British Policy Towards the National Movement in Egypt 1882-1914: A Master Thesis submit By Mohammed Hamza Hassin Al-Dulaymi

Abstract

When Egypt uprose, under the  leadership of Ahmed Urabi in 1881, against the shapes of the khedive tyranny and the foreign interference, forming the first nationalist government of the people's will. Britain claimed that the revelation had formed an unenviable danger for the future of the khedive family, and it -Britain- was keen to secure the future of this family, in the time, the real aim of Britain was the continuity of its privileges in Egypt.

Britain acted to occupy Egypt in September 1882, against all the international laws and traditions. Then it revenged upon the Urabi leaders, the matter that paved the way to control Egypt's fates and its administrations, as if it were one of its colonies.

The research is imposed of a preface and four chapters. The preface is considered as a prelude to illustrate the roots of the foreign penetration in Egypt and its influence in the rise of Urabi nationalist revolt 1881-1882 to the conclusion of the British occupation upon Egypt.     

The first chapter studied "The British Colonial administration in Egypt "1882-1914", and the way of this administration to control most of the Egyptian aspects. Succumbing the country by a handfull of British officials who directed the Egyptian privileges according to their wills and the privileges according the their wills and the privileges of their government.

The second chapter dealt with "The role of the political and intellectual currents in the development of the Egyptian nationalist movement, that the men of those currents had expressed their resentment to the forms of submission to foreign colonialism and the necessity of unifying the efforts to expel the invader.

The third chapter is allocated to study "The British policy toward the nationalist press of Egypt 1882-1914" considering that the beginning of the first nationalist patriotic movement was embodied in the national press and journals. The study concentrated on the most famous Egyptian national journal and their attitudes to the policy of the British occupation.

As for the fourth chapter, it had dealt with the "British policy towards the nationalist party "Al-Watani party" being the leader of the nationalist movement in Egypt, with the tracing of the party foundation stages from the stage since the stage of the underground activity till the official birth of the party.

The information given in this study allows us to look at the following conclusive notes:-

The Egyptian national movement was the product of political, economical, social and cultural factors which were resulted from the stage of the national struggle against the British occupation and under the influence of resisting it according to what the development need had acquired and the Egyptian intellectual and cultural heritage as well as the accumulative storage of the cultural experiences which had vacillated the operation of forming the Egyptian nationalist feeling.

This had led to the rise of the political, intellectual and religions leaderships which worked to spread and cast the nationalist feeling, putting the wills up together and illuminating the minds, announcing its rejection to the tyranny of the ruling khedive family as well as confronting the authorities of the British occupation.

The British policy toward the nationalist movement in Egypt had been characterized by the refusal and enmity, for it stands in the opposite side of its privilege and greediness to act at last containing the nationalist movement and minimizing it.