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The Era of Nasser Essay

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The Era of Nasser
Gamal Abd al-Nasser was President of Egypt from 1956 until1970. During his Presidency he dealt with two major events, the Suez Crisis in 1956 and the 1967 War. Nasser’s triumph in the Suez Crisis in contrast to his severe loss in 1967 can be explained by evaluating Egypt’s stability before and after each event and the reaction of the public during the times of stability and instability. In order to understand the stability of Egypt during Nasser’s Presidency, it is important to take into account Nasser’s government policies and what the Egyptian people expected from him. Nasser would eventually become a leading figure and hold immense powers within the Arab World. To Nasser’s surprise, being a leader came with great …show more content…

To the Egyptian people, King Farouk was a weak monarch who could not defeat Israel and who had struggled getting rid of imperial powers, leaving the Egyptian people angry and hopeless. Luckily, their hopes would again rise with coup to overthrow King Farouk by the Free Officers organization.
The Free Officers On July 23, 1952 the Free Officers group overthrew King Farouk and seized control of the government. The group was comprised of junior military leaders and headed by Gamal Abd al-Nasser. Nasser, along with many other members, had fought in the 1948 War against Israel and blamed the devastating loss on Farouk. Although they had no political organization and no ideological orientation, they all had the common goal to end British occupation and create reforms to provide social justice. They created a two-fold campaign focused on eliminating rivals for power and proclaiming reforms and introducing a new constitution. In 1953 the monarch was abolished and Egypt was declared a Republic. Through this process, Nasser was able to do away with centers of civilian power, eliminated potential rivals within the military, and placed himself as the aggressive political force within Egypt. Once Nasser was in power, he began building popular support by introducing reforms. One of the more successful reforms was the Agrarian Reform Law of September 1952. The reform limited the amount of land an individual could own and the excess land would be redistributed to the poor.

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