BORG EL ARAB: As the winds of urbanization sweep through the great expanse of land on Egypt’s North Coast, the Bedouin inhabiting the area between Borg El Arab and Marsah Matrouh face the trepidation of being uprooted, with their cultural identity jeopardized as the land of their forefathers is literally pulled from under their feet.
For more than three decades, the Bedouin of the Western Desert, known as Arab Gharb (the Arabs of the West) as opposed to Arab Sharq (the Arabs of the East who live in the Sinai Peninsula) were exposed to life-changing factors which left some of them affluent and others destitute.
Torn between adapting to the rhythm and norms of city life and adherence to desert tradition, the Bedouin of Borg El Arab believe that their tribal conventions are one of the few remaining outposts protecting their existence against what they consider to be an arbitrary migration to the desert encouraged by the government.
Arab Gharb, the descendents of Awlad Ali and El Jeimii tribes that hail from the Arabian Peninsula, face the challenge of being transformed to typical city dwellers in years to come.
Change and adaptation”The change brought about through investments in beach resorts, huge factories and other industrial establishments has been so rapid that the Bedouin are failing to adapt, Hisham Al-Agari told Daily News Egypt.
A history teacher who lives in Agami on the outskirts of Alexandria, Al-Agari is a descendant of the renowned Al-Agaria tribe.
“The fast-paced invasion is taking in its wake the majority of the Bedouin’s uneducated youth who can only get jobs as waiters or office boys in the new establishments, he explains, adding that today’s younger generation of Bedouin have to face the bitter reality of a government that is confiscating part of their land under the pretext that it is public property.
Paradoxically both the outskirts and the heartland of Borg El Arab are peppered with posh houses and magnificent palaces belonging to some of the Bedouin heavyweights.
Individual homes as well as clusters of buildings known as nogooa (hamlets) shelter middle and working class Bedouins who traditionally made their livelihood through herding sheep and seasonal barely farming.
The salt lakes, known in Arabic as malahat, located between Alexandria and Borg El Arab, are mostly populated by Bedouin farmers and fishermen who sell their produce at the Borg El Arab market.
But some complain of the fact that a large portion of the malahat was buried to make room for City Center mega project, Alexandria’s new commercial hub, as well as the International Park, both located near the city’s entrance along the Cairo-Alexandria desert road. “If they continue to follow these policies our livelihood as fishermen will definitely be threatened, complained Saleh El Sharmi, a fisherman from Bab El Abeed, a village in the malahat.
The land battleIt’s commonly known that wealthy Bedouins accumulated their fortunes through one of two businesses: selling land of drug-trafficking – an allegation that has marred the reputation of the Bedouin.
But by the time the desert dwellers realized how lucrative land trade was becoming, the government had already declared large areas of desert land as state property.
“In spite of the fact that we have deeds attesting to our ownership of many of these areas, the land has been seized and we have no hope of retrieving it, protested Al Agari.
But Faiz Salem, a Borg El Arab-based businessman begs to differ. “Most of these deeds are hand-written contracts that aren’t officially registered, he said. “They date back to the time when even Bedouin marriages were not officially documented.
Sameh Karim, a Cairo resident who has been running a farming business in Borg El Arab for the past 20 years said: “The government compensated the Bedouin for land that can be cultivated or used for residential purposes even in the absence of official documents. But the problem is with the open areas that the Bedouin have claimed to make some quick money.
Dr Abdel Hamid Azamel, a researcher at the Desert Research Center (DRC), told Daily News Egypt that the same piece of land is often sold and resold by the Bedouins, explaining that such duplicitous practices are commonplace.
“When the government began selling land to individual developers, the Bedouin realized its true value. Often buyers are forced to contend with Bedouins claiming the land they had just bought as their own which forces them to pay ‘protection’ money for compulsory services like guarding and fencing, he continued.
The city Bedouin For the Borg El Arab Bedouin adapting to their urban surroundings is no easy feat. Few people are aware of the fact that Alexandria is surrounded by Bedouin communities just as much as Cairo is by rural areas. But while the latter’s influence is hardly recognizable, the power of numbers of the former is a force to be reckoned with.
“We make up one third of Alexandria’s population, Al-Agari told Daily News Egypt. “We’re an electoral force that everyone must consider. We led to the rise and fall of many PA candidates, said the Bedouin-cum-city-dweller.
“Even when we’re scattered throughout cities like Alexandria and Matrouh and in the huge desert, the tribes arrange their own meetings, get together for weddings, funerals, disputes and reconciliations. Most of the time the police has to rely on us for violent conflicts between warring families.
But Al-Agari and other tribesmen look back wistfully to the not-so-distant past when areas like Agami, Wadi El Gamar, Om Zighau, Dekheila and others were typical Bedouin hinterland.
“Wadi El Gamar has now been reduced to rows of buildings occupied by former tent-dwellers, said Youssef El Gineishi, a taxi driver from Wadi El Gamar, who’s a descendant of the reputed Gineish tribe. “But we still hold on to our tribal allegiance and the non-Bedouin who come to live here have to either follow our way or leave.
In the less populated area of Om Zighau on the Alexandria-Agami road, some palm trees and fig bushels are the only signs of a dying Bedouin community. “Look at these houses. Less than 15 years ago this whole place was full of tents and palm-orchards, said Latufa El Barhoumi, a popular Bedouin poet and composer.
Having lived his whole life in Om Zighau, mainly populated by the descendants of Al Barahma and Al Malkia tribes, the poet is painfully aware of the change. “This is why I perform Bedouin folklore shows all over Egypt. It’s the only way to preserve our fading way of life, he said.
A question of loyaltyDespite the fact that the Bedouin have often been accused of not being loyal enough to the nation, Al-Agari emphasizes that a close look at the history books refutes these allegations.
The government has often relied on Bedouin valor to protect the Egypt’s desert territories, as proven by the fact that late President Gamal Abdel Nasser reversed their exemption status from military service, thus underscoring their identity as Egyptians.
Al-Agari speaks with pride of their role in resisting Napoleon’s armies and duping both the Allies and the Axis during World War II when they attempted to use the Bedouins as human shields.
That said, conflicts between the Bedouin and the central government in Egypt have been exacerbated of late, with observers sounding the alarm on the dangers of continuing to marginalize such a powerful and strategically located part of society.
Most Arabs of the West have not come to terms with the fact that the length and breadth of the desert is no longer their own.
“All the desert is the Bedouin’s domain, argued Al-Agari. “The coastline is for the bird-hunting season, the yellow sands for the cultivation of barely and the surroundings where figs grow are the shepherd’s home.
But despite the fact that there still exists Bedouin who refer to a family of a thousand people as cousins and recognize each and every one of them through facial features and dialect, life as they know it has changed forever.
