Suez Crisis Peacekeepers to police the Egyptian–Israeli border, British Prime Minister Anthony Eden resigned, Canadian Minister of External Affairs Lester Pearson won the Nobel Peace Prize, and the USSR may have been emboldened to invade Hungary. The Suez Canal was opened in 1869, after ten years of work financed by the French and Egyptian governments. The canal was operated by the Universal Company of the Suez Maritime Canal, an Egyptian-chartered company; the area surrounding the canal remained sovereign Egyptian territory and the only land-bridge between Africa and Asia. The canal instantly became strategically important, as it provided the shortest ocean link between
1956–57 exodus and expulsions from Egypt "around 25 000 Jews were expelled that year (1956)", equivalent to all of the Jews who left Egypt in 1956. On December 9, 1956, Egyptian Interior Minister Zakaria Mohieddin stated that of Egypt's 18,000 British and French citizens, 1,452 had been ordered to be expelled. 1956–57 exodus and expulsions from Egypt The 1956–57 exodus and expulsions from Egypt was the exodus and expulsion of Egypt's Mutamassirun community, which began during the latter stages of the Suez Crisis in Nasserist Egypt. The exodus of the foreign Mutamassirun ("Egyptianized") community, which included the British and French colonial powers as well as Jews,