We talked before about
the injuries that hit our Egyptian immune system starting with the duplication
of education system resulting in another terrible duplicity in both conscience
and culture. Then, we talked about discontinuity in the graphical line
representing Egyptian history. Later, we talked about Egyptians’ migration to
oil-rich Arab countries and what came next as a result like domination of
individual salvation philosophy, attitude of lavish consumption, and squandering
our national deposits over industries that do not establish real renaissance.
Today, we continue
talking about the part left in the third injury that has to do with Egyptians’
migration to oil-rich Arab countries; the part we should call the greatest
calamity for it’s an injury that hit our Egyptian mentality in the heart
affecting both conscience and social relations. The most dangerous was that it
had a significantly devastating effect on Egyptians’ relation with their
country and their citizenship.
History has proved that
the conqueror, whatever his source of power is, is the one who can impose his
culture and ideology on the conquered. In very rare cases, the conquered was
able to fight back in many ways; one of them was to digest what is imposed over
him by the conqueror and then transform it into a new version that guarantees
his identity in a way that benefits him. It’s what Egypt has succeeded to do
through its long history when conquered by foreign invaders. The invader
occupied its land but ended up being digested in it while Egypt stayed as it
is. Although Egypt was affected by the Greek-Roman invasion, adopted
Christianity, and later Islam, but through all this, it was able to affect and
impose its own character on all those, especially on Christianity and Islam as
well.
After Infitah[1]
and what followed later as to stealing the achievements of October 1973 victory
attained by all classes of the Egyptian people, especially lower and middle
classes and a little bit of the upper one – Classes here have to do with the economic
and consumption criteria – Egyptians decided to leave their country. That
exodus had two routes. The first was to North America; Canada and the U.S.A,
Europe, and Australia, where most migrants were Egyptian Christians. Some of
them were not allowed to do anything useful in their homeland Egypt, so they
stayed in their migration country, while some came back and later immigrated. This
kind of migration was different to that one heading to oil-rich Arab countries.
Since the first usually deepens your feelings of homesickness and nationalism.
The second, meanwhile, was the one I call the greatest calamity.
Days proved that
Egyptians, if conquered in their homeland, used to deal with the invader as we
described earlier but they can never lose their unique Egyptian identity. The
dangerous variable affecting this equation was the one I guess nobody paid due
attention to when Egyptians had to leave their homeland to the land of the
conqueror or the most powerful and stay there temporarily for a pre-decided set
of years or for long times, where they behaved totally different to when they
were conquered in their land. After leaving their homeland, Egyptians have lost
their identity and points of influence and distinguish in their society when
they went to Iraq, Gulf Arab countries, and Yemen. For example, they lost their
cohesion as an agricultural community and as a civil middle class. Both of
these two characters; agricultural and civil, were distinguished by cohesion
and solidarity, not to mention the integration quality popular among residents
of the countryside community due to the nature of the agriculture activity.
In migration to oil-rich
Arab countries, everyone sought his own benefits even if it was on his fellow
Egyptian’s dead body. We heard a lot – like in my case as I was one of those
who migrated for several years – about differences between Palestinian, Lebanese
and Sudanese communities’ behavior in oil-rich countries and that of the
Egyptian community since Egyptians were not accustomed or trained to migration
mechanisms or protocols if we can say. Migrating Egyptians lost very important
qualities. Some losses were due to harsh reality circumstances, while others
were nothing but deviant behaviors acquired during years of migration.
The concept of Arab
nationalism, both its political and cultural parts, was severely damaged, with
the Palestinian cause in the heart of it, which is a matter of direct national
security to Egypt. Expatriate Egyptians migrating to oil-rich countries were
subjected to unfair legal systems like al-Kafil[2], and also did not enjoy
the same benefits like those of the citizens of those countries. In addition,
some had a negative point of view of Egypt as they had images like Share’
el-Haram[3],
foul and falafel[4], pickpockets and
prostitutes, and others in their minds. Some, meantime, denied Egypt’s past
role in education, culture, art, and political role. Moreover, competition in
work fields among Arab expatriates of different nationalities started to have
negative effect; many talked about Palestinians persecuting Egyptians and
Sudanese denying their mutual history with Egyptians. In this way, concept of
Arab nationalism along with its political context was hit in the core in the
Egyptian mentality.
After this, the concept
of nationalism and citizenship was badly damaged in the mentality of many
expatriate Egyptians through two ways. The first was cultural brain washing
performed through religious discourse dominated in some Gulf Arab countries’
communities by hard-liners’ interpretations like that of Ibn Hanbal[5], Ibn Taymiyyah[6], and Ibn Abdel-Wahhab[7]; such interpretations that
do not recognize concepts of nationalism or citizenship. In those hard-liners’
ideology, such concepts are regarded either as pure fanaticism or cults, and
that dying for them is not for the sake of God and hence those who die
defending their countries or seeking their independence and freedom of land are
not considered martyrs. The other way that killed nationalism was the
consumption mentality that identifies homeland in terms of cash, balance in bank
account, and real-estate properties.
Things became worse when
all this took place during Sadat’s ruling era that lasted until 1981 and continued
through the corruption era of his hand-picked successor Mubarak for thirty
years. Egyptians used to travel and work in oil-rich Arab countries
accumulating what they thought was enough to fulfill their needs like affording
to have an apartment, car, household facilities, place to spend the summer, and
maybe a bank account in case they needed more money for educating their
children and preparing them for marriage, not to mention their commitments toward
their big families living in the countryside or city. But when deciding to come
back to Egypt thinking it is the last year away from their beloved homeland,
Egyptians found inflation, soaring prices, and corruption going higher and
eating away their savings. And so, again they migrate back desperate and heart-broken
for not being able to afford a good life in their homeland, wondering, whether
exclaiming or ironically-speaking, “Where is homeland? It no longer exists!” feeling
deep in their hearts that it’s the country where they couldn’t afford to have
their basic needs or even allowed to although they travelled, left his beloved people
behind, and worked hard day and night.
I here recall an account
of domestic migration that happened long time ago in our village when my father
found a job as an Arabic language and religion teacher in the mid forties. We
moved out to the city of Quweisna[8] for my father to work
in al-Massa’e al-Mashkoura school. I remember the grief, crying, and
insistence to provide us with all we might need before we travel after every
mid-year or summer vacations, including flour and Gella[9] dried plates in order to
find fuel to bake the bread. Distance separating our village in Gharbia
governorate’s countryside and Quweisna was not more than 70 kilo meters… you can imagine how
Egyptians feel thousands of miles away from their country despite having
planes, phones, internet, and other technology-facilitating tools available.
We shall talk later
about the rest of the greatest calamity aspects.
Translated into English by: Dalia Elnaggar
Translated into English by: Dalia Elnaggar
This article was
published in Al Ahram newspaper on February 18, 2016.
To see the Arabic
article, go to:
#alahram#ahmed_elgammal#our_egyptian_immune_system#Egyptians_mirgrating_to_oil_rich_Arab_countries#alkafil#Sadat#Mubarak
[1] Infitah: (Arabic: إنفتاح) the Arabic
word for the open door policy adopted by President Sadat in the years following
1973 October war. (Source: Wikipedia)
[2] Al-Kafil: (Arabic: الكفيل) is a legal
system emerged in Gulf Arab countries when oil started to appear there
prompting millions of job opportunities in those countries. According to this
system, al-Makfoul (Arabic: المكفول) – the foreigner
looking for a job – is put under the responsibility of al-Kafil –
the business owner or the oil-country citizen responsible for “importing” those
workers. As per this system, al-Makfoul is not allowed
to leave the country or leave his job to another unless his Kafil approves
this, the matter that is regarded as some kind of slavery performed under the
pretext of securing the country against the incoming laboring force.
[3] Share’ el-Haram: (Arabic: شارع الهرم, or el-Haram
street) a street in Cairo famous for its night clubs.
[4] Foul and Falafel:
(Arabic: فول وفلافل)
are two very popular food in Egypt made from beans but in different styles
which are affordable for the poor. The writer here means some used to remind
the Egyptians with these two dishes in specific in a hint at their current
poverty.
[5] Aḥmad
ibn Ḥanbal: (Arabic:أحمد بن حنبل ) was a Muslim scholar and theologian. He is considered
the founder of the Hanbali school
of Islamic
jurisprudence. Ibn Hanbal is known for his restricted opinions
and religious jurisdictions in Islam.
[6] Aḥmad
ibn Taymiyyah (Arabic: ابن تيمية) known
as Ibn Taymiyyah (22 January 1263 - 26 September 1328) was an Islamic
scholar, theologian and logician.
He lived during the troubled times of the Mongol
invasions, much of the time in Damascus. He was a member of the school founded by Ahmad ibn
Hanbal and is considered by his
followers, along with Ibn Qudamah, as one of the two most significant proponents of Hanbalism. Ibn Taymiyyah sought the return of Sunni Islam to what he viewed as earlier interpretations of the Qur'an and the Sunnah.(source:
Wikipedia)
[7] Muhammad
ibn ʿAbdel-Wahhab: (Arabic: محمد بن عبد الوهاب; 1703 – 22 June
1792) was a Sunni Muslim preacher and scholar from Nejd in central Arabia who claimed to "purify" Islam by returning it to what, he believed, were the
original principles of that religion as the salaf, that is first three generations of Muslims,
understood it. (Source: Wikipedia)
[8] Quweisna: (Arabic: قويسنا) is a
city in Monufia Governorate, Egypt. It has an area of 49009 feddans (210 square
kilometers). (Source: Wikipedia)
[9] Gella (Arabic: جلة) or Dung
cakes, made from the by-products of animal
husbandry, are traditionally used as fuel for making food in a
domestic hearth.
They are made by hand by village women and are traditionally made from cow or
buffalo dung. One dung cake of an average size gives 2100 kJ worth of energy.
This bio-fuel has been used for a long time primarily of two reasons 1. for
easy disposal of cow dung 2. easily available and cheap fuel. After burning the
residue ash is used to wash hands since it becomes germs free as bi-product of
burning and sprinkled also on crops to get rid of certain pests. (Source:
Wikipedia)
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