essentially, patience and thoroughness, which he must have acquired. As for his Hanbali affiliation, in colloquial Egyptian, a Hanbali referred to someone whose views were set in his conservatism when it came to matters of faith, one who took his Islam more seriously than any other Muslim.

al-Banna had taught school in Damahur. He was sent to Teachers Training College, Dar al-'Ulum, in Cairo in 1923, and he earned a scholarship to travel to Europe. He turned it down.  And, in 1927, he was appointed to teach secondary school in the Suez Canal City of Isma'iliyyah. There, the presence of foreigners was tangible. Ten thousand British troops were also camped nearby who frequented the city on their leave. al-Banna made his xenophobia known in cafés and in mosques. When he founded Jami'yat al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin in 1928, he had recruited 60 disciples to his views. He lectured against British presence in Egypt. He denounced the ways of Egypt's foreigners. He called for the observance of Islamic Law and the establishment of a true Islamic society in Egypt.

al-Banna, the teacher, was eventually posted in Cairo in 1932. His associates followed him to the capital. Barely the following year, the Ikhwan were founding schools, charitable associations, clinics and libraries. In 1936, the population of Egypt had reached 16 million. Since 1925, primary education rose from 193 thousand pupils to 661 thousand. In secondary education, the figure had reached 45 thousand from 17. The Ikhwan aimed to reach such a youth. Also, imitating the famous Egyptian feminist, Huda Sha'rawi (1879-1947) who had created, in 1923, a Union of Egyptian Women to promote women's rights, al-Banna, ten years later, founded the Muslim Sisterhood. 

Huda Sha'rawi

The sisters would wear the hijab, the head-scarf, in defiance to Sha'rawi's theatrical removal of her veil when she returned from Paris to Alexandria Harbour in 1909. The Sisterhood favoured education for women but it had to be Islamic education.  

Hasan al-Banna was addressing a rising strata of society, a lower middle class, when he warned Egyptians of the dangers of abandoning  their beliefs and religious practices. Morality, in society, is related to social cohesion, not to creed. Transition, for the new lower middle class, from a pre-modern to a modern civilization, invited new interpretations of Islam. Hasan al-Banna had stepped in to fill the vacuum which changes were causing and was drawing his social contract for the present and the future by using the ingredients of the past. He demanded complete submission to the strictest doctrine of Islam he knew. Totalitarianism was certainly in the air when he presented his ideological platform.

al-Banna had sought and found his inspiration from Rashid Rida (1865-1935), the Editor of al-Manar. Rida, the collaborator of Muhammad 'Abduh, had grown in time to be an admirer of

Rashid Rida

Muhammad ibn 'abd al-Wahhab (1703-1792), the preacher from Najd, in Arabia. The latter, was heir to the ideals of ibn Taymiyah (b. in 1263) the theologian and judge who died in prison, in 1328, in Damascus for his extreme views on Religion and State. All four, al-Banna, Rida, ibn 'abd al-Wahhab and ibn Taymiyyh, were in the intellectual trail of Ahmad ibn Hanbal (780-855) from Baghdad, the most rigid jurist when it came to formulating the Shari'ah, the Religious Law, the Path towards an all encompassing Islamic way of life.

Shortly before the death of the Prophet in Madina, in Hijaz, in 632, the Coranic Revelation came to an end: "wa al-yawm akmaltu lakum dinakum". Muslims were left with a compendium of Surat from which they derived a set of rules by which they may conduct themselves. Wherever there existed no rules, pious and learned Muslims would consider the Sayings, the aHadith of the Prophet, to help understand the path Allah had traced for them. The Science of Hadith divided these Sayings into true, weak or correct sayings. In time, Sayings were fabricated to suite interest groups. Whenever such Sayings, however weak, were conform with the spirit of Islam, they were retained. ibn Hanbal rejected, outright, most sayings in seeking to interpret the Scriptures.

Hanbali Law

Also, in the development of Islamic Jurisprudence, the technique of analogy was devised, Qiyas. The early jurists, moreover, utilized the consensus of Jurists and the opinion of the most learned, pious and eminent amongst them. Consensus, Ijma', and opinion, Ra'y, were acceptable to the most flexible of the four schools of law, attributed to abu Hanifa (702-767). While rulers favoured Hanafi Law which allowed them much latitude, Hanbali Law was adamant to use either of spurious aHadith, and certainly not consensus and opinion: only the text of the Qur'an bore the ultimate weight in Islamic Jurisprudence.

Hasan al-Banna taught formally to his disciples and informally in public that pristine Islam should not be tampered with. Innovations which the Europeans had brought into Egyptian society should be banned. His was a literalist reading of the Coran. And yet, like all fundamentalists before him, al-Banna was a man of his age, a reformist of what he and his disciples were experiencing. It is important that this point be retained. Conservatives are aware of the threats to their values and their creed. They react to change because they notice change. It is certainly the case amongst conservatives of the Lower Middle Class.

Hasan al-Banna ought to have known Rashid Rida personally. Or else, he must have regularly read Majallat al-Manar which the Syrian-born radical edited, after Muhammad 'Abduh's death. Rida was in favour of restoring the Caliphate yet opposed King Fu'ad's ambition to occupy this spiritual high office: the king may have claimed he was a descendant of the Prophet; he was, in fact, an Albanian through and through who, after the First World War, had even considered claiming the Albanian throne for himself; the King, also, was an Italophile who had studied in Turin and spoke Italian better than he did Arabic. al-Banna shared the view that the Caliphate ought to be re-instated and revert to a true descendant of the Prophet, a member of the Tribe of Quraysh. Rida, who had Wahhabi leanings, had turned out to become an advocate of Wahhabism: 

King 'abd al-'Aziz ibn Su'ud

he met with King 'abd al-'Aziz ibn Su'ud of Saudi Arabia, the descendant of the houses of 'abd al-Wahhab and Al Su'ud in Najd and the unifier, in 1915, of the entire Arabian Peninsula under his rule. ibn Su'ud fought along with his military phalanx called the Ikhwan. al-Banna chose Ikhwan to name the association he created to rid Egypt of its ills. Rashid Rida urged Muslims to turn away from European influence. al-Banna's refusal to further his studies in Europe may well have resulted from Rida's such admonitions made to his readers. Rida had been converted, in his youth, to the brand of Islamic Nationalism which Jamal ed-Din al-Afghani preached all his life. Nearing the year of his death, Rida stood committed to the Question of Palestine as a Muslim Nationalist should. 
So would Hasan al-Banna.  

A new weekly series about Egypt 

The author of this series "Egyptian Frescoes" André Dirlik was born in Egypt and spent the first twenty years of his life in Cairo, then moved to Beirut where he studied at the American University. He later completed his studies at Mc Gill University, in Montreal. 

André's long career as professor exclusively at the "Collège Militaire Royal de Saint-Jean" was only interrupted when that institution closed it's doors in 1995. 

Egyptian Frescoes part (9 of 19) issued with the permission of the author. 

Egyptian Frescoes (9): Tal'at Harb and Egyptian Economic Nationalism.

He was born in 1867 and died in 1941. He graduated from Fu'ad University as an economist. The university was staffed by Britishers and most subjects, the sciences and the social sciences, were taught in English. The Egyptians who later joined the university staff would also study in England. A few were educated in France, Italy or Germany. This was a time when the government was lavish with its scholarships. In 1907, Tal'at Harb wrote a pamphlet on the urgency for Egyptians to create their bank. Shareholders ought to be Egyptian. Depositors, of course, would be. Harb preached endlessly for this idea. He pointed to what was happening to Egypt when it remained in foreign hands.

Talaat Harb

His words did not fall on deaf ears. The Khediviate and, later, the Monarchy were in favour of regaining control of the land they were losing to the Khawagat. Amongst the landowning class, the intellectuals and the civil service who had grown loyal to Sa'd Zaghlul and to the Wafd Party, the time had come to change the course of Egyptian history.

As he stood still facing what is now Tahrir Square, Harb was pondering over the future from his high pedestal. His statue had replaced that of Sulayman Basha (al-Faransawi). Maydan al-Isma'liyyah had also been renamed after Liberation lest one was reminded too often of the House of Muhammad 'Ali. He stared in the direction of Kasr el-Nil Barracks, symbol of occupation, and the River Nile where permanence flowed. Our family had moved from Maadi into the heart of the city so that we be close to our schools and to my father's work. My mother also could easily drop by the Cairo Women's Club, on Maydan Mustafa Kamil, where Arabic and English were spoken, not French. Tal'at Harb and I had become neighbours now that he had moved into the quarter of the Khawagat.

It should be reminded that, no sooner did Muhammad 'Ali Basha order the creation of a centre for translation of European works, Madrasat al-Alsun, that there appeared on the book stalls texts of all kinds. The Age of Egyptian Liberalism to which Tal'at Harb belongs owes it vision of the future not only to the teachings of Muhammad 'Abduh, that Islam and Science were not in opposition, but also to the works of Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill, Rousseau and Montesquieu, and many more in translation.

Yet another book whom Fathi Zaghlul, the brother of Sa'd, had made available to the avid Egyptian readership was Edmond Demolins' A Quoi Tient la Superiorité des Anglo-Saxons, published in French in 1897. It told of the breeding of Britain's elites: education, sports and moral fiber had made tiny Britain powerful and rich. Character was an individual's strength and character building ought to be at the root of upbringing and education. Tal'at Harb appears to have acquired both.   

In 1911, Harb published The Reform of the Egyptian Economy and the Project for a National Bank. It took another nine years till Bank Misr was founded. And, from 1920 till 1940, his bank's Board of Governors approved or initiated more than 20 projects, companies and plants, who would form the nucleus of an industrial and commercial sector in Egypt's economy that, in some cases, resembled that of the Khawagats'; in others, it was, again, dedicated to promote the modernization of the country. These projects invariably received financing from Bank Misr. They were all directed by Egyptians although foreign expertise was inevitably sought. They also operated entirely in Arabic. These realizations provided employment to the Egyptians who had studied abroad or in Egypt itself. They induced more Egyptians to seek a university education. Bank Misr financed a printing house and the manufacturing of paper, cotton ginning, and cotton, linen and silk weaving and dyeing, fisheries, transportation, mines and quarries, and a travel agency to compete with Thomas Cook who controlled the growing tourist industry which brought Europeans and a smack of Americans to Ancient Egypt. All these companies which Bank Misr assisted or partly owned had Misr, Egypt, included in their name, like Misr li'l Nasig, Misr li'l Siyaha or Misr li'l Ta'min. In 1932, MisrAir was founded.

Um Kalthum

So far for commerce and industry. In 1935, Studio Misr which had been producing films with the technical assistance of Germans and Frenchmen, since a decade earlier, presented Wadad, a movie picture starring Um Kulthum, the rising feminine voice in the country. The movie was shown at Cinema Misr, on 'Imad ed-Din Street. It was a success. Nagib al-Rihani's comedies also hit the screen. Egypt was on the way of regaining the pride it had lost when the British stopped the armies of Muhammad 'Ali that marched on Istambul at Kutahya, in 1833, and when the British again defeated 'Urabi Pasha at Tall al-Kabir, in 1882, thus subsequently occupying Egypt. Meanwhile, the new social class which Bank Misr represented was not unlike that which, in Germany, shortly before Bismarck, had caused a Kultuurkampf. It brought the intellectuals and the civil servants, the entrepreneurs and the political elites, the landlords and the Court of King Fu'ad together in this national initiative. This was a class of liberal nationalists who shared in the effort of uplifting Egyptian society.

As early as 1907, the National Sporting Club, al-Nadi al-Ahli, was inaugurated on al-Gazirah, adjacent to the

Gezirah Sporting Club

Guerzirah Sporting Club which, like the Maadi Sporting Club, had been established by the British for themselves and was for long out of bound to the Natives. European sports like foot ball, tennis and swimming, athletics and rowing had caught the imagination of Egyptians. In the narrow lanes of Cairo where the workshops were located, young apprentices spent their lunch breaks playing football with a ball of fortune. On the Nile banks, crowds cheered as 'Abd al-Latif abu Hayf, Mar'i Hammad and Hasan 'abd al-Rahim, trained for the Channel crossing that would make them world famous. In 1948, Mahmud Fayyad, would win gold at the Olympics and Mahmud 'abd al-Karim would later become world champion in Squash Racquet. The new Egyptian elites showed interest and support for physical training, the spirit of competitiveness and fair play. The game of cricket, furthermore, puzzled rather than attracted people like myself: the Brits competing passionately at the game then suddenly stopped for tea, then carrying on with their playing, sometimes the following day. Come to think of it, economic development was such a game where ingenuity, patience and tenacity paid dividends back.

The new elites used the grounds of Nadi al-Ahli to meet and exchange ideas. Eventually, they moved from coffee houses and tea rooms to private clubs, like the Muhammad 'Ali Club on Sulayman Basha and the Royal Automobile Club, on Qasr al-Nil, in which business ventures, electoral strategies and the latest from the outside world in terms of inventions were discussed. The rise of Communism and Fascism in the West, and of totalitarianism in Egypt itself, was obviously of great interest to Egyptian Liberals. The dangers to the 1923 Constitution by an authoritarian monarch in 'Abdine Palace was as well. But, more on this later.

Abdine Royal Palace

The new elites of Egypt were obviously not impervious to the business ventures of the Khawagat. In fact, when sporting clubs were eventually opened to the Locals, as they were referred to, Egyptians started getting to be more informed about the strengths and the weaknesses of Khawagat society. They met at the Maadi, Heliopolis and Guezirah sporting clubs and at the Alexandria Sporting Club at Smouha. English was now competing with French as the main foreign language of communication. Otherwise, Egyptians spoke amongst themselves in Arabic. As I said, the mood was one of liberalism, of laisser faire, laisser passer.

The Misr group had inspired more financial and industrial conglomerates to form. Ahmad 'Abbud, was yet another baron in the business world: this magnate of the sugar industry, bought out the British Khedivial Mail Lines and his Khedewiyyah connected Alexandria with Haifa, Beirut, Latakiyyah, Limasol and Athens. Not since the sinking of Muhammad 'Ali's fleet at Navarino, in 1827, had the Egyptian flag been seen flapping on the waters of the Eastern Mediterranean. And there was Shabrawishi whose perfumes sent a sweet Breeze from the Nile in the air when people congregated around the ladies that had removed their Yasmak, their Ottoman-designed veil. Not in their wildest dreams could Rifa'a al-Tahtawi and Muhammad 'Abduh fathom such changes amongst a few Egyptians would happen in such a short time. These new elites moved with great ease between the modern world and the realm of their ancestry. They could telegraph to Europe to put in an order or close a deal then return home to their customs and their mores, to their daily religious practices and to listening, in the concert hall, to the compositions of Muhmmad 'abd al-Wahhab and the voice of Umm Kulthum. Someone once remarked that, in this respect, Egypt and Japan had much in common. 

The Ingiliz had, no doubt, introduced a growing number of Egyptians to values which were not indigenous to their culture. This was certainly the case with the Liberal elites. Socially, they rubbed shoulders with Foreigners. In clubs, they could be seen drinking beer. Their spouses and daughters dressed like Christians and Jewesses and wore bathing suites in pools and along the beaches. In the villas they had built for their families, they raised pets like the English did, who carried English names and were ordered around in English: sit, Rex. And, they had the fondest memories of their journeys to Europe. In the Canal City of Isma'iliyyah, one Hasan al-Banna, objected to the way in which his country had been evolving: "ya nas, he used to preach in some café to his growing audience, taraktum dinakum wa dhahabat akhlakukum", you have abandoned your religion and lost your souls to immorality. al-Banna and the formation he brought about, al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin, should adorn the next frescoe.