In a predominantly Muslim society, as many as 90% of women in Egypt have adopted a form of veiling. A majority of Egyptian women cover at least their hair with the hijab. A hijab refers to a head covering that is worn by Muslim women. Although the phenomenon of wearing the niqāb, a veil which covers the face is not as common, the niqab in Egypt''' has become more prevalent. While a few women in Egypt wear a black niqab along with a billowing black abaya as seen in countries such as Saudi Arabia, many choose to wear different colors of the niqab or manipulate the hijab to cover their face. Regardless, the growing trend of munaqqabat, or women who wear the niqab, has alarmed the authorities. They have begun to see this dress as a security threat, because it hides the face, and because it is perceived as a political statement, a rejection of the state in favor of a strict Islamic system.
Controversies over the niqāb appear to have emerged in Egypt's recent history. Particularly, a highly emotional response from Egyptian society occurred on October 8, 2009, when Egypt's top Islamic school and the world's leading school of Sunni Islam, Al-Azhar University, banned the wearing of the niqāb in all-female classrooms and dormitories of all its affiliate schools and educational institutes. However, the niqāb has had a long and contentious history in Egyptian society. The meaning of the niqāb worn by upper class Egyptian women at the turn of the century is different from what is worn by women today.
The niqāb during the early 20th century
In the early 20th century, the niqāb was not a practice confined to Muslims, but was worn by both Muslim and Christian elite women. This urban phenomenon originated in Istanbul and was part of the harem tradition, in which concubines and freeborn women of the Ottoman-Egyptian elite were secluded in harems that were guarded by eunuchs. During this time, wearing a face veil was described as "a national Egyptian dress for upper-class women" and it was called al-habara. It consisted of a full-length skirt, a head cover, and al-burqu’, which was the face-cover from below the eyes down to the chest.
Although these hareem women are the most visible class of women in chronicles of nineteenth century Egypt, they actually constituted no more than 2 percent of Egypt's five million female population in the late eighteenth century. Although they were numerically insignificant, the elite women's secluded lifestyle was considered the ideal and was envied by lower classes of women. Seclusion and veiling was a luxury that poorer families could not afford; so, Cairo's lower-class women could not cover their faces with the burqu. Having to attend to their work in the villages and the city, it was impossible to inhibit their movement with seclusion or cover their faces like the elite women.
Discourses on the veil during the nationalist movement
The debate about the position of Egyptian women and veil erupted at the turn of the 20th century. In the midst of the Egyptian nationalism movement, the status of Egyptian women was examined by foreigners and Egyptians alike to argue whether Egypt was sufficiently advanced to rule itself without British occupation. Western-educated Egyptians and other leading figures of Egypt's national movement consequently were forced to reexamine the practices of veiling, seclusion of women, arranged marriages, polygamy, and divorce.
Male nationalists' stance on the burqu'
For elite male nationalists as for the colonisers, the veil and segregation symbolised the backwardness and inferiority of Islamic society. Qasim Amin (1863–1908), a Western-educated Egyptian lawyer and jurist, was one of the founders of the Egyptian nationalist movement and was one of the main figures in the turn-of-the-century debate on women and society. Dubbed as the "Liberator of Egyptian women", he caused intense debate when his book The Liberation of Women (Tahrir Al Mar’a) was published in 1899. This book is widely considered the beginning of the battle of the veil that agitated the Arab press.