2022/02/22
It’s 10:50 a.m.
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Abdel Halim Hafez’s body, on March 30, 1977, to Cairo at three o’clock in the morning aboard an Egyptian plane after he died in a London hospital, after suffering with the disease that had occurred since his childhood and had grown up with him over the years.
His body was accompanied by Mrs. Nahla Al-Qudsi, the wife of the late artist Mohamed Abdel Wahab, who sent her to visit him because of his fear of flying, the lawyer Magdy Al-Amrousy, the sister of Abdel Halim Alia Shabana, and her cousin Shehata.
The body was received at the airport by two brothers, Nightingale Ismail and Muhammad Shabana, and a large number of artists, led by Baligh Hamdi, Sayed Ismail, Hussein Kamal, as well as Mr. Muhammad Al-Bassam, the media attaché at the Saudi Embassy.
The body of the late was scheduled to be transferred to Maadi Hospital, and from there in the morning to Omar Makram Mosque, but this measure was shortened, as Sheikh Muhammad Metwally Al-Shaarawy, Minister of Endowments at the time, ordered the mosque to be opened throughout the night to lay the body in it.
Within an intense security circle, the funeral of al-Tarab marched step by step from the Omar Makram Mosque, to Tahrir Square to the Circassian Mosque, and human waves were trying to penetrate the circle to reach the coffin.
But all attempts were met with deterrence in order to preserve the majesty of the situation, and in this circle the funeral procession continued in the designated streets, amid the sounds of women’s wailing and the nervous emotions of hundreds of thousands of young men.
At the forefront of the mourners were Mr. Ezz El-Din Jalal, Vice President of the Republic at the time, Anwar El-Sadat, and Mr. Mamdouh Salem, Prime Minister and Ministers, in addition to a large number of Arab ambassadors.
As for the musician, Muhammad Abdul-Wahhab, he failed to walk behind the coffin by order of the doctors because of the shock he suffered when he heard the tragic news in a phone call from his wife, Mrs. Nahla Al-Maqdisi, after the servants had hidden from him until the morning newspapers.
And in front of the Sharkas Mosque, the green car set off with Abdel Halim’s coffin to the Basateen area, after he bid farewell to the tears of millions.
There, Abdel Halim was buried in a private cemetery, which he had bought 17 years ago and did not agree to build it until 45 days before his death, before he traveled to London on his last medical trip.