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Towards the Urabi Revolt (1882)
The revolt led by Ahmad Urabi in 1881-82 represents a turning point in the history of modern Egypt. As noted by Thomas Mayer,
for the first time in modern Egyptian history a native Egyptian officer took power over the country, challenging the entire sociopolitical order, including the authority of the dynast, the influence of the agrarian aristocracy, and Egyptian foreign relations with the Western powers, notably Britain.1
The origins, development and consequences of the revolt, which set the stage for the invasion of Egypt by British forces in July 1882 and the beginning of the British protectorate on the country, can hardly be summarized in few paragraphs; indeed, since 1882 the revolt has attracted substantial attention from politicians and historians alike, making it probably one of the most studied episodes of the history of nineteenth-century Egypt.2 The revolt was the culmination of a period of political and social turmoil in the country, which had resulted in the late 1870s in the development of a nationalist movement opposed to the foreign interference into Egyptian political and economic affairs. Since May 1880 this movement, whose members came primarily from the native bourgeoisie, was led by an army colonel of humble origins, Ahmad Urabi. The influence of the movement grew in 1881 after a failed attempt to arrest Urabi and other members and in September 1881 the Egyptian Khedive Tewfiq agreed to appoint a Nationalist nominee, Muhammad Sharif Pasha, as prime minister. The publication of the manifesto of the National Party in January 1882 was swiftly followed by a "joint note" by Britain and France proclaiming support for the Khedive against any attempt to subvert his autocratic rule. Between January and June 1 882 the crisis rapidly escalated, and in July British ironclads bombarded Alexandria and set the stage for a brief military campaign that ended with the defeat of the Egyptian army in Tel el-Kebir in September 1882. Urabi was then arrested, trialed and exiled. He lived in the British colony of Ceylon until 1901, when the Khedive Abbas II allowed him to return to Egypt, where he died in 1911.
The debate on the causes of the war has attracted significant attention ever since 1882. "Hard" factors, including the dynamics of...