Personalities - Alphabetical Listing
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ABBOUSHI, FAHMI Mayor of Jenin from 1935-37; dismissed from the post by the British in 1937, as a result the Abboushi was family lived in exile in Beirut Lebanon till 1940. Fahmi Abboushi was one of founders of the Arab Independence Party. He was the chairman of the Arab Nationalist Bank, Jenin's branch, in the 1940s. He also served on numerous national committees during and after the British Mandate on Palestine.
At the turn of the century, the Abboushis and the Abdul Hadis were among the few prominent families in the Jenin area. The two families had what we may call a healthy competitive relationship especially in the field of politics. For example, Hafiz Bash Abdul Hadi and Haj Mustafa Abbushi were prominent figures in Jenin; they were also close friends. The two families always competed for the mayoral office. In the thirties Tahseen Abdul Hadi and Fahmi Abboushi competed for the mayoral office of Jenin. Fahmi Abboushi won the elections but in 1937 the British dismissed him from the post.
It is also worth mentioning that Fahmi Abboushi had a close friendship with Auwni AbdulHadi, both work together in the founding of the Arab Independence Party in the early 1930s. Fahmi Abboushi was also well known for his oratory skills.
ABDUL SHAFI , SHEIKH MUHEIDDIN (-1955) Palestinian notable from Gaza; member of the 'ulama (religious notables); served for the Ottomans until World War I; di-rector of waqf properties; Shari'a Court judge in Gaza; appointed member of the Supreme Muslim Council for Gaza and Southern Palestine in 1930; held this position until his death in Gaza in 1955.
ABDUL BAQI, AHMAD HILMI (1878-1963 Born in 1878 in Sidon; served as Gene- ral in the Ottoman army; Director-Gene-ral of the Ottoman Agricultural Bank in Syria and Iraq in 1908; Director-General of the Palestinian waqf under Hajj Amin al-Husseini in 1925; founder of the Arab National Bank in 1930 and its chairman in the early 1940s; early member of the Istiqlal party; named as treasurer to the first Arab Higher Committee formed in 1936; established the Arab National Fund in August 1943 which supported the Istiqlal party; military governor in Jerusalem; named first Prime Minister of the All-Palestine Government's cabinet established in September 1948 in Gaza; appointed District Military Governor under Hashemite rule in the West Bank; appointed Palestinian representative to the Arab League; died in 1963 in Cairo.
ABDUL HADI, AWNI (1889-1970) Born in 1889 in Nablus; landowner and lawyer; pan-Arabist; educated in Beirut, Istanbul, and at the Sorbonne University, Paris; founding member of the al-Fatat nationalist society in 1911 which was devoted to Arab independence and uni-ty; among the organizers of the first Arab Nationalist Congress in Paris, 1913; pri-vate secretary of King Faisal I at the Ver-sailles Peace Conference in 1919; then adviser to Amir Abdullah in Transjordan; returning to Palestine in 1924 he became one of the chief spokespersons of the Palestinian-Arab nationalist movement; elected representative to the 5th (August 1922, Nablus) and 6th (June 1923, Jaffa) Congress of the Arab Executive Commit-tee for Jenin and to the 7th (June 1928) for Beisan; secretary of the Executive Committee's Congress in 1928; member of the Palestinian Delegation to the Uni-ted Kingdom in 1930; lawyer for the Su-preme Muslim Council; founder, general secretary and first elected president of the Palestinian Istiqlal (Independence) Party, the first regularly constituted Pale-stinian political party (August 2, 1932); member and Secretary General of the Arab Higher Committee (formed in April 1936); partially responsible for the revolt of 1936-39; banned from re-entry to the country when the British decided to de-port the Committee members in 1937 (until 1941); member of the Palestinian delegation to the London Conference, St. James's Palace, February 1939; member and appointed Minister for Social Affairs of the All-Palestine government, establi-shed in 1948, served as Jordan's Minister (later ambassador) to Cairo, 1951-55; 1955-58 Jordanian senator; from 1958 chairman of the Arab League's Judicial Affairs Committee in Cairo; died on March 15, 1970 in Cairo.
ABDUL HADI, HAFEZ PASHA (1872- ) Palestinian notable; landowner from Na-blus, Arrabeh and Jenin; supported the Decentralization Party under Ottoman rule.
ABDUL HADI, NAIM (1912-) Born in 1912 in Nablus; engineer; mayor of Nablus 1951-55; contributed as such a lot to the city's development; Minister of Public Works and Economy in Jordan, 1955-57; member of Parliament in 1956.
ABDUL HADI, RUHI (1885-1954) Born in Jenin in 1885; served in the Ottoman diplomatic and consular corps; vice president of the Ottoman parliament in 1908; held senior positions in the Pa-lestinian administration under the British Mandate (Chief Secretary of Palestine); elected secretary of the first Delegation to London, 1921; became Minister in Jordan (Foreign Minister, 1949; Justice Minister, 1949 and 1952-53); died on July 16, 1954 in Nablus.
ABDUL HADI, SALIM AHMAD (1870-1915) Member of the Decentralization Party which demanded autonomy for the Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire in 1912; belonged to the 1st Arab nationa-list group, who were executed by the Ottomans in Damascus/Beirut in 1915.
ABDUL HADI, TARAB (1910-1976) Palestinian feminist; gave a speech in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre during the Arab Womens March to holy sites on April 15, 1933, warning of the replacement of the Arab population of Palestine with Jewish immigrants, one of many activists in the 1930s' campaign aiming at the removal of the veil.
ABDUL SHAFI, HAIDAR (1919- ) Born in Gaza; physician; early education in Gaza and Jerusalem; M.D. graduate from American University in Beirut, 1943; worked in British Government Hospital of Jaffa after graduation, later as medical officer in the Jordanian army; re-turned to Gaza in 1945 and opended private practice; member of the Arab Medical Society since 1945; director for medical services in the Gaza Strip, 1957-60; head of the Gaza Parliament's Legis- lative Council from 1962-65; member of the first all-Palestinian conference convened in Jerusalem in 1964, which established the PLO, deported to Lebanon in 1970 for PLO activities; head of Palesti-nian Red Crescent in Gaza since 1972; head of the Palestinian dele-gation to the Madrid Conference in 1990; led the Palestinian negotiation team for 22 months in the Washington talks.
ABED RABBO, YASSER (Abu Bashar) Born in Jaffa; co-founder (with Nayef Hawatmeh), former leader and Deputy Secretary-Gen. of the DFLP before broke off relations in 1990; founder of the Palestinian Democratic Union (FIDA); head of the PLO's information depart-ment in Tunis; leading PLO moderate; member of the PLO Executive Commit-tee; close advisor to Arafat during the peace negotiations with Israel; Minister for Information and Culture in the PA.
ABU GHARBIYEH, BAHJAT Co-founder (with Abdullah Rimawi and Abdullah Nawas) of the Baath Arab Par-ty's branch in Ramallah (Renaissance Party) in 1952; active member of the PNC; member of PLO Executive Committee in the 1960s.
ABU LUGHOD, IBRAHIM Born in Jaffa; professor of Political Scien-ce; B.A. and M.A. from the University of Illinois, USA (1953 and 1954); Ph.D. from Princetown University, 1962; lec-turer at several US universities; author of many works on the question of Palestine; head of the Palestinian Independent Group for Elections in the OPT; head of Palestinian Higher Committee on Education Curricula.
ABU MEDDIEN, FREIH (1944-) Born in Gaza; Palestinian lawyer; L.L.B. graduate from Alexandria University, Egypt, in 1971; member of various Pale-stinian councils and associations; former elected head of Gaza Bar Association (1989-94); member of the Palestinian ne-gotiating team to the peace conference; PA Minister of Justice.
ABU MEDDIEN, SHEIKH FREIH (1871-1955) Born in 1971; sheikh of tribe from the Beer Sheva, Negev and Gaza area; head of the tribal court in the Negev; took part in the Arab Revolt of 1916; first mayor of Beer Sheva in 1922; took refuge in Gaza after the 1948 war; owned much of the land; died in 1955.
ADWAN, KAMAL (-1973) Palestinian engineer; in the late 1950s teacher in Qatar; studied later petroleum engineering in Cairo; Fateh key figure and Central Committee member; among the top leaders of the Black September Organization; PLO leader in charge of operations in the OPT; killed by an Is-raeli raid in Beirut on April 10, 1973.
AL-ALAMI, FAIDI (- 1924) Mayor of Jerusalem 1906-09 and elected member of the "Administrative Council" for the sanjaq of Jerusalem in the Ottoman parliament, 1914-18.
AL-ALAMI, MUSA (1897-1984) Born in Jerusalem in 1897; son of Faidi al-Alami; landowner; graduated in law from Cambridge University; during the 1930s Secre-tary to the High Commissio-ner and Junior Crown Counsel in the Mandatory administration; in 1936 Se-cretary General of the Legal Department in Jerusalem; participated in the 1936-39 revolt along-side the Mufti; held a series of talks with the Jewish Agency leader David Ben Gurion; member of the Pale-stinian delegation to the London Confe-rence, St. James's Palace, February 1939; representative of the Palestinian political Parties at the Preparatory Conference for the Establishment of the Arab League, held in Alexandria in September/October 1944, preceding the establishment of the League of Arab States in 1945; founded Palestinian-Arab propaganda offices in Je-rusalem, Beirut, London and Washington and created a special fund to help Pale-stinian farmers to retain their land in 1945; after the 1948 war, founded the Arab Development Society in Jericho; died on June 8, 1984 in Jerusalem.
AL-ALI, NAJI (1938-1987) Cartoonist; born in 1938 in Skajara villa-ge (Galilee); grew up in Ein al-Hilwe re-fugee camp in Lebanon; published first drawings in the Lebanese newspaper Al-Muharar in the early 1970s; worked later for Al-Watan newspaper in Kuwait; retur-ned in the mid-1970s to Lebanon draw-ing for different newspapers; went back to Kuwait in 1982 to work for Al-Qabas newspaper; transferred then to their Lon-don office; famous for his cartoons sho-wing Palestine under occupation and his figure Handalla; shot on 22 July 1987 in London; led to his death on August 29.
ANTONIUS, GEORGE (1891-1941) Palestinian writer and politician; Greek-Orthodox Christian of Lebanese origin; born in 1891 in Cairo; graduate from Cambridge University in 1913; Deputy Press Censor in Alexandria during World War I; came to Palestine in 1921 and started civil service career in the Educa- tion Department (1921) and the Secreta-riat (1927) of the British Mandate Execu-tive; obtained Palestinian Citizenship in 1925; advisor to the Mufti; resigned from British service in 1930 in protest over British discrimination policy against Pale-stinians; began his work as Middle Eas-tern associate of C.R. Crane's Institute of Current World Affairs, New York; appea-red before the Peel commission 1936-37); author of The Arab Awakening (Lon-don: Hamish Hamilton, 1938) a classic work on Arab nationalism; member of the Palestinian delegation at the London Conference, St. James's Palace, February 1939, functioning as secretary to the Pa-lestinian delegation and Secretary Gene-ral to the united Arab delegation; died in Jerusalem on December 27, 1941.
ARAFAT, YASSER (Abu Amar) (1929-) Born on August 4, 1929 in Cairo; grew up mainly in Cairo and for a brief period in Jerusalem; fought in 1948 alongside the Mufti's defence forces of Palestine; graduated from Cairo University, Faculty of Engineering, in 1956; founder and president (1952-57) of the General Uni-on of Palestinian Students (GUPS) in Cai-ro/Egypt; founder and chairman of the Union of Palestinian Graduates in 1956; volunteered in the Egyptian army during the Suez Canal crisis; co-founder (with Abu Jihad) of the first Fateh-cell in 1957; founder of Fateh party (January 1959), until today PLO's largest faction; Fateh leader since 1958 and its spokesperson since 1968; elected chairman of the Exe-cutive Committee of the PLO since Feb-ruary 1969 when Fateh took over the PLO; changed the directions of the PLO from being pan-Arabist to focussing on the Palestinian national cause; appointed Commander-in-chief of the all-Palestini-an/Arab guerilla forces in September 1970; addressed the UN General Assem-bly in New York for the first time on No-vember 13, 1974; proclaimed November 15, 1988 the independent Palestinian State; and elected by the Central Council of the PLO as the first President of the State of Palestine on April 2, 1989; had secret negotiations with Israel from 1992 which led to the signing of the Declara- tion of Principles (peace accord) between PLO and Israel on September 13, 1993; since then negotiating with Israel on Pa-lestinian self-rule; returned to Palestine on July 1, 1994; set up the PA whose President and Minister of Interior he is.
AL-AREF, AREF (1891-1973) Born in Jerusalem in 1891; studied in Turkey and conscripted into the Turkish army in World War I; captured and spent three years in a camp in Siberia, from where he escaped after the Russian Re-volution and went back to Palestine; edi-tor of the first Arab nationalist newspaper Suriyya al-Janubbiyya, published in Jeru-salem in 1919; advocated a policy of mi-litant but non-violent opposition to Zio-nism; arrested during riots in 1920, es-caped with fellow-accused Haj Amin al-Husseini to Syria; sentenced to 10 years in prison in absencia on charges of fo-menting the riots; transferred back to Pa-lestine in 1929; became civil servant un-der the British Mandate (1933-48); Dis-trict Administrative Officer in Beer Sheba in 1936; then ministerial officer in Jor-dan; appointed mayor of Jerusalem (1950-55); author of Bedouin Love, Law and Legend, History of Beersheba and Its Tribes, History of Gaza, and History of Jerusalem; died on July 30, 1973 in Ramallah.
MIKHAIL ASHRAWI, HANAN (1946-) Palestinian politician; born in 1946 in Ramallah; member of the General Union of Palestinian Women (GUPW), 1967-72; member of the General Union of Pa-lestinian Students (GUPS) in Beirut, 1967-70; working at the Palestinian In-formation Office, Beirut, 1968-70; gradu-ate from American University of Beirut (M.A., English literature, 1970); Professor of English Literature at Birzeit University since 1974; founding member and direc-tor of the Legal Aid Committee since 1974; Ph.D., English Literature, at Uni-versity of Virginia, USA, 1981; Dean of Arts at Birzeit University 1986-90; mem-ber of the Union of Palestinian Writers; former member of Palestinian steering committee in the peace process and Pa-lestinian delegation spokesperson for the negotiations at the Madrid and Washing-ton peace talks; presented the Palestinian case in a moderate pragmatic way; con-tributed to development of Israeli-Pale-stinian dialogue; founder and head (1993-1995) of the Independent Palesti-nian Citizen's Rights Commission.
