What is "shawar"

Shawar (died January 18, 1169) was a de facto ruler of Fatimid Egypt, as vizier, from December 1162 until his assassination in 1169 by the Syrian general Shirkuh, the uncle of the Kurdish leader Saladin, with whom he was engaged in a three-way power struggle against the Crusader Amalric I of Jerusalem. Shawar was notorious for continually switching alliances, allying first with one side, and then the other, and even ordering the burning of his own capital city, Fustat, just so that the enemy could not have it.