Nasser, Gamal Abdul

(1918–70)

   Egyptian and pan-Arab leader. In February 1949, the Israel-Egyptian armistice agreement released an Egyptian brigade that had been trapped in the Faluja pocket near Beersheba. One of its officers was a Major Nasser, son of a village postmaster. In July 1952, he was one of a group of officers that ousted King Farouk and seized power in a bloodless coup. By 1954 Colonel Nasser had emerged as the strong man of Egypt and the most powerful figure in the Arab world.

   The new regime raised high hopes. With the evacuation of the last British troops from the Suez Canal Zone, over seventy years of British control in Egypt came to an end. Nasser proclaimed Arab socialism, agrarian reform and industri- alization as answers to Egypt’s poverty, and non-alignment in world affairs. By the time he died in 1970, the sixteen years of his absolute rule showed a dubious balance sheet. In spite of some economic development, the mass of Egyptians remained poor and backward. Politically, Egypt was a tightly- controlled police state. In place of the departing British he had brought in a more formidable and tenacious imperialism, that of the Soviet Union. The slogan of Arab unity fared little better in the shifting sands of mergers, federations and alliances, of plots and counter-plots.

   The only cause for which Nasser could rally the Arab world to his banner was the common crusade against Israel. Yet in 1956, and again in 1967, Nasser’s army suffered ignominious defeat from Israel, with little help from his Arab allies. In the Israel attitude towards Nasser, there was a certain ambivalence, especially in the early years of his rule. He was respected as an Arab of unusual calibre, who worked hard, lived simply and had the welfare of his people at heart. Moreover, he was regarded as the only Arab leader with enough prestige to make peace with Israel, if he chose. But by 1956, he had become Israel’s most formidable foe, and doubly so because of his Russian arms and political backing. In 1969, with his army rebuilt with Russian help, Nasser tried a new strategy: a war of attrition. But, as in 1956 and 1967, he was once more a gambler who miscalculated the odds and lost the game. By the summer of 1970, Nasser was compelled to accept an American proposal for renewing the cease-fire and the Jarring mission. A few months later, in September, he died of a heart attack.

   The grief of the vast crowds at his funeral showed that he had become a hero- figure to his people, in spite of the wasteful and humiliating military adventures into which his ambitions had dragged them.