Nostalgia Sunday – End of an Era
Filed under: A New Reality, coexistence, education, General, History and Culture, Life, News, Nostalgia Sunday, Politics, Profiles, War
The events in Egypt over the past two weeks, which culminated in the resignation of President Hosni Mubarak, are being watched with no little trepidation in Israel. The media, both international and local, have focused on Mubarak to the exclusion of anything that came before, as if there was no Sadat, no Nasser, no King Farouk, no British Mandate, no Ottoman Empire… in short, reportage without historical context.
Before history is forgotten completely, this would be a good time to dig into the Israel National Photo Archive for a glimpse at relations between Israel and Egypt over the years.
In 1956, for example, this float at the annual Purim Adloyada parade featured paper mache figures of Israel’s David Ben Gurion shaking hands with Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser above a banner emblazoned with the ironic, “Prophecy of the End of Days”.
Photo by Moshe Pridan
And yet, peace with Egypt did come. In 1977, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat made his historic visit to Israel and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin then visited Egypt.
Photo by Yaacov Saar
In 1979, peace talks were held at Beer Sheva, led by Begin and Sadat, who was accompanied by his then-Vice President Hosni Mubarak.
Photo courtesy of Ben Gurion University of the Negev
Begin and Mubarak met again at the funeral of Sadat who was assassinated in 1981.
Photo by Chanania Herman
Mubarak became president and continued to maintain Egypt’s commitment to peace with Israel. Together with Jordan’s King Hussein and US President Bill Clinton, he oversaw the signing of the Oslo Accords by Israel’s Yitzhak Rabin and the PLO’s Yasser Arafat.
Photo by Avi Ohayon
Mubarak’s only other visit to Israel was in 1995, to attend the funeral of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. (He is shown here with interim Prime Minister Shimon Peres).
Photo by Tsvika Israeli
It is too early to tell whether the current days mark a watershed in our relations with Egypt. But as the age of Mubarak comes to a close, we can look back fondly to the time when the impossible suddenly became possible; the day in 1979, for example, when the Israeli-Egyptian air corridor was inaugurated, Sadat, Mubarak and Begin took to the skies and the smiles — at least for that moment — were real.
Photo by Yaacov Saar
A look back at a different Egypt
Our family trip to Egypt a few years back
As Egypt continues to rock with turmoil from the past weeks’ revolution in Tahrir Square and beyond, I found myself reflecting on a trip we took with the whole family to the land of the Nile several years ago.
This wasn’t a trip to the Sinai (which is what most Israelis think when we tell them we visited Egypt). Rather, we flew to Cairo, spent a couple of days touring the pyramids and taking in the treasures of the Egyptian Museum, then took the night train to Luxor, toured the astounding tombs in the Valleys of the Kings and Queens, before heading further south to Aswan with its laid back water-faring vibe.
As tourists, we were struck by a palpable feeling of safety. I remember telling my wife that this is what it would be like if the Palestinian Authority truly had peace with Israel and we could sip coffee in Ramallah and Nablus. Yes, the security check as we entered the hotel grounds was thorough, but we’re used to such things in Israel, I figured.
That security, I now realize, was the result of a heavy-handed police state that kept the quiet by squashing dissent and rounding up anyone vaguely suspicious. And I can’t fail to mention that we scrupulously hid our Israeli identity, traveling on U.S. passports and speaking only English (although our son tried his hand at a little Arabic he learned in school, prompting our tour guide to comment, “I didn’t know they taught Arabic in American schools!”)
The stories from travelers evacuated from Egypt that I’ve read in the news – violence in the streets, tanks in Luxor, the economy in shambles – is unnerving of course, with the potential political ramifications even more so. Will a post-Mubarak still be safe for tourists? I hope so. But I suppose that’s the least of our problems…
Just another day in the neighborhood
Filed under: A New Reality, coexistence, General, Israeliness, Life, News, Politics, tv
Tahrir Square in Cairo on Tuesday.
Tonight for examples, Channel One’s nightly Mabat news broadcast and its presenter Inon Magal didn’t know what to do first – report on:
1 – the ‘Million Man March’ in Cairo and the nearing of the end of President Hosni Mubarak’s reign
2 – the decision by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak to cancel the nomination of Maj.-Gen. Yoav Galant as the next chief of staff adue to ‘ethical flaws’ in allegedly shady, if not illegal, behavior regarding a number of land affairs on his moshav, Amikam
3 – or Jordan’s King Abdullah feeling the domino effect of what’s transpired in Tunisia and Egypt and proactively sacking his prime minister and cabinet as thousands of Jordanians also began taking to the streets.
So they decided to mix all three up, switching back and forth from reports in Cairo to Galant’s bitter interview to the scene in Jordan.
That’s not even mention the other stories that, on any other day, might have been the big news – a Grad rocket fired into Israel from Gaza last night which landed so close to a wedding hall with an event taking place that all the attendees jumped out of their seats when it hit.
We like to take pride at Israelity in the fact that Israel is indeed a place of much more than strife and conflict – you can read about all the other aspects of the amazing country we live in here every day.
But it’s times like these that remind us there is something just a little crazy about life here – there is strife and conflict all around us. And even though it’s our neighbors who are experiencing the brunt of it right now, we can never forget that anything can be right around the corner.
Egypt revolt strangely missing Israeli element
Filed under: A New Reality, coexistence, General, Life, News, Politics, War
A demonstrator in Cairo - where's Israel? (Photo: Melanie Lidman)
Notwithstanding unfounded rumors that President Hosni Mubarak might find refuge if he flees his country in Tel Aviv, or fear of what an Islamic takeover of Egypt will mean for our southern border and future ties with the Arab country we’ve had a peace treaty with for over 30 years, the most glaring element of the whole revolt is how little Israel has to do with it.
As Herb Keinon wrote in The Jerusalem Post on Sunday, “for the tens of thousands of protesters who took to Egypt’s streets over the weekend, defying the curfew and calling for the departure of President Hosni Mubarak, Israel and the Palestinians were simply not on the agenda.
“And the same was the case during the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia earlier this month, and in the demonstrations intermittently taking place in Jordan, Yemen, Algeria and Morocco. No cries of death to Israel, no signs to “lift the siege” of Gaza, no chants against housing projects in Ariel.”
Melanie Lidman, the Post’s report in Cairo, wrote that anti-US and anti-Israel sentiment is growing over those country’s lack of overt support for the popular uprising. But from an Israeli perspective, it’s refreshing to have demonstrations and riots in the region that seemingly have nothing to do with us.
Which doesn’t diminish our vested interested in what transpires an iota. While the anti-government, pro-democracy demonstrators are demanding Mubarak’s ouster, there’s the extremist Muslim Brotherhood just waiting for a vacuum to rush in and turn Egypt into another Iran, this one with borders abutting Israel.
No matter how it turns out, one thing is clear. Settlements, Jerusalem and Israel’s policy on Gaza are not the main issues threatening stability in the Middle East.
Nostalgia Sunday – Egypt Under the Stereoscope
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, News, Nostalgia Sunday, Politics, Religion, Social Justice, Technology, Travel, tv
In December, one spark caused the dry underbrush that had amassed for years beneath the Carmel Forest trees to burst into flame. Similarly, the tinderbox that is the wild, wild Middle East has combusted spontaneously. Except that spontaneity would imply surprise. Although we Israelis are watching the events in Cairo unfold with no little anxiety, (our hope is that the “cold peace” with Egypt will stay intact), it would be a mistake to think that anyone here is entirely surprised. We just thought it would happen a bit differently.
One element that has proved surprising is the enormous amount of credit being attributed to social media, via the Internet and cellular, for driving events in both Tunisia and Egypt — and who knows where else in the near future. Given that, it might be nice to take a look back at the high-tech of 100 years ago: stereoscopy.
As written in a previous column, stereoscopic technology comprised two separate images printed side-by-side, mounted on cardboard and peered at through the lens of a stereoscope viewer. It sounds primitive by today’s standards but the impact of this form of 3-D photography was great. Take, for example, this description of what would today be called “e-learning” as written in 1905 by Prof. James Henry Breasted, Professor of Egyptology and Oriental History at the University of Chicago:
“Heretofore I have never been able to find any books or material which could furnish graphic reproductions of the remains still surviving in the ancient lands of the East… It was, therefore, with peculiar satisfaction that I made the acquaintance of this system of stay-at-home travel, the great merits of which are but beginning to be appreciated. By its use an acquaintance can be gained, here at home, with the wonders of the Nile Valley, which is quite comparable with that obtained by traveling there.”
The full text of Prof. Breasted’s book, Egypt through the stereoscope: a journey through the land of the Pharaohs, complete with stereoscopic images, may be found online. Meanwhile, here is a small selection of images from Cairo as it was 100 years ago.
“Cairo, home of the Arabian Nights, the greatest city of Africa, northwest from Saladin’s citadel to the Nile”
“A ‘Ship of the Desert’ passing the tombs of by-gone Moslem rulers, outside the east wall of Cairo”
“The great Nile Bridge at Cairo open for the passage of the daily fleet of cargo boats”
“The Holy Carpet parade with the Mahmal, before the departure of the pilgrims for Mecca, Cairo”
“The magnificent jewelry of the Pharaohs (Queen Ahhotep, 17th century B. C.), Cairo Museum”
We can only hope that the looters who broke into the Cairo Museum this week didn’t get to these. They did enough damage by tearing the heads off two mummies and breaking many other irreplaceable items.
In closing, here’s one that’s not from Dr. Breasted’s book but a must-share nonetheless: a stereoscopic image by the Keystone View Company entitled “The Graf Zeppelin’s rendezvous with the eternal desert and the more than 4,000 year old pyramids of Gizeh, Egypt” that documents the 1931 event. There’s nothing we in the West love more than a picture that fits our technology leapfrogging ideal and this one is an absolute wow.
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