1. Egyptian Revolution of 1919 and the Politics of the Street
HIST 107: Modern Middle East
Stacy Fahrenthold
12 October 2016

2. Primary source analysis Haikus
5 – 7 – 5 syllable pattern
Example: 1919 General Syrian Congress Protest Petition (Smith 123):
We of Damascus,
are unfit for self-rule? No,
You’re uncivilized.

3. Context: Egypt During WWI

4. Hizb al-Wafd (The Wafd Party)
Zaghlul in Yellow Circle. Note the presence of Christian and Muslim leaders

5. Sa'ad Zaghlul and the Wafd Party
Wafd = “delegation”
Zaghlul: lawyer and nationalist against British protectorate.
Approach: step-by-step independence via collaboration with British government.
Methods: petitions, civil disobedience, appeals to international forum and League of Nations.

6. 1919 Revolution Wafd Petitions, Strikes, Demonstrations
8 March: Sa'ad Zaghlul exiled
Confrontations in city, armed insurrection in countryside
British repression, 3,000 dead
Dec March 1920 Milner Mission
Note: Christian and Muslim symbols (the
crescent and cross here) were used simultaneously to show the Revolution's support across faiths.

7. Women's Wafd

8. The Ladies Demonstrations, 1919
Above: Egyptian Women addresses a male
audience. Right: demonstrating Ladies, 1919
- Elite women, using petitions, entering traditionally “male” public squares.
- The Women's Wafd: partner to Wafd Party, and nationalist causes preeminent.
- Women as national symbols: as mothers, wives, as nation embodied.

9. Egyptian Feminism v Nationalism
Above: Safiyya Zaghlul (L) and Huda Shaarawi. These images appeared in the press, 1922.

10. Outcomes: Egyptian Monarchy
Feb. 1922: British unilaterally declare Egyptian independence
Several “catches”
King Fu'ad, the Wafd, the the British
1923 Constitution
Monarchy lasts until Free Officers Revolution in (Nasser)