The Camp David accords were signed by Egyptian president anWar al-sadat, Israeli prime minis-
ter Menachem Begin, and U.S. president Jimmy Carter on September 17, 1978, and created a general framework for Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai Peninsula, taken by israel in 1967, in
exchange for a formal peace treaty between the two countries. The 13 days of negotiations medi- ated by the U.S. president were notoriously acri- monious, and the two negotiating teams were held virtual prisoners at the U.S. presidential retreat at Camp David, Maryland, until they reached agree- ment. Even in the hours leading up to the official televised signing ceremony, Begin balked at put- K 128 camel
ting his name to a document that also included provisions that would have led, if implemented, to an eventual end to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land in the West Bank and Gaza based on UN Security Council Resolution 242. An Egyp- tian-Israeli peace treaty was signed by Begin and Sadat in Washington on March 26, 1979. Subse- quently, Begin and Sadat received the Nobel Peace Prize for their agreement, but the Middle East was left in turmoil.
The Camp David accords were the result of a lengthy political opening to Israel initiated by Anwar Sadat. After Sadat’s surprise attack on Israeli forces in the Sinai in October 1973 and the resulting military stalemate, Sadat indicated through secret diplomatic channels that he was willing to negotiate a comprehensive peace agree- ment with the Israeli government. For the next four years, Sadat’s overtures to Israel fell on deaf ears until November 20, 1977, when he made an astounding visit to JerUsalem and addressed the
Israeli Knesset. Despite Sadat’s bold initiative, the Israeli government conducted substantive negotiations only under pressure from the Carter administration.
Significantly, the Camp David accords placed the Palestinian question at the heart of the Middle East conflict. egypt, Israel, and Jordan were sum-
moned to negotiate an agreement to establish a “self-governing authority” to represent the Pal- estinian population in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. When the Palestinian authority was established, a transitional five-year period would commence, the end of which would bring an Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories, Palestinian elections, and Palestinian “autonomy.” The Palestinian section of the accords was never addressed and never implemented.
The Camp David accords resulted in a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel as well as the final withdrawal of Israeli troops from the Sinai Penin- sula in the spring of 1982. However, the imperfec- tions in this separate peace agreement led not only to a rather “cold peace” between Egypt and Israel
but also to a profound crisis in the Middle East region. Even before the final Israeli withdrawal from Sinai, Sadat was gunned down by Islamist opponents of the treaty on October 6, 1981. Arab governments initiated a diplomatic boycott of Egypt. The Begin government embarked on a full-scale invasion of lebanon in June 1982, just
weeks after the Sinai withdrawal. Israeli public outrage at the massacre of Palestinian civilians in Beirut in September 1982 and the rising Israeli military casualties resulting from its occupation of Lebanon led to Begin’s resignation in 1983 and his self-imposed withdrawal from public life until his death in 1992. The Camp David accords, while successful in achieving a negotiated peace between Egypt and Israel, set an unfortunate prec- edent of unfulfilled transitional phases and left the question of Palestinian sovereignty unresolved. These problems have since plagued every other attempt to reach a truly comprehensive settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
See also arab-israeliconFlicts; palestine.
Garay Menicucci Further reading: Irene Beeson and David Hirst, Sadat
(London: Faber and Faber, 1981); William L. Cleve- land, A History of the Modern Middle East (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 2004); William Quandt, Camp
David: Peacemaking and Politics (Washington, D.C.:
Brookings Institution, 1986).
Canada
There has been a Muslim presence in Canada since very early times, with the first national census for 1871 showing 13 Muslims. It was not until the 20th century that Islamic institutions became established in North America. The first
mosqUe in Canada was the al-Rashid Mosque in
Edmonton, Alberta, built in 1938. June 28, 1952, saw the first national Muslim conference in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, with 400 Muslims from Canada and the United States in attendance. In July, 1954,
the Federation of Islamic Associations of the United States and Canada (FIA) was formed. The first conference of the FIA was held in London, Ontario, in 1955.
With the growth of the Muslim community in North America and the migration of Muslim students from other countries (particularly the arab world, but also iran, india, pakistan, and
tUrkey) to study in North America, the mUslim
stUdents association (MSA) was formed in 1963.
Today there are active chapters of the MSA in most major colleges and universities in North America. In 1981, the islamic society oF north america
(ISNA) was created. It is the largest Islamic orga- nization in North America, with its Canadian headquarters in the Toronto suburb of Missis- saugua, Ontario. There are, of course, many other Muslim communities in North America, repre- senting such groups as the Shia (both Twelve- Imam and Ismaili) and Sufi societies, the nation oF islam (and all of its splinter groups such as the
Nation of Five Percenters), the Dar ul-Islam, and others.
There is no accurate count of the Muslim population in Canada or the United states. The
Canadian census does ask the question of reli- gious affiliation. The 1981 Census of Canada was the first to recognize Islam as a separate, distinct religious category. According to the 1981 cen- sus, there were 98,165 Muslims in Canada. The overwhelming majority (77 percent) of Canadian Muslims were foreign-born, with only 23 percent being born in Canada. In 1981, more than half (53.1 percent) of Canadian Muslims lived in Ontario. The figures from the 1991 census show 253,260 Muslims in Canada, an increase of more than 2.5 times the number from 1981.
The figures from the 2001 census list 579,600 Muslims in Canada, an increase of almost 2.3 times the number from the 1991 census. The esti- mate of 579,600, however, may be low. The main reason is that most Muslims are recent immigrants who are reticent to self-identify as members of a minority religious group for reasons ranging from
personal privacy, to a perception of discrimina- tion, to a desire to fit in. This is particularly true with the recent immigration of reFUgees into
Canada from countries such as Somalia, Bosnia, and Albania. On the other hand, estimates of population numbers are often linked with self- worth, that is, minorities often tend to prefer higher estimates for their own group and lower estimates for others.
The ways in which Islam is lived and prac- tised in Canada can best be seen in the Toronto area, which has the largest population of Canada’s Muslims. Three umbrella organizations represent various communities there: the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), the Canadian Council of Muslim Women (CCMW), and the Council of the Muslim Community of Canada (CMCC). There is a strong Shii presence in Toronto, both in its Twelve-Imam and Ismaili forms. Sufis, including members of the Chishti, Alawi, Qadiri, Jerrahi, Rifai, Naqshbandi, and Nimatullahi orders are quite active in Toronto. The Ahmadis are actively involved in proselytizing and have built the larg- est mosque in the Toronto area. This mosque, named the Bait-ul-Islam (House of Islam), is actually the largest mosque in all of Canada. It was designed in 1987 by Gulzar Haider, a pro- fessor of architecture at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario, and the same architect who in 1979 was asked to design the mosque for the headquarters of the Islamic Society of North America in Plainfield, Indiana.
While Islam is a minority tradition in Canada, Sunni Muslims constitute the majority of Toronto’s Muslims. However, there are substantial minority communities who practice their own forms of Islam. Shi’i traditions are quite well represented in Toronto. One estimate is that Shiis make up at least 30 percent of the total Muslim population of North America, about twice that found generally among Muslims, and attributable to immigration patterns. The Shii community in Canada increased dramatically after the expulsion of South Asians from Uganda in 1972 and the subsequent arrival K 130 Canada
of Muslims from other East African countries such as Kenya or Tanzania. Seven years later came the revolution in Iran, resulting in another wave of Iranian Shii immigration into North America. There is also a substantial Ismaili community in Canada (predominantly of South Asian and east aFrican origin), self-estimated to consist
of some 30,000 members in the Greater Toronto Area alone. Another minority is the Ahmadi com- munity in Toronto, which has experienced major difficulties from other Muslims.
Amir Hussain Further reading: Sheila McDonough, “Muslims of
Canada.” In South Asian Religious Diaspora in Brit-
ain, Canada, and the United States, edited by Harold
Coward, John R. Hinnels, and Raymond Brady Wil- liams, 173–189 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000); Rheem A. Meshal, “Banners of Faith and Identities in Construct: The Hijab in Canada.” In The
Muslim Veil in North America: Issues and Debates, edited
by Sajida Sultana Alvi, Hooma Hoodfar, and Sheila McDonough, 72–104 (Toronto: Women’s Press, 2003); Regula Qureshi, “Transcending Space: Recitation and Community among South Asian Muslims in Canada.” In Making Muslim Space in North America and Europe, edited by Barbara Metcalf, 46–64 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996); A[sma] Rashid, 1981 Census
of Canada: The Muslim Canadians, A Profile (Ottawa:
Statistics Canada, 1992).
cat
During his travels in syria, the American Roman-
tic poet and journalist Bayard Taylor (1825–78) encountered an unprecedented sight: a hospital where cats roamed freely and were sheltered, cared for, and fed. This institution was funded by a private endowment (waqf) that supplied veterinary care, food, and caretakers’ wages. The British Orientalist and sometime denizen of Cairo Edward W. Lane (1801–76) described a cat garden that was originally endowed by the 13th-century
ruler al-Zahir Baybars (r. 1260–77). At a time when European town dwellers ate cats or killed them by papal decree (which led to rising rat populations that may have hastened the spread of plagues), cats enjoyed life in arab cities in ways
that signal their special relationship with Arabs generally and Muslims in particular.
The cat is the quintessential pet in Islam. According to a hadith, “Love of cats is an aspect
of faith.” Other hadiths prohibit the persecution and killing of cats. But it is because the cat is considered pure that it is welcomed in homes; a Muslim may eat food that cats have sampled or perform ablUtions with water from which they
have drunk. Such rulings are often accompa- nied by biographical snippets that demonstrate mUhammad’s fondness for cats. He took care of
the kittens that a cat was allowed to have on his cloak, and he cut off his sleeve rather than disturb a sleeping cat when he had to rise for prayers. His own cat was purportedly named Muizza, and he invented the nickname of the famous companion and hadith transmitter Abu Hurayra (Father of the Kitten) because the latter was always accom- panied by his cat. According to legend, it was this cat that saved Muhammad from a snake. Until recently, Arab farmers also told of cats that warned or protected them against snakes.
Cats were guardians of food stores and gra- naries and, consequently, important members of the environmental network that sustained cities. In the text- and paper-based cultures of Arab-Isl- amicate cities, they protected books against mice and became friends to bibliophiles and scholars with whom they sometimes appear in paintings. The cat’s symbiotic relationship with people and (crowded) cities is reflected in the account of the cat’s creation in al-Damiri’s (ca. 1341–1405) Book of Animals: when the animals on Noah’s Ark com-
plained of mice, God caused the lion to sneeze and so created the first cat. Cats continue to play this role in modern cities, where they prowl the streets in pest patrols and keep impurities outside the home. The cat’s enemy is the lofty skyscraper,
which is transforming the street hunters into indoor pets.
See also Folklore.
Nuha N. N. Khoury Further reading: Cats of Cairo, Photographs by Lor-
raine Chittock, Introduction by Annemarie Schimmel (New York: Abbeville Press, 2001); Bayard Taylor, Lands
of the Saracen (New York: Putnam, 1855).
cemetery
A cemetery is a plot of land dedicated to the burial of the dead. It is usually set apart from residential and commercial areas and contains distinctive monuments, religious buildings, and
gravestones that memorialize those who are bur- ied in it. Beyond serving the practical end of providing a place for the disposal of the bodies of the deceased, cemeteries often are regarded as sacred ground in connection with the aFterliFe
beliefs of a community. This is especially evident for the Abrahamic religions, which believe in the resurrection of the body for a final judgment. For followers of Judaism, Christianity, and islam,
therefore, cemeteries are regarded as places of rest for the dead until that time.
Cemeteries form part of the communal land- scape wherever Muslims reside. In rural areas, they are located in fields or elevated areas adjacent to villages. Urban cemeteries are usually placed outside the city limits. Cemeteries in medieval
Cairo’s City of the Dead (al-Qarafa) (Juan E. Campo)
Islamicate cities were usually located outside the city gates, where they could be easily reached by funeral processions and people who wanted to visit the gravesites of family, friends, or holy people. Some urban historians have noted that cemeteries may have actually inhibited the expan- sion of some cities, but many cemeteries have also been engulfed by urban growth or simply aban- doned or forgotten with the passage of time. Jews and Christians living in Muslim countries bury their dead in their own cemeteries.
Visiting the dead and pilgrimages to the tombs of Muslim saints are important aspects of life
for many Muslims to this day, even though such practices are condemned by followers of the most conservative schools of Islamic law, such as the Wahhabis of saUdi arabia. During Ramadan, on
major feast days, and during the mourning period after someone dies, families visit the cemetery together, and women prepare food to distribute to the needy on behalf of the dead. In Cairo’s larg- est cemetery, the City of the Dead (also known as al-Qarafa), there are family mausoleums that look like houses where people pass the holiday near their deceased relatives. Cemeteries may have trees and gardens, which make them popular places for strolling, picnicking, and other forms of socialization. They were also known as places where people could meet secretly to conduct illicit activities, so secular and religious authorities have periodically sought to control or ban people from using cemeteries for anything other than their intended purposes. In the popular imagination, they are believed to be places where the Jinni and
demons may lurk.
Among the most famous cemeteries in Islamic lands are the medieval ones found in medina,
damascUs, cairo, and baghdad, where the com- panionsoFthe prophet, his relatives and descen-
dants, and other important figures from early Islamic history are buried. naJaF, Iraq, where the
Shii shrines of Muhammad’s cousin ali ibn abi
talib (d. 661) is buried, has the Valley of Peace,
a vast cemetery where many of the Shia lay their
dead to rest. The nearby shrine city of karbala,
where Ali’s son Husayn (d. 680) is buried, has another important Shii cemetery, known as the Valley of Faith. In Iran, the shrine of the eighth Shii imam Ali al-Rida (d. 818) at Mashhad is
surrounded by cemeteries that began to develop when tWelve-imam shiism became the religion
of the Safavid state in the 16th century. Tehran’s Behesht-i Zahra cemetery has recently become famous as the burial place of Ayatollah rUhol- lah khomeini (d. 1989) and Iranian martyrs of
the 1978–79 revolution and the eight-year war with iraq (1980–88). Also, powerful Muslim rul-
ers have left spectacular funerary complexes that they built for themselves from morocco to Cairo,
Tabriz (Iran), bUkhara (Uzbekistan), Delhi, Agra,
and Hyderabad (india). These constructions con-
tain some of the best surviving examples of medi- eval Islamicate architecture in the world.
Small cemeteries can be found on the grounds of mosqUes and madrasas located within city pre-
cincts, such as the mamlUk madrasas of Cairo,
Ottoman mosques in Turkey, and the Mecca Mosque in Hyderabad. Sufi hospices may also have burial grounds on the premises for a Sufi saint, shaykhs, dervishes, family members, and
important patrons. For example, the shrine of Nizam al-Din Awliyya (d. 1325) contains, in addi- tion to the graves of his family and disciples, those of Amir Khusraw (d. 1325), a leading Persian poet and friend of Nizam al-Din, and Jahanara (d. 1681), an influential Mughal princess and patron of the chishti sUFi order.
Since the 1970s, Muslim immigrants to eUrope
and the United states have purchased lots within
existing non-Muslim cemeteries for the burial of their dead. Some prefer, however, to transport the bodies of their deceased back to their homelands for burial.
See also death; FUneraryritUals; Jinni; sUFism.
Further reading: Raymond Lifchez, ed., The Dervish
Lodge: Architecture, Art, and Sufism in Ottoman Turkey
(Berkeley: University of California, 1992); Muhammad
Umar Memon, Ibn Taymiyya’s Struggle against Popular
Religion (The Hague: Mouton, 1976); Christopher
C. Taylor, In the Vicinity of the Righteous: Ziyara and
the Veneration of Muslim Saints in Late Medieval Egypt
(Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1999).