Image: Wikimedia. No copyright restriction known. Staff photographer reproduction rights transferred to Library of Congress through Instrument of Gift.
If there was one legacy (among many) of president Gamal Abdel Nasser that Egypt could have done without, it is the peculiar suspicion towards foreigners, to the point of embarrassment, that rode the region’s pan-Arab nationalism wave in the 1950s and 1960s. A problem that still, in various manifestations, continues until today in institutions, mass media and the public discourse.
Behind the iconic image of legendary jazz musician Louis Armstrong playing his trumpet at the Pyramids was an artist that you would think had no relation to Egypt’s politics and the Middle East conflict. In fact he once stated, “I don’t know nothin’ about politics”, but he was dragged into a mind-boggling controversy.
