Instruct: Given a question, retrieve relevant documents that answer the question.
Query: When was the Arab Republic of Egypt founded?
On 22–26 July 1952, the Free Officers, a group of disaffected officers in the Egyptian army founded by Gamal Abdel Nasser, and headed by General Muhammad Naguib, initiated the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 with the overthrowing King Farouk, whom the military blamed for Egypt's poor performance in the 1948 war with Israel and lack of progress in fighting poverty, disease, and illiteracy in Egypt. In the following two years, the Free Officers consolidated power, and, following a brief experiment with civilian rule, abrogated the 1953 constitution, and declared Egypt a republic on 18 June 1953, Muhammad Naguib as Egypt's first President.
Egyptian Arabic is the commonly spoken language, and is occasionally written in Arabic script, or in Arabic chat alphabet mostly on new communication services.
After the revolution that led to the overthrow of the monarch, King Farouk, and the declaration of the republic, President Nasser adopted the nation’s first written constitution as a republic in 1956. During the short spell of the United Arab Republic, (Egypt & Syria), President Nasser adopted yet another constitution for the new merger, but this merger was dissolved in 1961. In 1964, President Nasser once again introduced a new written constitution for the republic. In 1971, when President Anwar Sadat took office, he moved to the adoption of a new democratic constitution that would allow more freedoms, a return of a more sound parliamentary life and correct democratic practice with the return of political parties and a bicameral parliamentary system.
Immediately following the declaration of the new state, both superpower leaders, US President Harry S. Truman and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, recognized the new state.
The Arab League members Egypt, Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq refused to accept the UN partition plan and proclaimed the right of self-determination for the Arabs across the whole of Palestine. The Arab states marched their forces into what had, until the previous day, been the British Mandate for Palestine, starting the first Arab–Israeli War. The Arab states had heavy military equipment at their disposal and were initially on the offensive (the Jewish forces were not a state before 15 May and could not buy heavy arms). On 29 May 1948, the British initiated United Nations Security Council Resolution 50 declaring an arms embargo on the region. Czechoslovakia violated the resolution, supplying the Jewish state with critical military hardware to match the (mainly British) heavy equipment and planes already owned by the invading Arab states. On 11 June, a month-long UN truce was put into effect.
Egypt–Italy relations refer to relations between Egypt and Italy. Relations were first established during the period of the Roman Republic, when the Ptolemaic Kingdom frequently interacted with Rome, culminating in the Roman annexation of Egypt in 30 BC. With the dissolution of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD and Egypt's continuation as a province of the Eastern Roman Empire until the Islamic conquest in 642 AD, there were no independent states of Italy and Egypt, and as such no diplomatic relations. Cultural ties between Egypt and Italy distanced further over time with the Islamisation of Egypt and the strength of Catholicism in Italy. It would not be until Egypt's official independence from the British in 1914 that relations with Italy would be reestablished. With the rise of Mussolini and fascism in Italy and the eventual Italian invasion of Egypt during World War II, relations became severely strained. However, after the war, relations were re-established and the countries now have a cordial relationship. Egypt has an embassy in both Rome and Milan, while Italy has an embassy in both Cairo and Alexandria. Egypt and Italy are both members of the Union for the Mediterranean.
Ancient Egypt developed over at least three and a half millennia. It began with the incipient unification of Nile Valley polities around 3500 BC and is conventionally thought to have ended in 30 BC when the early Roman Empire conquered and absorbed Ptolemaic Egypt as a province. (Though this last did not represent the first period of foreign domination, the Roman period was to witness a marked, if gradual transformation in the political and religious life of the Nile Valley, effectively marking the termination of independent civilisational development).
The Arab League was formed on 22 March 1945 with five members, while a sixth member joined later that year. On 2 December 1945, it issued its first formal declaration of an economic boycott of the Jewish community of Palestine. The declaration urged both Arab United Nations member states and Arab states which had not yet obtained UN membership to prohibit the products and usage of the products of Jewish industry in Palestine, effective January 1, 1946. The declaration, contained in Arab League Resolution 16, stated:
The Arab League began to create the apparatus for implementing the resolution in February the same year. The first body established for this purpose was the Permanent Boycott Committee, based in Cairo, Egypt. On 12 June the Boycott Committee adopted a recommendation in Arab League Resolution 70, which called upon the Arab states to set up national boycott offices. Later measures adopted by the Committee included requiring those selling goods to Arab states to provide a certificate of origin to prove the goods were not manufactured by Palestinian Jews, the allocation of 50% of the value of goods confiscated in this manner to customs officials, the prohibition by Arabs of the use of Jewish banks, insurance companies, contractors, and transport in Palestine. Member states of the Arab League began implementing these resolutions through legal and administrative measures. After the Partition Plan of Palestine into Arab and Jewish states was introduced at the United Nations on 29 November 1947, efforts to apply the boycott were intensified. However, the boycott was unsuccessful, as noted in the first annual report of the Boycott Committee, and trade between Palestine (the vast majority by Jews) and Arab States neighboring Palestine continued to thrive.
One of the earliest linguistic sketches of Egyptian Arabic is a 16th-century document entitled "" (, "The Removal of the Burden from the Language of the People of Egypt") by Yusuf al-Maghribi (). It contains key information on early Egyptian Arabic and the language situation in Egypt in the Middle Ages. The main purpose of the document was to show that while the Egyptians' vernacular contained many critical "errors" vis-à-vis Classical Arabic, according to al-Maghribi, it was also related to Arabic in other respects. With the ongoing Islamization and Arabization of the country, Egyptian Arabic slowly supplanted spoken Coptic. Local chroniclers mention the continued use of Coptic as a spoken language until the 17th century by peasant women in Upper Egypt. Coptic is still the liturgical language of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria.
In 1831, Tahtawi returned home to be part of the statewide effort to modernize the Egyptian infrastructure and education in what became an Egyptian renaissance ("Nahda") that flourished in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, later moving to Ottoman-ruled Arabic-speaking regions including Lebanon, Syria and others. He founded the School of Languages (also known as School of Translators) in 1835, which become part of Ain Shams University in 1973. Upon his return, Al-Tahtawi became an advocate of parliamentarian, the rights of citizens to political participation, and the rights of women to education. The School of Languages graduated the earliest modern Egyptian intellectuals, who formed the basis of the emerging grassroots mobilization against British colonialism in Egypt. Three of his published volumes were works of political and moral philosophy. They introduced his Egyptian audience to the liberal ideas of the Enlightenment such as secular authority and political rights and liberty, his ideas regarding how a modern civilized society ought to be and what constituted by extension a civilized or "good Egyptian", and his ideas on public interest and public good.
Ancient Egypt was one of the world's first civilizations, with its beginnings in the fertile Nile valley around 3150 BC. Ancient Egypt reached the zenith of its power during the New Kingdom (1570–1070 BC) under great pharaohs. Ancient Egypt was a great power to be contended with by both the ancient Near East, the Mediterranean and sub-Saharan Africa. The empire expanded far south into Nubia and held wide territories across the ancient Near East. The combination of a fertile river valley, natural borders that made an invasion unfeasible, and a military able to rise to the challenge when needed, turned Egypt into a major power. It was one of the first nations to have a system of writing and large scale construction projects. However, as neighboring civilizations developed militaries capable of crossing Egypt's natural barriers, the Egyptian armies were not always able to repel them and so by 1000 BC Egyptian influence as an independent civilization waned.
The official language of the Republic is Arabic. The spoken languages are: Egyptian Arabic (68%), Sa'idi Arabic (29%), Eastern Egyptian Bedawi Arabic (1.6%), Sudanese Arabic (0.6%), Domari (0.3%), Nobiin (0.3%), Beja (0.1%), Siwi and others. Additionally, Greek, Armenian and Italian, and more recently, African languages like Amharic and Tigrigna are the main languages of immigrants.
Following the Israeli declaration of independence on 14 May 1948, the Permanent Boycott Committee ceased to function upon the outbreak of war between Israel and surrounding Arab States on 15 May 1948, and the Arab League repeated its calls for a ban on all financial and commercial transactions with Palestinian Jews, boycotting the newly formed State of Israel. The Arab League cut off postal, telegraphic, and radio communications with Israel, and Arab States began to impose a land, sea, and air blockade on the fledgling state. Israeli goods, shipped through Alexandria, Port Suez and Port Said, were confiscated by Egyptian inspectors. A prize court established in Alexandria in 1949 authorized the seizure of cargo ships destined for Israel. In 1950, regulations were promulgated to allow the search of ships and aircraft and the seizure of Israeli-bound goods found within.
Mohamed Salah El Azab (; born 19 September 1981) is an Egyptian writer and novelist. He was born in Cairo. He has published several novels and short story collections, and has won multiple awards for his fiction. He has been described by Al-Ahram newspaper as "one of Egypt's rising literary talents".
The Anglo-Egyptian Sudan ( "") was a condominium of the United Kingdom and Egypt in the eastern Sudan region of northern Africa between 1899 and 1956, but in practice the structure of the condominium ensured full British control over the Sudan with Egypt having local influence instead. It attained independence as the Republic of the Sudan, which since 2011 has been split into Sudan and South Sudan.
Because knowledge of the hieroglyphs were lost from 6th century until 1822 when Jean-François Champollion deciphered the Rosetta Stone, the memory of ancient Egypt was that of an impressive civilization which built various monuments whose precise meaning had been long since been lost, limiting the extent of popular identification with it. Mohammad Ali the Great, the Albanian tobacco merchant turned Ottoman "vali" (governor) of Egypt and who ruled the country with an iron hand from 1805 until his death in 1849, had no interest in the ruins of ancient Egypt except as a source of gifts for foreign leaders. Likewise, Mohammad Ali had a permissive attitude towards Europeans taking ancient Egyptian relics with them, allowing much plundering of various sites such as by the Italian Giovanni Battista Belzoni while a diplomatic posting in Cairo was highly sought after owing to opportunities for looting. One of Mohammad Ali's officials, Rifa'a al-Tahtawi, persuaded him in 1836 to embark on preserving Egypt's heritage by ending the plundering of sites in Egypt and to create a museum to display Egypt's treasures instead of letting them be taken to Europe. Tahtawi later published a history of ancient Egypt in 1868, which took advantage of the discoveries of archaeologists and the deciphering of the hieroglyphs, which marked the first time that the heritage of ancient Egypt was used as a symbol of national pride in modern Egypt.
On 11 July, the Quartet on the Middle East met to discuss a return to negotiations, but the meeting produced no result. On 13 July, in an interview with "Haaretz", Palestinian Ambassador to the United Nations Riyad Mansour claimed that 122 states had so far extended formal recognition to the Palestinian state. On the following day, the Arab League released a draft statement which declared a consensus to "go to the United Nations to request the recognition of the State of Palestine with Al Quds as its capital and to move ahead and request a full membership." The league's secretary-general, Nabil al-Arabi, confirmed the statement and said that the application for membership will be submitted by the Arab League. On 18 July, Syria announced that it had formally recognised the State of Palestine, the last Arab state to do so. The decision was welcomed by the league, but met with criticism from some, including former Lebanese prime minister Selim al-Hoss: "Syria has always been calling for the liberation of Palestine from Israeli occupation and ambitions. The latest stance, however, shows that [Syria] has given up on a national policy that has spanned several decades. ... Why this abandonment of a national principle, and what is the motive behind it? There is no motive except to satisfy international powers that seek to appease Israel".
The Ptolemaic Kingdom was founded in 305 BC by Ptolemy I Soter, a "diadochus" originally from Macedon in northern Greece who declared himself pharaoh of Egypt and created a powerful Macedonian Greek dynasty that ruled an area stretching from southern Syria to Cyrene and south to Nubia. Scholars also argue that the kingdom was founded in 304 BC because of different use of calendars: Ptolemy crowned himself in 304 BC on the ancient Egyptian calendar, but in 305 BC on the ancient Macedonian calendar; to resolve the issue, the year 305/4 was counted as the first year of Ptolemaic Kingdom in Demotic papyri.
Five countries are observer states—a status that entitles them to express their opinion and give advice but denies them voting rights. These are Eritrea, where Arabic is one of the official languages, as well as Brazil and Venezuela, which have large and influential Arab communities. India is another observer to the Arab League, with a sizable number of people claiming Arab descent. Armenia was granted observer status in 2004.Only five Arabic-speaking countries remain outside of the League: Chad, Eritrea, Israel, Malta and South Sudan. Additionally, there are also two other Arabic-speaking states with limited recognition – Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic and Somaliland – but their disputed status, being claimed by League members Morocco and Somalia respectively, makes their membership unlikely for the foreseeable future.
Today structures such as clubs, schools, and sports facilities reinforce communications among Armenian Egyptians and revive the heritage of their forefathers. In spite of these efforts, many Armenian Egyptians of the youngest generation (and who are mostly the result of marriages between the Armenian community and other Egyptians - whether Christian or Muslim) do not speak the Armenian language, or go to Armenian schools, and are not in touch with their heritage or community. The Armenian Church and the apolitical structure of the Armenian community have a very important role in unifying Armenians in Egypt. Unlike Armenian minorities in Syria and Lebanon, Armenian Egyptians stay out of local politics.
The holiday commemorates the events of 29 October 1923, when Mustafa Kemal Atatürk declared that Turkey was henceforth a republic. Turkey had "de facto" been a republic since 23 April 1920, the date of the establishment of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, but the official confirmation of this fact came only three-and-a-half years later. On 29 October 1923, the status of the nation as a republic was declared and its official name was proclaimed to be ("the Republic of Turkey"). After that, a vote was held in the Grand National Assembly, and Atatürk was elected as the first President of the Republic of Turkey.
Armenia declared its independence from the Soviet Union on August 23, 1990, having previously been the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, one of the constituent republics of the USSR since 1936, and part of the Transcaucasian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic since 1920. In the wake of the August Coup (1991), a referendum was held on the question of secession. Following an overwhelming vote in favor, full independence was declared on September 21, 1991. However, widespread recognition did not occur until the formal dissolution of the Soviet Union on December 25, 1991. The dissolution of the Soviet Union brought an end to the Cold War and created the opportunity for bilateral relations with the New Independent States (NIS) as they began a political and economic transformation. The U.S. recognized the independence of Armenia on December 25, 1991, and opened an embassy in Yerevan in February 1992.
In 1958, Egypt and Syria formed a sovereign union known as the United Arab Republic. The union was short-lived, ending in 1961 when Syria seceded, thus ending the union. During most of its existence, the United Arab Republic was also in a loose confederation with North Yemen (or the Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen), known as the United Arab States. In 1959, the All-Palestine Government of the Gaza Strip, an Egyptian client state, was absorbed into the United Arab Republic under the pretext of Arab union, and was never restored.
The "Eagle of Saladin" holds a scroll on which the name of the state appears in Arabic script, "Gumhūriyyat Miṣr al-ʿArabiyyah" ("Arab Republic of Egypt"). The eagle carries on its breast a shield with the flag's colors — but with a vertical instead of a horizontal configuration. When appearing on the national flag, the eagle is rendered entirely in gold and white. During the union with Syria in the United Arab Republic (1958–1961), and in the ten years afterwards when Egypt retained the union's official name, the two green stars of the union's flag appeared in the white band of the eagle's shield. Between 1972–1984 the eagle was replaced by the golden Hawk of Quraish, as part of the symbolism of the Federation of Arab Republics.
For a while Egypt and Syria formed the United Arab Republic. When the union was dissolved, Egypt continued to be known as the UAR until 1971, when Egypt adopted the current official name, the Arab Republic of Egypt. The Egyptians' attachment to Arabism, however, was particularly questioned after the 1967 Six-Day War. Thousands of Egyptians had lost their lives and the country became disillusioned with Pan-Arab politics. Nasser's successor Anwar Al Sadat, both through public policy and his peace initiative with Israel, revived an uncontested Egyptian orientation, unequivocally asserting that only Egypt and Egyptians were his responsibility. The terms "Arab," "Arabism," and "Arab unity," save for the new official name, became conspicuously absent. (See also Liberal age and Republic sections.) Sadat only engaged in Parhaonism for international consumption as when he arranged for the mummy of King Ramses the Great to go to Paris for restoration work in 1974, he insisted the French provide an honor guard at Charles de Gaulle airport to fire a 21 gun salute as befitting a head of state when the coffin containing his corpse touched French soil. Domestically, Pharaonism was discouraged under Sadat who closed the mummy room in the Egyptian Museum for offending Muslim sensibilities, through in private Sadat was said to remark that "Egyptian kings are not be made a spectacle of" suggesting a degree of respect for the ancient past. Pharaonism largely exists in Egypt today for the tourist industry, and most Egyptians do not deeply identify with ancient Egypt.
Similarly, when Egypt and Syria united to form the United Arab Republic (UAR) under the banner of pan-Arabism in 1958, Iraqi politicians found themselves in a vulnerable position. Iraqi leaders had no interest in uniting with Egypt and instead proposed and ratified their own pan-Arab union with Hashemite Jordan in May 1958. Great Britain and the United States openly supported this union, but many Iraqis were suspicious of its purpose and regarded the Arab Union of Iraq and Jordan as another "tool of their Western overlord".