Egypt - 1801.
The military objective of the French campaign in Egypt fails, which was in reality, to prevent England from reaching India, and to control the routes of world trade, by re-digging the "Sesostris Canal"; which the Caliph "Abu Jaafar al-Mansur" had completely filled in at Suez, to prevent any supplies from Egypt reaching the people of Mecca and Medina, who were rebelling against Abbasid rule.
And in the same year, 1801, with the withdrawal of the French, and the English pressure and the unrest and tension that reached the Egyptian ports; the Ottoman Empire pushes a battalion of Albanian soldiers by sea.. and the commander of this battalion was the son of the ruler of the Greek "Kavala".. which we call "Qulla".
And as soon as the battalion reaches the port of Abu Qir in Alexandria in the spring of the year 1801, its commander decides that he will return alone and appoints his aide over it.
And his aide was a young man, brave, successful and extremely ambitious from the people of Kavala.. of Albanian origin.. his name is "Mohammed Ali".
"Mohammed Ali" and his men disembark and he is surprised that the situation in Egypt is extremely turbulent, because with the withdrawal of the French, and the Ottoman Empire's being occupied with marching on the Levant, the Mamluks begin to think of returning.. but a sharp split occurs among them, leading to the existence of two armies of them against each other.. an army on the side of the Ottoman Empire led by "Ibrahim Bey the Great", and another army, on the side of the English "led by Mohammed Bey al-Alfi".
Civil war.
The two sides were in a sharp violent civil infighting, and plots and ambushes and assassinations against each other all the time.. and what helped this was that England signs a treaty with France by which their enmity ends temporarily, called the "Treaty of Amiens" and under it England likewise withdraws from Egypt.
"Mohammed Ali" leaves all this and orders his men to merge among the people, so his battalion begins to help the weak, and rushes to the need of an elderly woman.. and searches with the locals for missing children and returns them to their families.. and this wins him the love of the Egyptians in a short period.. during which he was courting and drawing near to the men of Al-Azhar and the senior scholars.. and attending their lessons and their gatherings and praying behind them.. and this earned him their affection in turn.
And at the same time some of the men of his battalion were carrying out the task he had assigned them.. so they constantly sow discord between the two warring Mamluk factions.. and increase the dispute between them more and more.. and this left no side among them able to monopolize power.. until in March 1804.. the Ottoman Empire sends "Ahmed Khurshid Pasha" of Georgian origin, to become governor of Egypt and control the situation in it.
As soon as "Khurshid" arrives he worries about "Mohammed Ali" and the people's love for him from their highest classes to their lowest.. so he decides to send him to Upper Egypt, him and his company, to fight the Mamluks.. and he asks the Ottoman Empire to supply him with an army that would enable him to control matters.. and indeed it sends him what he asked for.
But the mercenary Ottoman army as soon as it reaches Cairo.. begins to spread corruption in it.. and to act like thugs.. and they steal from people by force under threat of arms.. and take from the shops and markets whatever they wish without paying.. and they vacate houses from their owners by force and inhabit them.. and the matter develops further.. and they violate the sanctities of women.. so the scholars and the notables of Egypt set out, at their head "Sheikh al-Sharqawi" and Sayyid "Omar Makram" from the Al-Azhar Mosque to "Khurshid", and demand of him in anger that he restrain his accursed forces.
"Khurshid" indeed issues a firman to these forces that they leave Egypt and return to Turkey immediately.. but they refuse to obey his orders.. and they storm and steal the public treasury to the last penny.
The people rise in a massive revolution, and they begin a guerrilla war with "Khurshid's" forces in the streets.. and "Omar Makram" heads out with hundreds.. and they besiege the house of "Mohammed Ali".. who comes out to them.. so they tell him that "Khurshid" is a tyrant.. and that they have deposed him from the governorship.. so he asks them in innocence: "Well, I don't know.. who do you want in his place, people?" so they reply: "We accept none but you". So he says to them: "And what the people of Egypt want.. shall be".
They carry him to the courthouse, and they indeed pledge allegiance to him to be governor of Egypt.. and Sheikh al-Sharqawi presents him with clothes and a cloak.. and they send to Khurshid Pasha that they have deposed him.. and appointed "Mohammed Ali" in his place.. of course "Khurshid" is enraged.. and he says to them angrily: "I am appointed by the Sultan, so I am not deposed by the order of the rabble nor do I descend from the Citadel except by order of the Sultanate".
And two new parties enter the arena in the ring of conflict.. "Khurshid" and his forces against "Mohammed Ali" backed by the street.
The Ottoman Empire learns of the people's pledge of allegiance to Mohammed Ali.. and fears a revolution if it objects to the matter.. so it decides to withdraw "Khurshid Pasha".. and issues a firman on 9 July of the same year appointing "Mohammed Ali" governor of Egypt on a temporary basis.. and "Khurshid" leaves Egypt days later.. in the year 1805 heading to Qusais.
This situation is strange because there is a lot of spontaneity in it.. and despite that it was destined that because of it history would change and the map of the world would be reshaped.
And "Mohammed Ali" becomes governor of Egypt.. despite the nose of the failing Ottoman Empire.. which does not like what happened.. and harbors against "Mohammed Ali" a plan by which to depose him from the rule of Egypt.. which it implements immediately in the following year.
The year 1806.
And this plan we will talk about later.
And there remains for the talk the rest.
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Previous posts.
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1 - http://bit.ly/30anGpF
2 - http://bit.ly/2Q7e6zv
3 - http://bit.ly/2VVkcrX