World War II (1939-1945) brought major changes to Egypt in the form of rapid economic growth and thousands of British troops, whose culture and behavior reinforced anti-Western sentiment among Egyptians. By 1948 the Brotherhood had an estimated 500,000 members and probably a similar number of sympathizers. By this time, the Brotherhood had also developed a so-called Secret Apparatus of guerrilla fighters, many of whom fought against Israel after Israel declared its independence in 1948. Although Bannah’s approach was gradual, his results were radical from the government’s point of view. Fearing the Brotherhood was becoming a state within a state, the Egyptian government outlawed the organization and in 1949 assassinated Bannah. The Brotherhood revived in 1950, and some of its members ran in elections independently of the Brotherhood. In 1952 army officers led by Gamal Abdel Nasser seized control of the Egyptian government and legalized the Brotherhood, only to ban it in 1954. The Secret Apparatus retaliated by trying to assassinate Nasser, who responded by imprisoning and executing many fundamentalists. After Nasser’s crackdown and during the repression that followed, the Brotherhood entered a quiet period. But in 1974 the group reemerged, in part because President Anwar al-Sadat promoted the conservative Brotherhood to balance his leftist opponents. Although Sadat opened parts of Egypt’s economy to Westerners, many of the Brotherhood’s senior leaders did not oppose him, because by this time they had come to favor a more market-oriented economy. At the same time, however, the increased competition and other reforms hurt many Egyptians. Some of the disaffected young people embraced the writings of Sayyid Qutb, a Brotherhood writer whom Nasser had hanged in 1966. Qutb asserted that Egypt was in a state of pre-Islamic ignorance, or jahiliyya, and should be brought into a state of knowledge. Thus inspired, several young militants in the Egyptian army, with ties to a more radical group called Jihad, assassinated Sadat in October 1981
Posted on: Wed, 21 Aug 2013 23:56:33 +0000
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