Personal Info
- Country of residence: Palestine
Information
Akram Zuaiter (1909 - 1996) was an Arab nationalist writer and politician, born in the city of Nablus in 1909. His father, Sheikh Omar Zuaiter (the Algerian), was one of the senior men of Nablus, and headed its municipality in the early twentieth century. His brother, scholar Adel Zuaiter, Sheikh of Arab Translators.
Akram Zuaiter studied primary classes in the city of Nablus, completed his secondary studies at An-Najah College, then joined the American University in Beirut, and then joined the Institute of Law in Jerusalem.
At the beginning of his life, Zuaiter practiced the profession of teaching in the secondary schools of Palestine, and following the revolution in 1929 in Palestine and the campaign of the British delegate against the Arab revolutionaries, he resigned from the teaching profession to devote himself to working in the national field, so he took over the editor-in-chief of the Mirror of the East newspaper in Jerusalem, and after three months of his work in journalism He was arrested and imprisoned as a result of his involvement in the national action, and he was sentenced to deportation for a year to Nablus, and there he led the national demonstrations, especially on the day of the execution of the three martyrs: Fouad Hijazi, Muhammad Jamjoum, and Atta Al-Zir. The events of 1931, however, Zaiter was arrested and Al-Hayat newspaper was closed, and he was deported again to the city of Nablus, where he taught at An-Najah College, and formed, with a group of free people, the Association for the Care of Arab Prisoners. During that period, he founded with a number of his companions the Arab Independence Party in Palestine. He used to publish his patriotic articles on the pages of Al-Difaa and Al-Jami'a Al-Jafawiyya newspapers.
Akram participated in the establishment of the National Action League in Syria, and he was a vice-president of its founding conference that was held in Beirut in 1933, and when King Faisal I died in Baghdad, Akram represented the Independence Party at his funeral ceremony, so Yassin al-Hashemi met him and asked him to stay to work in the Iraqi institutes as a nationalist mentor There, he contributed to the founding of (Al-Muthanna Club) and (Al-Jawwal Al-Qawmi).
After his return to Palestine, he began holding popular meetings in all parts of Palestine, calling for resistance and to confront the British Mandate. Following the clash that took place in 1936 between the Palestinian nationalists and the British police forces, Akram Zaiter called for the formation of national committees, and he assumed the secretariat of the Nablus committee.
The Nablus Committee contacted the Free Palestinians and Arabs and called for the great general strike that lasted for six months, which paved the way for the 1936 revolution, so Akram was arrested and was the first detainee in this revolution, as he was sent to Auja Al-Hafir and Sarafand prisons, and after a while he took refuge in Damascus where he attended the Bloudan Conference He took over media work for the Palestinian cause in Syria and neighboring countries.
After the Mandate forces chased the free Arabs, Akram headed to Iraq, where he worked as an inspector at the Ministry of Education and a professor at the Iraqi Teachers’ House until the Rashid Rida al-Kilani revolution broke out in 1941, and he participated in it. Aleppo and then to Turkey to spend three years as a political refugee in Anatolia.
After the declaration of Syria's independence in 1946 AD, Akram returned to it, and became close to its president, Shukri al-Quwatli. He also represented Syria in many national activities, and was an advisor to its delegation to the League of Arab States, and a member of the Palestine Permanent Committee in the Arab League.
his diplomatic work
In 1947 he headed an Arab delegation to Latin America to explain and defend the Palestinian cause, and participated in most of the national and Islamic conferences held in the Arab East. In 1963 he was appointed Jordan's ambassador to Syria, where he spent nearly a year, then Jordan's ambassador to Iran and Afghanistan. In 1966 he was appointed Jordanian Minister of Foreign Affairs, and in 1967 he became a member of the Jordanian Senate, then Minister of the Royal Court.
In 1971 he became Jordan's ambassador to Lebanon and Greece until 1975, then he returned again to the membership of the Senate during its fourteenth, fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth sessions.
During Akram Zuaiter's stay in Lebanon in the eighties, he actively participated in the cultural movement, and was head of the Islamic Cultural Center for many years. He also shared with the Lebanese people their pain and suffering during the Israeli siege of Beirut in 1982. The homeland and the diaspora, and this caused him deep sorrow, so he left Beirut for Amman, where he assumed the chairmanship of the Royal Commission for Jerusalem Affairs.
Zuaiter was a member of the Jordanian Academy of the Arabic Language, and a corresponding member of the Academy of the Arabic Language in Damascus. He was also a member of the Royal Academy for Research in Islamic Civilizations at the Aal al-Bayt Foundation.
Akram Zuaiter was an eloquent orator whose literature was influenced by Al-Jahiz, Abu Hayyan Al-Tawhidi and Ibn Hazm. He also studied under his brother Adel Zuaiter, Muhammad Isaaf Al-Nashashibi, Amir Al-Bayan Shakib Arslan, and Khalil Al-Sakakini, with whom Akram was closely associated, and throughout his life he boasted of his apprenticeship at the hands of this great writer. He was so influenced by his knowledge and personality that he gave the name (Sari) to his first-born, imitating his teacher, Sakakini, Abi Sirri.
his death
Akram Zuaiter died at his home in Amman after suffering a heart attack on Thursday, corresponding to the eleventh of April 1996. I prayed over his body in the mosque of Al-Hussein Medical City, and he was buried in the Islamic cemetery in Sahab near Amman.
His writings
Zuaiter's books occupied a prominent place in the Arab library, and he was unique in recording the most accurate details of the Palestinian struggle, the moment it occurred, honestly and objectively, and among the most important books:
Our History, published in 1935 in collaboration with Darwish Al-Miqdadi.
Arabic reading, printed in 1939 with Muhammad Nasir.
History for Primary Classes, printed in 1940 with Ali Al-Shariqi and Sidqi Hamdi.
Modern History, printed in 1940 with Majid Khadduri.
A Message in the Union, published in 1945 in collaboration with Satih al-Husari and Kamel Marwa.
A mission in a continent, printed in 1951.
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Achievements and Awards
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