Al-Afghani wanted internal Muslim borders while pursuing an Arab empire

Evidence

Although it was Islam that linked Muslims to their land, al-Afghänï’s articles made it clear that they could not exist in a land without internal borders of its own, between territories within the same religion. It was his hope, or so he intimated to the spy hired by the British government, Professor Anthony Habib Salmone, to be an intermediary between the Mahdï, `Uräbï, and the British. He also aspired to be the leader of a great “Arab empire” in Africa and Asia, with the Mahdï’s military help, once negotiations were finalized. Yet, he urged Egyptians to fight for the integrity of their own land, against the British and Sudanese attempts to nullify those borders. Although he proscribed Egyptians from fighting in the Sudan against their fellow Muslims, the Sudan was rightfully theirs. — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 464

Categorization

• QUESTION: A paradox worth chasing: how did al-Afghani reconcile a Muslim super-state (Arab empire) with insisting on bounded watans within Islam? Was his Arab empire really state-centered or cultural?
• SEED: Angled article: the spy Professor Anthony Habib Salmone as an unseen colonial intermediary — how British intelligence used a professor to triangulate pan-Islamism.