Empire in Egypt and Sudan, to 1929

Wartime Egypt

Egypt had been nominally a part of the Ottoman Empire, and in 1915 Britain was at war with the Ottoman Empire and in Egypt, and so it declared Egypt no longer under the Ottomans. It declared Egypt a protectorate and deposed Egypt's khedive (governor-ruler), Abass II, who remained loyal to Britain's enemy, the Ottomans. The British set up the khedive's uncle as the Sultan of Egypt - the Ottomans having a sultan and now Egypt having a puppet sultan, His Highness Sultan Husayn Kamil. Egypt's ulama (Muslim scholars) administered Islam's sacred law while while accepting the chasm between the country's idle and wealth elite and the impoverished masses. Banking, finance and shipping was in the hands of the British and other foreigners - the French, Greeks, Armenians and others - who enjoyed the kind of extraterritorial rights commonly offered diplomats. The ulama and various Islamists were annoyed with Britain's "Christian rule," and a broad segment of the population disliked the thousands of foreign soldiers in their country: British, Australian, New Zealanders and Indians. Professionals were annoyed also. Egyptians bureaucrats disliked working under young Britons. In their opposition to Britain's prescesne in Egypt, civil servants, professors and journalists were keen on quoting British authors opposed to imperialism. Egypt's Christians were also opposed to British rule. But there was no organized violence opposition to the British presence, as if it was realized that because of the war the British would be adamant in their response. During the war common Egyptians suffered shortages and rising prices, and there was forced labor sent to the front in France, commandered by the British, but there were no riots. Riots would come after the war.

Riots and "Independence"

At the end of the war, trouble arose with hope for indendence, aroused in part by point twelve of Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points, about "unmolested opportunity of an autonomous development" in for former portions of the Ottoman Empire. A political party had developed devoted to Egyptian independence, the Wafd party. Its members wanted to send a delegation to the Paris Peace Conference. The British did not allow it. In March 1919, the British arrested three Waft party leaders and deported them to te island of Malta. An explosion of rioting followed that surprised the British. In some Egyptian provinces, civilians attacked and killed British soldiers. Egyptians tore up railway tracks and cut telegraph wires. British troops managed to restored order, but passive resistance to British rule remained.

The British released Waft Party delegates from prison and allowed them to go to Paris, where they were shaken by Woodrow Wilson's acceptance of a British protectorate over Egypt.

A British commission did a study and decided on an "alliance" with an "independent" Egypt. Egypt was to have a constitutional monarchy and the British were to have the responsiblity for protecting Egypt from "foreign aggression," to guide" its foreign relations, and to protect Egypt's minority populations and foreigners in Egypt - businessmen, diplomats and what have you, in others words to maintain law and order. And Britain was to remain in control of its "lifeline " to India: the Suez Canal.

Sultan Faud, who had succeeded his elder brother, Sultan Husayn Kamil, who died in 1917, became known as King Faud. Egypt had a constitution and a bicameral legislature, but the king's powers were extensive. He could dissolve the legislature. He appointed and dismissed ministers. He could rule by decree. He had veto power over legislation, which could be over-ridden by two-thirds of the legislature. And he was commander-in-chief of Egypt's armed forces. It might have been easier for Britain to control Egypt with a politically powerful and friendly, or subservient, king than it would have been with a weak king and a powerful parliament.

Elections held in Egypt in January,1924, gave the Wafd Party an overwhelming majority in parliament. The Wafd party leader, Zaghlul, became Prime Minister and remained a national hero, but he was able to take power only by accepting the safeguarding of British interests in Egypt. Meanwhile, in the Sudan the British wanted no competition with Egyptian forces. The Sudan had been considered Egyptian, and Zaghlul demanded that Egypt and Sudan be merged. On November 19, 1924, the British Governor-General of Sudan, Sir Lee Stack, was assassinated in Cairo and pro-Egyptian riots broke out in Sudan. The British demanded that Egypt pay an apology fee and withdraw troops from Sudan. Zaghlul agreed to the first but not the second, and he resigned.

The north of Sudan was predominantly Arab and Muslim and had maintained close ties with Egypt. The south of Sudan was a mixture of Christianity and animism. The British put Sudan's north and south under separate administrations. From 1924, it was illegal for people living in Sudan's north to go south of the 10th parallel and for poeple in the south to go above the 8th parallel. The British were interested in preventing the spreado of malaria and other tropical diseases that had ravaged British troops, and they wanted to facilitate the spread of Christianity among the predominantly animist population in the south while keep Islamic influences out.

The Muslim Brotherhood

IIn Egypt some Muslims remained annoyed by being ruled by Christians. This led to a reinforcement of the devotion to Islam. Some of Egypt's Muslims were alarmed by what they saw as British influences producing a deterioration of Muslim law and institutions. They disliked the growth in secularism, including the secularization of Egyptian schools. Also, they disliked the secular revolution they saw in Turkey - the land whose empire before 1920 had given unity to Islam in the Middle East. In 1928 by a 22-year old school teach Hasan al-Banna, gathered together a few discontented Muslims whom he described as brothers in the service of Islam. His group became known as the Muslim Brotherhood, and he claimed that they had two loyalties. One was to their own nation and the other was to the spiritual nation: Islam.

Al-Banna believed in love of country, in patriotism and in defending one's homeland militarily. He believed too in a sense of community among all Arabic speaking people. He saw Islam as a self-sufficient alternative to the capitalism that dominated Western societies. He looked forward to a revival of the caliphate - Muhammad's successor as head of a united Islam - but he was also modern. He disliked the West's cultural penetration into Islamic societies as saw the West as not exclusively in possession of the science and technological progress that interested him.

One of the Brotherhood's programs was education, and al-Banna spoke of working for the public good, peace and the betterment of all people. About non-Muslims he quoted from the Koran where it said that Muslims should get along with people who live alongside them in peace. And he quoted from the Koran's Sura 60, Verse 9, where it states, God enjoins you only from befriending those who fight you because of religion, evict you from your homes, and band together with others to banish you. You shall not befriend them. Those who befriend them are wrong doers.

The year that the brotherhood was founded, 1929, was the year that bloodshed erupted between Jews and Arabs in Palestine. The Muslim Brotherhood sided with their fellow Muslims there, but Egypt's government suppressed this support. Printing anti-Jewish or anti-Zionist articles was forbidden. Police patrols were sent to protect Jewish neighborhoods in Cairo and Alexandria. Egypt's ruling elite, including King Faud, were interested in getting along with their British overlords, with Jews and with people in general.

Recommended Books

The Middle East, Past and Present, by Yahya Armajania, Prentice-Hall Incll, 1970.

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