Ahmed ‘Urabi

Who was Ahmed ‘Urabi?

Colonel Ahmed ‘Urabi or Orabi, formerly known in English as Ahmad Arabi or Arabi Pasha, was a nationalist Egyptian and an officer of the Egyptian army. The first political and military leader in Egypt to rise from the fellahin, ‘Urabi participated in a 1879 mutiny that developed into a general revolt against the Anglo-French dominated administration of Khedive Tewfik. He was promoted to Tewfik's cabinet and began reforms of Egypt's military and civil administrations, but a massacre of foreign and native Christians in Alexandria in 1882 prompted a British bombardment and invasion that deposed ‘Urabi and his allies in favor of a British occupation.