Muhammad Hosni El Sayed Mubarak[a] (Arabic: محمد حسني السيد مبارك‎; 4 May 1928 – 25 February 2020) was an Egyptian politician and military officer who served as the fourth president of Egypt from 1981 to 2011.

On 6 October 1973, at the breakout of the Yom Kippur War, the Egyptian Air Force launched a surprise attack on Israeli soldiers on the east bank of the Suez Canal.

[34] Mubarak also developed friendships with several other important Arab leaders, including Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud, Oman's Sultan Qaboos, Morocco's King Hassan II, and Sudan's President Jaafar Nimeiry.

[32] Though supportive of Sadat's earlier efforts made to bring the Sinai Peninsula back into Egyptian control,[34] Mubarak agreed with the views of various Arab leaders and opposed the Camp David Accords for failing to address other issues relating to the Arab–Israeli conflict.

Until Libya's suspension from the Arab League at the beginning of the Libyan Civil War, Egypt was the only state in the history of the organization to have had its membership suspended, because of President Sadat's peace treaty with Israel.

[45] By the time he became president, Mubarak was one of a few Egyptian officials who refused to visit Israel and vowed to take a less enthusiastic approach to normalizing relations with the Israeli government.

[34] The Israeli historian Major Efraim Karsh wrote in 2006 that in Egypt "...numberless articles, scholarly writings, books, cartoons, public statements, and radio and television programs, Jews are painted in the blackest terms imaginable".

[51] According to Tarek Osman, the experience of seeing his predecessor assassinated "right in front of him" and his lengthy military career—which was longer than those of Nasser or Sadat—may have instilled in him more focus and absorption with security than seemed the case with the latter heads of state.

[53] In June 1995, there was an alleged assassination attempt involving noxious gases and Egyptian Islamic Jihad while Mubarak was in Ethiopia for a conference of the Organization of African Unity.

[55] During Hosni Mubarak's presidency, Egypt was marked by widespread human rights abuses, including arbitrary detention and systematic torture.

[56] The government maintained a continuous state of emergency, granting security forces extensive powers to arrest and detain individuals without due process.

[63] In June 2007, Mubarak held a summit meeting at Sharm el-Sheik with King Abdullah II of Jordan, President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

[66][67] Israel tied an easing of the blockade to a reduction in rocket fire and gradually re-opened supply lines and permitted around 90 daily truck shipments to enter Gaza.

Egypt was a member of the allied coalition during the 1991 Gulf War; Egyptian infantry were some of the first to land in Saudi Arabia to remove Iraqi forces from Kuwait.

In fact, luck was on Hosni Mubarak's side; when the US was hunting for a military alliance to force Iraq out of Kuwait, Egypt's president joined without hesitation.

[81] In 2005 Freedom House, a non-governmental organization that conducts research into democracy, reported that the Egyptian government under Mubarak expanded bureaucratic regulations, registration requirements, and other controls that often feed corruption.

[90] In February 2011, Voice of America reported that Egypt's top prosecutor had ordered a travel ban and an asset freeze for Mubarak and his family as he considered further action.

[91] On 21 May 2014 a Cairo court convicted Mubarak and his sons of embezzling the equivalent of US$17.6 million of state funds which were allocated for renovation and maintenance of presidential palaces but were instead diverted to upgrade private family homes.

[99] In a state televised broadcast on 1 February 2011, Mubarak announced that he would not seek re-election in September but would like to finish his current term and promised constitutional reform.

Gamal and Alaa were jailed in Tora Prison; state television reported that Mubarak was in police custody in a hospital near his residence following a heart attack.

[109] On 24 May 2011, Mubarak was ordered to stand trial on charges of premeditated murder of peaceful protesters during the revolution and, if convicted, could face the death penalty.

[8] On 28 May, a Cairo administrative court found Mubarak guilty of damaging the national economy during the protests by shutting down the Internet and telephone services.

They were charged with corruption and the premeditated killing of peaceful protesters during the mass movement to oust the Mubarak government, the latter of which carries the death penalty.

[125] On 13 January 2015, Egypt's Court of Cassation overturned Mubarak's and his sons' embezzlement charges, the last remaining conviction against him, and ordered a retrial.

[126] A retrial on the corruption charges led to a conviction and sentencing to three years in prison in May 2015 for Mubarak, with four-year terms for his sons, Gamal and Alaa.

Mubarak also expressed great admiration and gratitude towards the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan of the United Arab Emirates and his children, for their continuous support of Egypt and its people.

[140] On 26 July 2011, Mubarak was reported to be depressed and refusing solid food while in hospital being treated for a heart condition and in custody awaiting trial.

[144][145] On 20 June 2012, as Mubarak's condition continued to decline, state-run media erroneously reported that the former president had been declared "clinically dead", causing widespread confusion.

Egyptian president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi participated at the funeral and extended his condolences to Mubarak's widow, Suzanne, and his sons Alaa and Gamal; three days of national mourning were subsequently proclaimed.

[151][152] In April 2016, Alaa Mubarak was named in the Panama Papers as someone with financial interests that intersect with that of Mossack Fonseca, the firm implicated in that scandal.