The writer occasionally
finds a certain topic rich to write about… once the idea is present, he finds
all contexts and phrases flowing in his mind finding its way to the paper or to
the keyboard without effort… and if there was anything to do in such case, it’s
to control this flow so that the article stays brief, clear and precise.
That’s exactly what
happened between me and 1956… I say it in numbers because if I went into
determining “which 1956 I mean?”… I’d have written more than what is likely to
be said in one side alone.
1956 from my personal perspective is what remained in the memory
of a 10-year old boy who lived with his family in a small city; that is the
city of Dessouq; city of Sufi spiritual leader; Master Ibrahim Ibn Abol-magd,
known as ed-Dessouqi… what remained in that memory is deep and profound enough
to represent the whole thing.
As to 1956, from other
unlimited perspectives, it’s the shining solid ring of the many rings forming
the wills’ battle between the Egyptian people and those forces that kept
working on breaking its will…
Also, it’s the battle
between the Egyptian people and challenges of poverty, diseases, retardation
and subordination… and so, it was the model people that inspired the British
history philosopher, Arnold J. Toynbee of the “challenge and response” law…
which he saw is the base in understanding the historical movement or understanding
the human relation to time… and as long as these challenges exist, the battle
of wills’ conflict exists too from the past to the present and reaching also to
the future… its forms may vary and its parties could differ but the context is
still the same; it’s the tale of people who want to live a decent life in all aspects
without assaulting others, but there are parties and circumstances which
intersect with this will for unlimited reasons…
And since history is a
chain of connected rings extending from the past, through present, to the future,
we cannot separate the rings from one another… first, the 1805 ring, when the
Egyptian people rose to impose their will over the Ottomans to change the
regime ruling then adopted in Egypt… then came the 1882 ring, when cadres of
the Egyptian people recruited in the army moved to stand against injustice,
discrimination and looting… then the 1919 ring, when the whole people moved to
imposed their collective will to achieve independence and democracy… and many
rings followed after that in 1935 and 1946 until we reached the 1952 ring when
change took place to achieve independence and so came evacuation of British
troops in 1954…
At that time, the regime’s
orientation was to build and develop our country by controlling our national
resources and by having a strong determination to set off from the river
towards the sea through three circles; the Arab, African and Islamic ones in
addition to the international circle… then this Egyptian role intensified and
so came the first Arab unity in 1958… etc… until our present moment where we
find ourselves in the middle of wills’ conflict battle on all levels; domestic,
regional and international.
Such context requires
that we analyze very carefully the other wills intersecting with our Egyptian one…
adopting the style of “exchanging seats” or “exchanging roles” may be useful
here… meaning to imagine ourselves in the other side or playing the role of the
other opposite party and see how he thinks, plans and moves… we may discover
that this connected continuous battle requires that we shall be definitely obliged
to enhance our tools, disciplines and the way we manage things while keeping
our priorities and principles standing before our eyes.
We were in the middle of
this battle of wills’ conflict when the international powers in the 19th
century found that the Egyptian army movement in 1881 and the demands called for
by the leaders of the 1881 revolution could revive the Egyptian role that was undermined
by the Convention of London of 1840… without going deep into details justifying
my goal, the British interference and occupation was aiming at undermining
Egypt’s role and also containing this role in the side of a certain party in the
international colonial conflict at that time.
We were involved in such
wills’ conflict when we put an end to the corrupt royal autocrat regime… also,
we had the British troops’ evacuation treaty signed… then, we revealed our
intention to start an independent industrial and agricultural development,
cultural and political comprehensive renaissance, Arab unity and supporting
liberation movements in the world… and indeed we went into achieving all of
them… and building the High Dam was the most prominent achievement of them at
that time.
Only then, the old
colonization along with the Zionist state realized that we represent a standing
danger and maybe more threatening to them in the future despite we didn’t start
the assault or seek to engage with any party…
In such regard, I remember
the known incident that took place shortly after the July 23 revolution had
erupted, when an American political envoy came to Egypt and afterwards went to
the Zionist state… when he met Ben-Gurion, Sharett and Meir, he told them: “I have
the best and most important news you could wish to hear; that is I sat with
Nasser and asked him about his regime priorities and he directly answered: our
priority is to get busy building our country to become a strong nation on all
levels… and going in a war with Israel is not listed on our agenda…” When the Zionists
heard this, they yelled: “it’s the worst news we could ever hear in this
century”.
This is a brief of the battle
of wills’ conflict … as 1956 was not only a tripartite assault on our country
but a ring of the chain representing the Zionist and colonial others’
determination to break our will and destroy our present and future.
The lesson we should
learn from 1805 and what followed after until our current moment and the wills’
conflict we have since been through on all three levels; domestic, regional and
international, is that we must realize how to manage such conflict
scientifically and practically… and also value the powerful cards we have in
our hands… as it’s well known that power is not only weapons and ammunition…
but along with that and even equally important is how domestically cohesive we
are and how much we depend on our national capacity in economy and services…etc…
and all those who seek the nation’s interests know well that this is exactly
what we need in this era.
I loved to write more completing
the scene by talking about the role of words, music and conscience in the
battle of wills to reply to the one who dared to say in a public event that: “talking
about Egypt’s role is out-dated now and Halim’s songs do not make a role”…
these words were said by Abdel-Moniem Said more than a month ago replying to me
when I tried to inquire about the possibilities of intersection between the
Egyptian and Saudi roles in light of the paper “The Kingdom in 2030” which was
demonstrated by him in that occasion.
Translated into English by: Dalia Elnaggar
Translated into English by: Dalia Elnaggar
This article was
published in Al-Mosawar magazine, issue no. 4803 on October 26, 2016.
To see the original
article, go to:
#almosawar
#ahmed_elgammal #1956
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