Green Shirts and Red Fezzes
67
A dust cloud became visible in the distance. A welcoming
shout went up. It turned out to be a column of soldiers,
marching with their banners in the wind—a contingent of
about two hundred volunteers bound for Palestine under Misr
el Fattat auspices. They were dressed in war-surplus khaki and
the Arab headpiece—consisting of the flowing white shawl,
khaffiya, held down around the temples by twin black cords.
Their faces were bronzed by the Nile sun, their hands bony
from toil. They were fellaheen—those lowest in the social
scale, usually tenant-slave farmers or unskilled workers. They
joined the Green Shirt columns, and together marched past a
guard of honor of Green Shirt officials. I began to photograph
the scene with one policeman behind me, the other at my
side. Suddenly, as the massed banners and flags passed by, a
dozen Green Shirt arms shot out in the old-fashioned Fascist
salute. To snap or not to snap! What would the police say?
Nervously, I took two photographs of the saluting soldiers.
Nothing happened.
As the contingents marched toward the Nile, I jumped into
Hussein's car with Sheikh Mahmoud Abou el Azaayim, a
wealthy Egyptian who was financing the volunteers. We drove
ahead to Hussein's home on the other side of the bridge. His
apartment commanded a magnificent view of the Nile, and
the famous Pyramids of Giza in the distance.
"Take a picture of my daughters," Hussein said. "I have
named them Faith and Liberty." Hussein's wife was nowhere
in evidence, faithful to the Moslem tradition that no decent
woman ever shows her face to strangers. In his military dress
and cap, hands on hips, jaw stuck out, Hussein on the balcony
of his home imitated II Duce. Hussein had neither the girth,
the stature, the jaw, nor the snarl of the Italian Fascist whom
he admired and tried to emulate.
It was now the turn of Sheikh el Azaayim to pose for me.
In our country, thanks to Hollywood, the word "sheikh" suggests a virile, handsome son of the desert dashing about on a
full-blooded Arab charger. Undoubtedly there are some Val-