History of the Republic of Egypt
On 22–26 July 1952, the Free Officers, a group of disaffected officers in the Egyptian army founded by Gamal Abdel Nasser, and headed by General Muhammad Naguib, initiated the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 with the overthrowing King Farouk, whom the military blamed for Egypt's poor performance in the 1948 war with Israel and lack of progress in fighting poverty, disease, and illiteracy in Egypt. In the following two years, the Free Officers consolidated power, and, following a brief experiment with civilian rule, abrogated the 1953 constitution, and declared Egypt a republic on 18 June 1953, Muhammad Naguib as Egypt's first President.
Flag of Egypt
Though Syria withdrew from the U.A.R. in 1961, Egypt continued to use the official name of the United Arab Republic until 1971, when the country was renamed officially as the Arab Republic of Egypt. In 1972, when Egypt formed the Federation of Arab Republics along with Syria, and Libya, the U.A.R. flag (whose design Syria would reuse for their own flag, eight years later) was replaced by a common flag for the Federation, once again based on the Arab Liberation flag. The two green stars in the white band were replaced by the Hawk of Qureish, which had been the coat of arms of Syria prior to the formation of the U.A.R. in 1958. The Hawk of Qureish was also adopted as the Federation's coat of arms. The shade of red used in the red band was lightened slightly.