When it comes to deciphering interpretations of Egypt's recent past, the common thread linking them is the sense of squandered potential.
Blame has been thrown at the feet of various players and ideologies, but the trauma engendered by the Six Day War of 1967 with Israel is the haunted skeleton hanging in the proverbial closet, a reminder that there was once an alternative reality wherein loss was not etched into the national psyche.
Deep in the muck of 1967, one man was singled out: Abdel Hakim Amer—Gamal Abdel Nasser’s trusted military officer and former vice-president.
The two men were, for many years, described as the best of friends. Their bond was forged during their days in military school, long before the Free Officers movement led to the overthrow of King Farouk in 1952. They seemed to share the same political leanings and cultural interests, including a mutual love for film and the arts, which flourished throughout those years. But, their friendship became strained over time and the 1967 defeat (or, “Naksa,” as it is commonly referred to) marked a point of no return. It was Amer’s apparent ill-preparedness that was ultimately blamed for the fallout.
Blame has been thrown at the feet of various players and ideologies, but the trauma engendered by the Six Day War of 1967 with Israel is the haunted skeleton hanging in the proverbial closet, a reminder that there was once an alternative reality wherein loss was not etched into the national psyche.
It’s worth noting that the 1967 defeat was not only a militaristic one: it also marked the collapse of pan-Arabism, dashing hopes of an emerging “new Arab,” the proud, anti-colonial identity that would be the salvation of Egyptians and Arabs throughout the region after years of subterfuge by Western powers. The optimism brought about by the meteoric rise of the Free Officers and Gamal Abdel Nasser’s reign suddenly came to a screeching halt, and a new era of acquiescence began, one which resulted in the postponement of the revolutionary dream.
For this, and rumors of fomenting a military coup against Nasser, Amer was placed under house arrest. He swallowed poison to kill himself, subsuming the shame he brought upon his country — according to the narrative promulgated by the state. Thus is the tragedy of Abdel Hakim Amer, a once great man who suffered an epic fall from grace, barely remembered again.
Although the specifics from that period may have been memory-holed, the lacerations remain and continue to shape much of Egypt’s socio-cultural discourse. The Egyptian public went from listening to nationalist anthems sung by Umm Kalthoum and Abdel Halim Hafez on the radio to seeing dissonant images of tortured soldiers returning home. The feeling of being lied to by their leader was almost too painful to bear.
The 1967 defeat was not only a militaristic one: it also marked the collapse of pan-Arabism, dashing hopes of an emerging “new Arab." A proud, anti-colonial identity that would be the salvation of Egyptians and Arabs throughout the region after years of subterfuge by Western powers.
Meanwhile, the entertainment industry complex was enlisted in the dissemination of state-approved nationalism to service Abdel Nasser’s goals. Entertainers and politicians - seemingly two polar entities - have circled each other for decades in Egypt, drawing power and influence from one another, so long as certain guardrails were kept in place.
Before the public’s distrust of the media fully settled in, Amer was the convenient scapegoat, and his alleged distractions — women, a life of excess — were tangible vices upon which the public could hang their discontent. Amer came to represent the regrettable collusion of these entities, beleaguered by the unsavory portrait of corruption in the name of the mighty dollar. Very few people, besides his wife, have gone on the record to speak on his character, his career, or upbringing. This chapter in cultural history remains hidden, even as its fallout continues to inform the present.
At a time wherein the arts are blatantly used to camouflage the many human rights abuses perpetrated by the government of Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates continues to open more anemic museums and art galleries while barely hiding their genocidal proxy war in Sudan, the confluence of political goals and propaganda is just as apparent as ever in the Arab world. Amer’s regrettable fate can be viewed anew through this contemporary lens, a warning that governmental machinations can eventually cannibalize itself.
Idle whispers
Cafés and literary salons have long animated Egyptian public life. The chatter inevitably evolves into politically-tinged gossip, as is the case with any society experiencing massive social upheaval. After all, gossip is the most fluid way in which power structures are challenged.
Nasser’s inner circle understood that rumors could be used to counteract attempts to question their authority. These rumors could be relatively benign, or the basis of massive smear campaigns, depending on their target. The rumor mill was an indelible feature of Nasser’s rule, as Gamal al-Ghitani alluded to in his 1971 novel, "Zayni Barakat."
Set in the Mamluk Dynasty, al-Ghitani’s film critiques Nasser’s rule with a story paralleling the atmosphere of conspiracy and intrigue that stifled the 1960s. The president’s distracting focus on the war in Yemen while trying to improve the morality of Egyptian life backfired as Israel prepared for invasion. In the novel, the Mamluks fell to the Ottomans, and the sea of spies and conspiracies binding together the royal dynasty shatters spectacularly - an ending that echoes the reality of the recent present.
Recorded history in the form of primary sources or national archives were, and remain, closely guarded, thereby erasing marginal actors. For a state keen on projecting a facade of national unity, how history was being documented in real time made all the difference to Nasser, who himself understood the power of the moving image and the importance of controlled messaging. This symbiotic relationship between state-oriented image making and hearsay would continue to define post-1952 Egypt. As famed Syrian poet, Nizar Qabbani, would later write “our history is nothing but a rumor.”
Nasser was a cinephile, and understood the utility of Egypt’s beloved art scene in service of the national project. As such, a select number of the Arab world’s famous entertainers enjoyed a measure of access within the political sphere, thus setting the stage for the paranoia that would later emerge regarding mainstream media and its complicity in formulating political objectives. So, while it’s true that Egypt’s cultural scene in the 50s and 60s experienced what would later be framed as a Golden Age, it was also routinely censored, with most movies featuring heavy moralizing about the individual and their place in society.
After 1967, the entire arts and culture scene was caught in stasis. For years, no one knew what to make of the defeat. Slowly, counter-narratives emerged, especially through literature and cinema. The latter saw a rise in documentary filmmaking, and narrative films that openly questioned Egypt and the Arab world’s role in both the Nakba of 1948 as well as the disastrous reshaping of the region after 1967.
It is within this historical context that Amer met and married the famed screen siren Berlanti Abdel Hamid in a secret ceremony with close family members in 1964. The secrecy of their union was a nod to the discomfort that large swaths of the public felt towards mixing of the political establishment with the seemingly frivolous celebrity scene.
Performers were hounded by claims of espionage, either at the behest of Egyptian authorities or foreign entities, thus compounding the mistrust. Nefarious gossip aside, the union did not cause Amer’s downfall. It was rumors of his womanizing, his affinity for famous sirens or songbirds, as in his alleged affair with the singer Warda, that was ultimately his undoing.
Much of what transpired between Amer’s house arrest and death remains unclear. We only know the stories we’ve heard from various interlocutors. While military historians would later point to the complexities that led to the Naksa, whispers that the General was with his wife while soldiers were being fed to the enemy consolidated his fate as the nation’s scapegoat. Nevermind that Nasser’s inner circle were busy recording his friend’s conjugal relations in secret as blackmail. Nevermind that years of mismanagement under Nasser’s rule played a direct role in the Naksa. That a military man was with an actress not approved by the state’s inner circle was enough to puncture his veneer of morality.
After 1967, the entire arts and culture scene was caught in stasis. For years, no one knew what to make of the defeat. Slowly, counter-narratives emerged, especially through literature and cinema. The latter saw a rise in documentary filmmaking, and narrative films that openly questioned Egypt and the Arab world’s role in both the Nakba of 1948 as well as the disastrous reshaping of the region after 1967. Censorship in Egypt was still strong, and vital films like Tawfiq Saleh’s "The Dupes" (1972) were either produced in other countries like Syria, or were temporarily banned from cinemas altogether, such as Mamdouh Shoukry’s only film, "Visitor at Dawn" (1973).
Shoukry’s work is particularly notable here. A political thriller produced by its star, Magda El-Khatib. Visitor at Dawn tells the story of a journalist whose murder points to the collusion of politicians, businessmen, and all manner of unsavory characters flooding the edges of Egyptian society. Entertainers are mainly invisible, showing up as shadowy figures on the periphery, and it’s clear from their comportment that they’re far from the respectable, established stars that littered the mainstream in industry’s so-called Golden Age.
Shoukry’s omen? Unfettered capitalism was coming, and the flood of cash would be the ultimate death knell for pan-Arab socialism.
The Mubarak years and onwards
Social progress continued to limp into the 80s, and as Nasserism gave way to Sadat, who gave way to Mubarak, the idea that state corruption was inevitable had congealed in the eyes of the general public. So, too, did socialism and any semblance of secular politics, as activist Arwa Saleh eloquently captured in her memoir, The Stillborn, published in 1996, shortly after her suicide. Islamist ideology became more entrenched in the Mubarak years, as other policies failed: “to many, the defeat of Arab armies at the hand of Israel [...] was a defeat of political regimes and their secular ideologies. Furthermore, it was a blunt reminder of the century-long humiliation by the West, which is seen by Arabs and Muslims as a patron and supporter of Israel.” The idea that military insiders were influenced by foreign agendas, and performers were infiltrated by spies or politicians servicing an amalgam of enemies, all have their root in Amer’s demise.
The current genocide in Gaza and the West Bank has undoubtedly dredged up old wounds that never healed for many Egyptians. And in a turnaround for historically conservative Saudi Arabia, the blatant attempt to grab the mantle of cultural influence from Egypt and Lebanon has provided a convenient way to whitewash the Kingdom’s human rights violations.
The film that is perhaps most emblematic of a post-1967 fugue is Samir Seif’s "The Bellydancer and the Politician" (1990). Based on a short story originally written by Ihsan Abdel Kouddous, the film documents the various layers of hypocrisy underlying the political system, and the ways in which it scapegoats belly dancers and other outsiders for an array of societal ills.
In the film, Nabeela Abeid plays a belly dancer who, while beloved by the public, no longer enjoys the graces of the political establishment once she moves beyond the box they’ve assigned her. The moralizing of politicians and mainstream society is lampooned for its vacuous nature, and the film not-so-subtly argues that society’s marginalized figures, from belly dancers to drug addicts, are all far more honest than the politicians who hide behind a mask of righteousness.
The 2011 Revolution upended this dynamic once again. But, after that brief period of cultural openness and ingenuity, doors were stiflingly shut under Abdel Fatah al Sisi’s rule. The difference with Sisi’s presidency, however, is that the propagandistic efforts undertaken by his government are far less beguiling than anything previously produced in the Egyptian mainstream. Part of this is because Sisi and his inner circle have very little use for pretending that they’re invested in capturing the populace’s imagination. The other part is that the country does not have mainstream stars with the sway of Faten Hammah or Umm Kalthoum. Any entertainment consumed by the public exists solely for the purpose of distracting them from looming economic and political catastrophes. The need to lie is gone.
The current genocide in Gaza and the West Bank has undoubtedly dredged up old wounds that never healed for many Egyptians. And in a turnaround for historically conservative Saudi Arabia, the blatant attempt to grab the mantle of cultural influence from Egypt and Lebanon has provided a convenient way to whitewash the Kingdom’s human rights violations. So, for other countries, what’s old is new: the propagandistic tactics haven’t changed.
Shortly after his death, Amer’s last testament was found by intelligence agents. It was, allegedly, written by hand and reveals one of the few moments of genuine self-reflection we have left from that era.
“We destroyed our economy by our own hands and put our destiny and history in the hands of the devil,” Amer wrote. “We made many mistakes, but the biggest mistake we made was that we did not admit those mistakes.”
Looking at the region’s bleak socio-political landscape, these words reach beyond the grave with a wretched, prophetic power.
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