The Greek Exodus from Egypt

Diaspora Politics and Emigration, 1937-1962

Angelos Dalachanis

• Publisher: Berghahn Books
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781785334481
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Storia
• Subtopic: Storia mediorientale

From the nineteenth century to the middle of the twentieth, Greeks comprised one of the largest and most influential minority groups in Egyptian society, yet barely two thousand remain there today. This painstakingly researched book explains how Egypt's once-robust Greek population dwindled to virtually nothing, beginning with the abolition of foreigners' privileges in 1937 and culminating in the nationalist revolution of 1952. It reconstructs the delicate sociopolitical circumstances that Greeks had to navigate during this period, providing a multifaceted account of demographic decline that arose from both large structural factors as well as the decisions of countless individuals.

Part I

The Politics of Remaining in Egypt (1937–60)

Chapter One

End of an Era (1937–52)

In spring 1952, the post of Greek ambassador in Cairo became vacant. That August, Michail Melas was appointed head of the embassy in Egypt and would serve until April 1956. His delayed appointment was mainly due to the fact that none of his superiors sought the position. In his autobiography, Melas explains that the tough times had already started for the Greeks in Egypt and that the community dignitaries, who had strong links with the Athenian political elite, often blamed the ambassadors—who were from Greece and appointed by the Greek government, as were the consuls—for their own difficulties.¹ The picture Melas paints of the community dignitaries, who practically constituted the Egyptiot leadership, was that they were almost entirely oriented toward Athens, just a few months before the Egyptian military coup d’état and fifteen years after the abolition of the Capitulations. After years of “full unaccountability” and “important opportunities for easy enrichment,” during which the Greeks constituted “a state within a state,”² the Egyptiot leadership needed to find a new path for itself and the community after the changes brought about by the winding down of the Capitulations. In the post-Capitulations environment, the community had the opportunity to emancipate itself and to create and reinforce its political, economic, social, and cultural ties with Egypt.

However, from 1939–40 to the summer of 1952, local and international developments roiled the community. During World War II, British troops were deployed in Egypt, where London tried to control the political situation. The exiled Greek government, along with the members of the main Greek resistance organization, the National Liberation Front (EAM), also established itself there. This peculiar coexistence of the Greek government, resistance groups, and the community shaped, to a certain extent, the different poles of postwar community political life. In the immediate postwar period, the international context changed radically after the creation of the Israeli state, the gradual decline of the colonial empires, and the simultaneous emergence of the two superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States of America. In Egypt, a long period of political instability, which intensified after the war, ended in the Free Officers coup d’état on 23 July 1952. This chapter examines the positions of the different elements of Egyptiot community life and the Greek state from 1937 to 1952 as its members dealt with the issue of the long-term presence of Greeks in Egypt. It also looks at the relationship between the community leadership, Greek state, and Egyptiot Left, on the one hand, and the question of the community as a coherent and homogeneous entity and its relationship with a changing Egyptian context, on the other.

THE CAPITULATIONS AND THEIR ABOLITION

Following the Egyptian Revolution of 1919 against British occupation, the country became independent three years later in 1922 but only in name. The British continued to control foreign policy and the defense of Egypt. Their hegemony was confirmed in the first three conditions of the declaration of the British government with which they acknowledged Egypt’s independence on 22 February 1922. With one of these conditions the British undertook the obligation to protect foreign interests and minorities in Egypt.³ Thus, it is not surprising that the extension and consolidation of the country’s national sovereignty became the main demand of Egyptian political life in the following decades. British power was somewhat diminished with the signing of the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty of 26 August 1936. Under this twenty-year treaty, Britain agreed to reduce its armed forces in Egypt to 10,400 men (10,000 soldiers and officers and 400 pilots) and to station them once it had constructed a new military base along the Suez Canal. The protection of the canal and, therefore, imperial communications was the main, but not the only, purpose of the British military presence in Egypt. London maintained the right to intervene militarily in the country in the event of an external threat. In exchange, it undertook to provide equipment and material to the Egyptian Army—whose hierarchy was opened up to the middle and lower strata—and train new officers. Among those who joined the military academy at that time was Gamal Abdel Nasser, a son of a postal clerk. Britain also supported Egypt’s membership in the League of Nations, which permitted the latter to create embassies and enter the world diplomatic map. According to Article 12 of the Anglo-Egyptian Treaty, the protection of foreign interests would gradually pass to Egyptian authorities, for Article 13 foresaw the abolition of the Capitulations, as they were a sticking point with all of the Egyptian political parties at the time.

The Capitulations were bilateral agreements between the Ottoman Empire and individual states regulating the rights and privileges of foreigners within the empire. In 1536, France became the first country to sign such an agreement with Constantinople, and other countries followed its example in securing extraterritorial legal rights for their citizens. Greece, as a relatively newborn state, having gained independence in 1830, endorsed the Capitulations in 1856. Apart from Greece, sixteen different states—Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Denmark, France, Prussia (and later Germany), Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States—negotiated capitulatory privileges for their citizens at different times. However, contrary to the situation prevailing in the rest of the empire, in Egypt the Capitulations offered privileges that greatly exceeded those foreseen by the spirit and the letter of the agreements. As the British consul general—and Egypt’s de facto governor—Lord Cromer stated, “The European who is privileged in Turkey, is ultra-privileged in Egypt.”⁴

The Capitulations exempted Egypt’s foreigners from almost all taxes.⁵ For the Ottomans, the initial idea was to exempt Western Europeans from a number of commercial taxes in order to boost economic activity and trade; however, in Egypt these privileges developed into almost complete tax immunity. The Egyptian government was not allowed to impose taxes on the citizens of capitulatory states without the consent of those states. Using his influence, the British consul general managed to impose some minor taxes on the citizens of other capitulatory states in order to protect British interests. The capitulatory states in general, though, never consented to the imposition of income tax on their citizens but only minor taxes, as, for instance, a small residency tax or, in the 1930s, an automobile tax. Along with tax immunity, the Capitulations also guaranteed the freedom of movement and commerce. Thus, up to the 1930s, Egypt was open to anyone who wished to settle there and acquire—in a relatively simple procedure—a residence permit.⁶ Moreover, they granted immunity from legal and judicial control. The Egyptian state had no right to promulgate laws referring to foreign citizens, over whom the Egyptian courts had no jurisdiction. In those cases where foreign litigants were of the same nationality, only consular courts were empowered to deal with them. Where the litigants were of different nationality, they were subject to the jurisdiction of the Mixed Courts, created in 1875. Appointed by the Egyptian government but always with the consent of the capitulatory states, judges of different nationalities served in these courts, which constituted a hybrid institution with its own regulations, an amalgam of the Napoleonic code, Islamic sharia, and Egyptian customary law.

Given the extensive privileges the Capitulations granted to foreigners, their abolition became a priority issue for the Egyptian nationalist movement. The Ottoman Empire had unilaterally suspended them upon the outbreak of World War I, a move the capitulatory countries officially recognized in 1923 in the Lausanne Treaty. In Egypt, on the other hand, the Capitulations remained in force during the 1920s and much of the 1930s. The Montreux Convention of 8 May 1937 finally abolished them, following almost a month of negotiations in the Swiss city of the same name.

The convention, proposed by the Egyptian government, was signed by twelve capitulatory states—Belgium, France, Denmark, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Austria, Germany, and the Soviet Union were not invited to Montreux, since they had already lost their privileges following World War I and the Russian October Revolution. The 1936 Anglo-Egyptian Treaty, though, allowed the remaining capitulatory states little room to maneuver. Ahead of the conference, it was a common expectation among foreign diplomats in Cairo that, if the capitulatory states rejected the Egyptian proposals, Egypt would proceed to abolish the Capitulations unilaterally. The perception was that Egypt’s call to Montreux was less an invitation to negotiate than the announcement of a prearranged decision.

Egypt’s main aim in Montreux was the abolition of the privileged status of foreigners and the affirmation of its sovereignty over them. This included introducing equality before the law for foreigners and Egyptians by placing all the country’s residents under the jurisdiction of the Egyptian national courts, after winding down the Mixed Courts following a transitional period. Consequently, what was at stake at the conference was the length of the transitional period for the full implementation of the convention. The issue was essentially the manner in which such a radical change should be effected and the time frame within which foreign interests could adjust themselves to the new conditions.

The first article of the convention declared that “the High Contracting Parties . . . agree . . . to the complete abolition in all respects of Capitulations in Egypt” in October 1937. Eventually a twelve-year transitional period was agreed on. This was the original Egyptian proposal, to which the British had already agreed. The Italians also backed it. The French, on the other hand, had sought an eighteen-year transitional period, and the Greeks, even though they earnestly favored the French proposal, decided that there was no point in supporting it, as it would only displease the Egyptians.

The Egyptian government promised not to enact discriminatory laws against foreigners during the twelve-year transitional period, at the very end of which, on 14 October 1949, the Mixed Courts would cease to exist. During the transitory period, the consular courts, which dealt with cases involving litigants of the same nationality, would also continue to operate. Following the conference, Nikolaos Politis, the head of the Greek delegation, highlighted the importance of the transitory period for the fate of the foreign populations in Egypt: “According to whether it is wisely or unwisely applied, the next twelve years will become a true period of transition, preparing the normal evolution of the present toward the future.”⁷

To reassure the foreign delegations at Montreux, the Egyptian side added an annex to the convention stating that before the end of the transitory period, the Egyptian government planned to conclude treaties of establishment and friendship with the ex-capitulatory powers, which would reiterate the guarantees of nondiscrimination against foreigners provided for in the transitory period. The idea of new future treaties was unanimously accepted by the foreign delegations, who saw in them an opportunity to renew the privileged status of their citizens under the pretext of equality and reciprocity that a treaty of establishment required. David Ewan Wallace, the chief British negotiator, was left in no doubt that the planned treaties were simply old wine in a new bottle. “In reality the Capitulations constituted a kind of treaty of establishment,” he acknowledged.⁸

Since participants had agreed on the outcome of many of the conference items beforehand, only two matters remained for the Greek delegation to consider: the unrestricted continuation of the professional activities of Egyptiots and the safeguarding of the national legal character of Egyptiot institutions. Chapter 3 examines the first issue. The second matter, the viability of Greek institutions, was more crucial than for any other foreig...