"My Heart Is in Cairo": Malcolm X, the Arab Cold War, and the Making of Islamic Liberation Ethics

Abstract

When Malik El-Shabazz, as Malcolm X had come to be known, prepared to address the Young Men's Muslim Association in Cairo, Egypt, on July 27, 1964, he jotted down an outline of the speech in his travel diary. After attending the summit of the Organization of African Unity just days before, the former Nation of Islam minister and now head of the Muslim Mosque, Inc., in Harlem, New York, had stayed in Egypt to undergo training as a Muslim missionary. The speech in front of a Muslim audience in Egypt gave Shabazz an opportunity to cement his burgeoning partnership with the Egyptian government's Supreme Council of Islamic Affairs, which was sponsoring his months-long residency in Egypt in 1964. The talk also offered a chance to seek the moral, political, and financial support of a foreign Muslim audience for the African American liberation struggle. The Egyptian president and Third World hero Gamal Abdel Nasser loomed large in the outline of the speech not only as a political revolutionary but also as an embodiment of Islamic ethics. Shabazz listed nine different points about Nasser:

Your President is my President

A Man: fearless, far-reaching (wise)

Uncompromising on the side of freedom

Supports (always) African Freedom Fighters

Supports freedom everywhere

Brought freedom to Egypt (Africa)

Returned The Suez to Africans

Defeated the foreign invaders

Good man, good Muslim—may God bless him.