'Aziz 'Ali al-Misri
| 'Aziz 'Ali al-Misri | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born | 1879 |
| Died | 1965 |
| Nationality |
Ottoman Empire; Egyptian |
| Known for | co-founder of Al-Qahtaniyya and Covenant Society; Arab Revolt |
Aziz Ali al-Misri (Cairo 1879 - Cairo 15 June 1965) was an Egyptian officer and politician. He co-founded of al-Qahtaniyya and al-‘Ahd (The Covenant).
Al-Misri (or al-Masri) was born of both Egyptian and Circassian (Ubykh and Bzedugs) ancestry. His father, Zakariya, and previous relatives on his father’s side of the family were Circassian, with the original family name before having moved to Irak and then Egypt: Şhapli. He was conscious of this fact throughout his lifetime. His half sister Aziza (1872-1936), from their common mother Chafika Siouk Mukbel, was the wife of Aly Pasha Youssef Ramzy Zulficar a governor of Cairo.
Al-Misri trained at the Ottoman Military Academy, where he graduated in 1901, and moved onto the Staff College of the Ottoman Army. He appreciated 19th century German military school. Shortly after, he became an officer in the Ottoman army. His first assignment as a member of the military was in Ottoman Vardar Macedonia. During his stay in the Balkans, al-Misri joined the ranks of the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), at first a secret organization, more commonly known as the Young Turks. It later became a political group that would eventually take control of the country in 1908.
In the formative constitutional years of the Ottoman Empire, al-Misri remained an advocate for Ottoman unity. He was a political moderate who wanted the three main political groups, Ottomanist, pan-Islamic, and Egyptian and Arab nationalist, to exist in cooperation. "He had come to the conclusion that in so composite a society as the Ottoman Empire the best way to maintain its integrity was not by attempting to suppress nationalities but by recognizing them, each as an autonomous unit within the Ottoman superstructure." In 1911, Al-Masri helped mediate a treaty between the Imam Yahya of Yemen and Izzat Pasha, the commander of the Ottoman campaign.
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