No God but God

No, this post isn't about the book No god but God, I already covered that. It is about the book No God but God - notice the difference?

I picked this up somewhat by chance at the library, but it turned out to be exactly what I was looking for. It discusses the rise of Islam in Egypt from about 1970 to the late 1990s. It was released in 2000 so it doesn't cover the last eight years. But I tend not to trust anything written about Islam that came out from 2002 to around 2005 (I figure anything in that time period is going to be too reactionary) so it is hard to do better than a release date of 2000.

If you're not going to be in Egypt in a couple months not sure how interesting it would be, but I found it interesting so this post will probably end up way too long. The one downside of the book is it seems like the chapters were written separately so there is a bit of repetition of facts.

The main thing I learned is that the relationship between religion and the state in Egypt is in many ways inverted from other countries in the Middle East. The government is secular and has been fighting against the rising power of Islamist, such as banning niqabs and hijabs for students at various times as opposed to forcing women to wear them.

The other big message I took away is that there's not a clear good guy or bad guy (well, the militants are bad guys). The government is secular, "democratic", made peace with Israel and generally tries for good relations with the West. However, there is some serious corruption and obvious vote rigging. Since 1956 when Nasser took over the presidency (partially by putting the previous president under house arrest), there have been three presidents. Sadat took over when Nasser died of a heart attack and Mubarak took over after Sadat was killed by Islamic militants (notice how no one was ever voted out). The government also occasionally rounds up suspected Islamic militants, jails them, and often tortures them. It also some times passes laws to prevent Islamist from getting elected to lead unions and student groups. While the Islamic movement pushes for censorship that doesn't fit its morals, the secular government also uses censorship to protect itself. The government also works hard to look good in the West partially because America provides 10% of the Egyptian GDP in aid money. This can lead to over reactions and getting the wrong people to confess to crimes in order to maintain that image. And passing laws against female circumcision, but not enforcing them. It also helps to explain why the government is so protective of tourists (other than tourism being a major industry).

There is a militant portion of the Islamic movement. Although the majority of the movement has been peaceful for several decades. There is a push for women wearing a veil and for female circumcision. Although many women, even rich and well educated women, volunteer to wear the veil, even against the wishes of their husbands. The female circumcision is a bit odd because it is actually an African tradition, not Islamic, but has been incorporated into Islam in Egypt - well female circumcision is horrible, not odd, but its introduction to Islam is one of the odd things about it. Along the same lines, the requirement of women wearing a veil is also questionable. In the Koran it was only the Prophet's wives who had to have a sheet separating them from men, but since then has been interpreted as a requirement for all women to wear a veil. But on the other side, members of the Islamic movement who have been elected in unions and student groups have broad support, even among secularists and Coptic Christians, because they work hard to look after their member's economic and social situations, which the government has largely failed to do. Unlike in the US, the unions are also for middle class professions like engineers, doctors and lawyers. Many people in these middle class professions are displeased with the government because Nasser pushed to educate the country to fuel its economic growth (seems like a good idea), but when people came out of school with advanced degrees there were no jobs and they were making less money than taxi drivers.

The other pattern that was interesting is that when the government tried to suppress the Islamic movement, the movement got stronger and when Sadat supported the movement for a while it got stronger and eventually assassinated him. Although through all of this the militant side slowly lost support. And the militant side's last major act, the Luxor attack in 1997, caused it to lose almost all of its popular support.

The book also confirmed a lot of The Yacoubian Building and the Golden Chariot as realistic stories.

I guess the biggest message for me is in addition to avoiding taking a Menorah, I should also avoid taking a Qur'an on the trip (not that I was planning to take either, but you get the idea).

My last comment is - if a young man supports a movement, especially one that is uptight about sex, torturing him in jail and humiliating him sexually - probably is not the best policy for steering him away from violence. Just a guess.