The Italian invasion of Ethiopia steered Egypt toward pan-Arab leadership

Evidence

Only one of the Arab states, however, could seriously aspire to the leadership of the Arab world—and that was Egypt. By her central position, her cultural, economic, demographic and technological preponderance, Egypt was the natural leader of any larger grouping of Arabic-speaking countries. After Iraq, and apart from the desert kingdoms of Arabia, too remote and too undeveloped to play any such role, Egypt was moreover the first of the Arab states to acquire sufficient freedom of action to be able to pursue an independent foreign policy. The threat posed to both British and Egyptian interests by the Italian occupation of Ethiopia led to a change of policy in both countries, and to the conclusion of the Anglo- Egyptian treaty of 1936. After this Egypt was able to follow a more active and independent line, and began to interest herself in Arab affairs. To begin with this was merely an aspect of Egyptian foreign policy; in time it grew into some­ thing more than that, into a commitment to Arabism. — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 880

Categorization

• XREF: The Italy-in-Ethiopia trigger parallels how external colonial pressures elsewhere reconfigured regional identities; feeds the representation cluster on external forces shaping Arab self-definition.