nasser | Pandaemonium

ON THE DESTRUCTION OF THE EGYPTIAN REVOLUTION

August 21, 2013 by Kenan Malik

On 29 August 1966, Sayyid Qutb, the ideological leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, was hanged in Cairo’s military prison, on the orders of Egyptian president Gamel Abdel Nasser. Qutb and the Brotherhood had, in 1952, supported Nasser when he seized power in a military coup that overthrew the monarchy. In return for his support, Nasser offered Qtub a government post, which the latter declined. The two, however, soon fell out. Nasser, who came to personify Arab secular nationalism, bloodily repressed […]

Categories: International, Politics • Tags: anwar sadat, arab spring, egypt, freedom struggles, hosni mubarak, islamism, liberalism, muslim brotherhood, nasser

NO GOING BACK. THE ARAB REVOLTS AND THE REMAKING OF THE POLITICAL LANDSCAPE

February 21, 2011 by Kenan Malik

The brutal, blood-soaked response of Arab rulers, especially those in Bahrain and Libya, to the revolts engulfing their nations exposes the desperation of old tyrants clinging to the past. But the revolts themselves reveal the extent to which the Arab political landscape has irrevocably changed. The ‘strong man’ model of rule that has held sway over much of the Arab world for the past half century has rested primarily on two props: the ability to constrain opposition at home, and […]

Categories: International, Justice & Liberties • Tags: arab world, democracy, egypt, islamism, james baldwin, muslims, nasser, olivier roy, palestine, protests, regime change, usa, western policy

A REVOLT FOR WHOSE BENEFIT?

February 7, 2011 by Kenan Malik

How can Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak be eased out of office without causing too much turmoil, or without providing a political opportunity for the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood? That’s the question with which many Western leaders are now grappling. The growing consensus seems to be that what Egypt needs is, in the words of Hillary Clinton, an ‘ordered transition’ to a post-Mubarak Egypt and that vice-president Omar Suleiman is the man to manage this. The idea of an ‘ordered transition’ that […]

Categories: International, Justice & Liberties • Tags: cia, democracy, egypt, fareed zakaria, freedom struggles, hillary clinton, hosni mubarak, ian johnson, islamism, muslim brotherhood, nasser, protests, secularism, tony blair, usa, working class movements

HOW IRONIC IF FEAR OF THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD SHOULD LEAD TO POLICIES THAT ENHANCE ITS CLAIM TO POWER

January 31, 2011 by Kenan Malik

The spread of the contagion of protest across North Africa, from Tunisia to Egypt and beyond, has not just been exhilarating. It has also given the lie to one of the great myths about the Muslim world – the belief that people in Muslim countries have a different mindset to those in the West, that democracy and secularism are ‘Western’ concepts alien to the political culture of Egypt or Jordan or Yemen. What the demonstrators in Cairo and Tunis have […]

Categories: Atheism & Religion, International • Tags: democracy, egypt, gilles kepel, iranian revolution, islamism, muslim brotherhood, nasser, secularism

EGYPT’S SECULAR DICTATORS & THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD

January 28, 2011 by Kenan Malik

The Egyptian government is clearly attempting to portray the current revolt as the work of the Muslim Brotherhood, in an attempt to retain Western support. ‘It’s me or the Islamists’, Mubarak is in effect telling Western leaders. It’s worth reflecting, therefore, on how successive Egyptian regimes, like so many in the Arab world, have relied on Islamists to restrain popular revolt:

Categories: Atheism & Religion, International • Tags: egypt, From Fatwa to Jihad, gilles kepel, islamism, kenan malik's books, muslim brotherhood, nasser, protests, secularism