Anwar Al Sadat

Submitted by Another one (Egypt), Apr 5, 2006 at 10:12

Frustration,a feeling i wasn't familiar with till the day i decided to enter this debate, i really had no intention to keep on posting but out of curiosity i thought to drop in and see what's the anchor point of the discussion at the moment,so i stumbled with your post sword.I couldn't help it but to defend the honor of that man who died for his peaceful principles,saving him from being another subject for mockery.Not only the Egyptians owed and still owing him respect but most of the leaders around the whole world as well.

A Quote from your post
"Now comes the interesting part; before becoming president of Egypt he served 4 years in prison for collaboration with the Nazi's during WWII. This was a 'moderate'!"

- Egypt had fallen under the british occupation for nearly 24 years,during those years Egyptian people tasted all kind of suffering and bitterness,they tried all the possible peaceful methods to end this occupation,but they failed. Probably the most famous approachs was from "Saad Zaghlul" who went to the British Residency and demanded Egypt should be given the right to self-determination. He was allowed to speak and leave, but was arrested a month later and sent to Malta. Egypt revolted on the news of this. Overnight Cairo became a revolutionary city as every town and city was seized by Egyptians. Everything stopped. Trains and trams stopped, no one went to work and strikes began.Trenches were dug and the city was barricaded. Many people were killed either in the fighting or executed after being captured.

- The resident minister was replaced by General Allenby and he immediately had Zaghlul
released from Malta. Allenby was criticized for years for this as being too compromising, but
this probably saved Egypt for Britain more than anything else. He declared martial law and
stopped the strikes one by one. Zaghlul had been released from Malta, but was not allowed to
come to Egypt yet. He went to Paris where he tried to get someone to help him get Egypt's
independence. On April 20, 1919 the United States recognized the British protection of Egypt.

This all but ended the hope the Egyptians had of being free.
- The desire for independence from Britain was the dream of all Egyptians at that time.
- So when the british troops were facing several casualties on the hands of the germans
forcing "Montgomery"troops to retreat towards Alexandria,Romel sent emissarys to bargain
with the underground Egyptian resistance promising them with a free country after defeating
the Brits relying on a common Egyptian saying " The enemy of my enemy is a friend".

- Please,bear up with me and read the following chapters from the life of Sadat book..

During the first years of World War II, Sadat was stationed in the western desert, in the signal
corps, facing the Germans under General Rommel. Aziz al Masri ( Inspector General in the
army and served as a role model for the new students) was incarcerated by the British at that
time. Sadat helped him escape... For this act Sadat was arrested in 1941.

Sadat took a leading role in the resistance movement, keeping in touch with Aziz al Masri. He
was in contact with two German spies whose radio transmitterin order to contact Erwin
Rommel. For this he was put in prison. Had he confessed he would have been executed by
the British. The defeat of Rommel and the Germans at El Alamein saved Sadat. The British
stripped him of his rank as an officer and kept hint incarcerated. Sadat remembered his
childhood hero Zahran of Denshway and was happy that he had also defied his rulers. He
was also pleased that he was also able to take their punishment.

For the next six years, Sadat was in and out of British prisons. He escaped in October 1944
and remained a fugitive for the next year. During that year Sadat worked in the Canal Zone as
a laborer then as a trucker hauling building materials to a housing project near the pyramids.
After returning home in September, 1945 he soon became involved in the underground
movement against the puppet ruler whom the British had installed in Cairo. An accomplice of
Sadat's shot the Prime Minister-designate, for which Sadat was arrested and put in solitary
confinement on January 12, 1946. He remained there for one and a half years. Sadat said that
while in prison he read an article written by an American psychologist who helped him cure
his nervous tick and other bad habits, which he had developed earlier. He also worked out
his personal philosophy of living and sincerely believed that his suffering made him a
stronger and better person. The following are some of the things he said then: "Be loyal to
your real entity within you.. this became a real faith with me.. .great suffering builds up a
human being and puts him within reach of self-knowledge. . .To love no longer meant to
possess but rather to let yourself be absorbed into another person's soul, to give and lose
yourself in another person's being. Love is the only force capable of pulling down barriers
which may stand between matter and spirit, visible and invisible, individual and God" (Sadat).
Anwar Sadat was released from prison in July, 1948. A friend, Hassan Izzat, took him to Suez
to restore his health. While there he met Jihan (half British-half Egyptian Lady)who would
become his wife later. During this same period the editor of the newspaper, Al Hilal, saw
Sadat's prison diary and persuaded him to have it published. Sadat also went into a brief
business partnership with Hassan Izzat. He thereafter decided to go back into the army which
reinstated him with the rank of Captain. Soon he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel.

The citizens of Cairo rioted in January 1952. The riot so unnerved King Farouk, the titular
head of the Egyptian government, that Colonel Nasser and his Free Officers Association
decided to attempt their long planned coup d'etat in July 1952, while the king would be on
vacation in Alexandria. In July these officers posted their troops in strategic positions and
were in control of the escape route of King Farouk by July 22, 1952. On the next day, Anwar
Sadat announced to the people that the Free Military Officers under Gamal Abdul Nasser were
in control of the country and thus a new Egypt was born. The officers asked Ali-Maher to
head the new government. Wanting to depose the king, Nasser sent Sadat and General
Naguib to order King Farouk to abdicate. The King willingly obliged and left the country for
foreign asylum on July 26, 1952.

-The latter was a union of all the Muslim countries of the Middle East.Egypt had its lost rights
for freedom after expelling the oppressive rule of the British.

On December 20, 1969, Nasser appointed Anwar Sadat as Vice-President of Egypt. The Arab
Summit Conference in Cairo in September 1970 greatly weakened a sick Nasser. On
September 23, the day the conference ended, Nasser died. Sadat succeeded to the
Presidency on September 30, 1970, and was confirmed by an election on December 1970.
Sadat set about restoring confidence and order at home. He ended mass espionage and
spying activities by the government against its own citizens. He released all political
prisoners detained by Nasser. He limited the holdings of the large landowners. Sadat realized
that Nasser had copied Russian Socialism in Egypt, although Egypt lacked the resources,
technology and trained manpower of the Russians. Thus Sadat promoted a system more in
keeping with the resources, skills and traditional ideology of the Egyptian people. Sadat
dismissed the Russian cliques of Ali Sabri and company, forcing the return of fifteen
thousand advisers whom the Russians had provided to Nasser. Thus Sadat took over the
government of Egypt, running it for the benefit of the Egyptians. He restored social justice,
peace and civil rights. He strengthened the courts by suspending arbitrary arrest without trial.
He substituted action for empty slogans. He relied on the genius of his people, on their long
tradition of good character and on the strength of their culture and customs. He banished
foreign interference and foreign ideologies.

Anwar Sadat started his peace proposals after only six months in office. On February 4, 1971,
Sadat initiated a peace inquiry speaking in he Egyptian Parliament. Israel and the United
States ignored him. As U.S. Secretary Kissinger stated, "The U.S. regrettably could do
nothing to help so long as you (Egypt) were the defeated party and Israel maintained her
superiority. Now in times of reality you are the defeated side and shouldn't therefore make
demands acceptable only from victors. You must make some concessions if the U.S. is to
help you. How can you in defeat dictate your conditions to the other side?" (Sadat.238).
Israel's superiority was due to the billions of dollars of military equipment and economic aid
the United States provided. It seemed as if the Nobel Laureate for Peace, Henry Kissinger,
could talk about peace only if the weak, defeated Egyptians could become strong militarily.
The politics of "realpolitic" and the balance of power was more important than peaceful
negotiations. The prevention of soldiers killing each other in war appeared to be beyond the
power of the then U.S. Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger.

Anwar Sadat therefore, had no choice. In order to achieve peaceful negotiations he first had
to prove the military skill of his countrymen. It seemed as if only military victories could
qualify a country for respectful treatment by other countries, including the superpowers.

To destroy the myth of Israel's invincibility in order to get to the peace table, Sadat launched
his October 6, 1973 attack against Israel. The action started in the Sinai desert, the part of
Egypt overrun and occupied by Israel in the June 1967 war. The Egyptian forces were
successful in pushing back the Israelis, and in destroying many tanks and planes. After
sixteen days, the U.S. provided Israel with sophisticated new weapons like the smart bomb
and the camera bomb for use against Egyptian missile launchers. Henry Kissinger finally
proposed a cease-fire. Sadat replied to Kissinger, "Well, just as we embarked on a peace
process, let us have a forces disengagement which would peacefully put an end to this
counter-attack. You know I am a man of peace. If you had accepted the 1971 initiative, no war
would have broken out at all. I care very much for human life, and am loathe to losing one
soldier. But you didn't take me seriously and this is the outcome. But I wanted my victory to
be maintained because I regarded it as an avenue to the just peace for which I had worked
unceasingly" (Sadat.269).

A good start was thus made toward peaceful settlement of most of the disputes between
Israel and her Arab neighbors. If the other leaders in the area had continued with the process
of talking over their problems instead of turning to military solutions, lasting peace and
justice in the Middle East might have developed.

The Sinai has since been restored to Egyptian sovereignty, but Gaza, the West Bank of the
Jordan and Jerusalem are still unresolved issues. Egypt has recognized Israel's right to exist
as a state within its borders, according to the Camp David Accord and according to
Resolution 242 of the United Nations.

If the other Arab states would abide by U.N. Resolution 242 and recognize Israel, then Israel
could withdraw from the land it is illegally occupying. Peace could then be restored to all the
parties concerned including Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and the Palestinians.

President Anwar Sadat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 1979 together with Prime
Minister Menachem Begin. Perhaps President Carter should have shared in this prize since
he was instrumental in getting these two leaden to come to a peaceful accord at Camp David.

The Assassination :

- On November 19, 1977 Sadat became the first Arab leader to officially visit Israel when he
met with Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin, and spoke before the Knesset in Jerusalem.
He made the visit after receiving an invitation from Begin and sought a permanent peace
settlement (much of the Arab world was outraged by the visit, due to their widespread view of
Israel as a rogue state, and a tyrannical symbol of imperialism). In 1978, this resulted in the
Camp David Peace Agreement, for which Sadat and Begin received the Nobel Peace Prize.
However, the action was extremely unpopular in the Arab and Muslim World.
In 1979, the Arab League suspended Egypt's membership in the wake of Egypt's peace
agreement with Israel; the League moved its headquarters from Cairo to Tunis. It was not
until 1989 that the League re-admitted Egypt as a member, and returned its headquarters to
Cairo. Many believed that only a threat of force would make Israel negotiate over the West
Bank and Gaza Strip, and the Camp David accords removed the possibility of Egypt, the
major Arab military power, from providing such a threat. As part of the peace deal, Israel
withdrew from the Sinai peninsula in phases, returning the entire area to Egypt by 1983.

- On October 6, the month after the crackdown, Sadat was assassinated during a parade in
Cairo by army members who were part of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad organization. They
opposed Sadat's negotiations with Israel, as well as his use of force in the September
crackdown. A fatwa approving the assassination had been obtained from Omar Abdel-
Rahman, a cleric later convicted in the U.S. for his role in the February 26, 1993 World Trade
Center bombing. Though Sadat was protected by four layers of security, the army parade
was considered safe due to ammunition-seizure rules; but the officers in charge of that
procedure were on hajj to Mecca.

- Islambouli firing shots at the PresidentAs air force Mirage jets flew overhead, distracting the
crowd, a troop truck halted before the Presidential reviewing stand, and a lieutenant strode
forward. Sadat stood to receive his salute, whereupon the assassins rose from the truck,
throwing grenades and firing assault rifle rounds. The assassin Khalid Islambouli shouted "
Death to the Pharaoh!" as he ran toward the stand and then fired into Sadat's crumpled and
lifeless body. He was later found guilty of the crimes and executed in April of 1982. As the
crowd of dignitaries scattered, many were wounded, including Foreign Minister (future U.N
Secretary General) Boutros Boutros-Ghali and visiting diplomats including James Tully, the
Irish Minister for Defence, and four US military liaisons.

- On the contrary of Arabs,we "Egyptians" still owe him respect as a role model for peace and
believe that if he was among us today,non of such a conflict would be present in the middle
eastern area.
- President Mohammed Anwar el Sadat Hero of War--Hero of Peace Lived for Peace and
martyred for his principles 1918-1981.

- Jimmy Carter, President of the United States, paid this tribute to Anwar El Sadat in the
forward of Sadat's book, Those I Have Known. "In my own determined search for peace and
justice in the Middle East I have found him always to be like a breath of fresh air. There was
no element of subterfuge of evasiveness in his analysis of the many complicated issues or in
his own enlightened proposals to resolve them. He was always more inclined to look to the
future than to dwell on the hate-filled and bloody past. Anwar Sadat was an unflinching
champion of Palestinian rights, Arab unity and peace in the Middle East. He was willing to
endanger his personal and political life in a search for the resolution of the conflicts. When
his tragic sacrifice was finally made I lost a beloved friend and the world lost an irreplaceable
champion of peace" (Foreword by Jimmy Carter) (Sadat).

- (hatred diggers,truth seekers) that's My final post,wish you all a happy life...

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