If we look at Abdel Nasser in Egypt as an Arab leader, he was secular.
Many people are quick to say that we are not recognized by Muslims in the East . And I start with the Honorable Elijah Mohammed. In 1959, he went throughout the Holy City of Mecca to dine and wine with Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt and all of the black, mainly the rulers of the Islamic countries.
When Mubarak does die, he will be remembered as the most bland of those military men turned dictators: compare him with Gamal Abdel-Nasser and Anwar Sadat. The legacies most associated with him are a network of bridges and highways and 'stability.'
Under Nasser, Egyptian nationalism was built on little more than pan-Arab irredentism and anti-Western and anti-Israeli sentiment. Mr. Mubarak retained these powerful brainwashers and allowed the rise of a religious component to further alienate Egyptians from liberal and democratic thinking.
When at just 27 years old, Qaddafi, colonel in the Libyan army, inspired by his Egyptian colleague Abdel Nasser, overthrew King Idris I in 1969, he applied important revolutionary measures such as agrarian reform and the nationalization of oil.
Gamal Abdal Nasser, the nationalist leader of Egypt, was described by British Prime Minister Anthony Eden as an Egyptian Hitler. Then it carried on like that. Saddam Hussein became Hitler when he was no longer a friend of the West. Then Milosevic became Hitler.
Schulz told lies in German, and it's unfortunate someone can speak German in this house, but it is our responsibility to stand up against it - the generation of Schulz's parents and the generation of the Arab MKs' parents collaborated to destroy the Jews. (on European Parliament President Martin Schulz)
Rulers like Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser started subsidizing bread as a way to buy loyalty, or at least obedience, and this system became so pervasive that the Tunisian scholar Larbi Sadiki described countries who used it as dimuqratiyyat al-khubz - "democracies of bread." But the problem with this system of offering bread in exchange for genuine democracy is that it can never last - sooner or later, the bread will run out, and people will start demanding bread and roses too.
The death of Abdel Nasser on September 28, 1970, was an irreversible setback for Egypt.
I grew up watching a lot of Egyptian movies. My parents had this huge VHS collection of every Egyptian movie you can possibly imagine, and Egypt was kind of the Hollywood of the Middle East back in the '40s, '50s, and '60s. That was my first education in film.
Even in the 1950s, President Eisenhower was concerned about what he called a campaign of hatred of the U.S. in the Arab world, because of the perception on the Arab street that it supported harsh and oppressive regimes to take their oil.
I'm Egyptian and Muslim, but I grew up in the West, far from my Arab roots. I began 'Sex and the Citadel' to help outsiders - like myself - to better comprehend this pivotal part of the world, up-close and personal.
My mom grew up in Idaho, went to Brigham Young University: they're very Molly Mormon. And my father is, like, first generation Albanian, and his parents lived in Southey and grew up in downtown Boston. My parents are complete opposites.
We did not think that [Egyptian President] Nasser wanted war. The two divisions he sent to Sinai on May 14 would not have been sufficient to launch an offensive against Israel. He knew it and we knew it.
I'm half Egyptian, and I'm Muslim. But I grew up in Canada, far from my Arab roots. Like so many who straddle East and West, I've been drawn, over the years, to try to better understand my origins.
I'm a Muslim Egyptian-American, born in Cairo. I grew up in Kuwait until the first Gulf War, when my family relocated to the United Arab Emirates. As an adult, I studied and lived in the U.K. before moving to Boston.