 However, the opening of a new sea route between Tadjoura and Shewa cut further into Zeila's historic position as the main regional port.Although part of the Ottoman Empire since 1559, between 1821 and 1841, Muhammad Ali, Pasha of Egypt, came to control Yemen and the "sahil", with Zeila included.After the Egyptians withdrew from the Yemeni seaboard in 1841, "Haj" Ali Shermerki, a successful and ambitious Somali merchant, purchased from them executive rights over Zeila.