Year 1960 - Part 2: Nasser's Twenty-Three-Day Tour of the North Begins in Aleppo

Thursday the 28th

I finished reading, today, Anthony Eden's memoirs on the Suez War, as published by al-Ahram, and drew the following conclusions from them:

The British and the French, together with Israel, were determined to destroy Abdel Nasser and the regime that had grown too big for its own bounds, but he fought them until he humbled them.

This desperate, unusual defense of "Israel's own survival" confirms our own suspicions that Israel is, for the Western powers, a matter of vital importance, first to divide the Arab world and weaken it, and second to serve as a tool for threatening the Arabs from within their own midst, so that they never think of achieving independence by developing their own wealth, especially their oil wealth, which must be left in the hands of the "oil sheikhs" to spend on their own pleasures, with whatever remains deposited in Western banks, and Israeli ones disguised behind an American or British mask.

What truly astonished me was this bitter complaint, running again and again from Eden's own pen, over the position of the United States, and its president Eisenhower personally, during the Suez War.

This was a position we already knew of, though we had not known the full extent of its own force and influence, having given first importance instead to the Soviet Union's own warning.

Away from the atmosphere of ministerial work, today brings our own daughter Maysa's birthday, as she turns twelve. She is progressing well in her studies with the Franciscan nuns, and I confess my own admiration for this school's discipline, and for how well it teaches the French language.

I was Minister of Education during the Suez War of 1956, and deputy for the Foreign Minister, and it was I who summoned the British and French ambassadors to the Foreign Ministry and informed them of the severing of diplomatic relations, meaning they and the members of their own missions were required to leave Syrian soil.

But I offered the French ambassador the chance to maintain cultural relations, an offer that meant keeping the educational institutions open, along with the archaeological excavations Mr. Schaeffer was carrying out at Ugarit, north of Latakia.

The offer was received with gratitude and relief, and I kept in place, in Paris, my friend and fellow student Dr. Jamil Mahfouz, as director of the Syrian missions there, while he, in turn, kept the French Cultural Institute and the excavations in place.

To preserve appearances, I appointed Syrian directors for the French and English institutes, to calm public opinion, which stood in solidarity with Egypt, and required them not to interfere in administrative matters until the effects of Suez and its own tragedies had passed, and things returned to normal, at which point this measure was lifted.

The French embassy sent word, sounding me out on accepting the French Order of Merit, through Dr. Anwar Hatem, Secretary-General of the Council of Ministers, perhaps out of some sense of the wisdom of what I had done for French culture. But I thanked them for the offer and declined to accept the honor, for the circumstances of the moment itself simply did not allow me to accept it.

Thursday, 11 February: Exceptional Pensions

The President issued Legislative Decree No. 35, dated 11 February 1959, enabling the state to grant exceptional pensions to persons with no legal entitlement to one, in recognition of exceptional services rendered to the state.

Our own legislation knew no such grant, except by special law, such as the law once issued to educate Ibrahim Hananu's own children at the state's expense, and the law issued to educate the children of General Sami al-Hinnawi in 1949, after one of al-Barazi's own sons assassinated him in Beirut, in revenge for the killing of his cousin Dr. Muhsin.

But the new law set out certain conditions:

Article 1 required, for the granting of exceptional pensions or increases to pensions, that they go to "civilian and military officials, and non-officials rendering great services to the Republic."

Article 2 provided for the formation of a committee, by a decision of the President of the Republic, to review exceptional pensions and rewards "on the proposal of the Minister of the Treasury," though this committee's own decisions would not take effect unless approved by the President of the Republic.

But until this committee was formed, pensions and rewards would be granted by a decision of the President of the Republic.

Under this law, the President issued several decisions granting exceptional pensions, among them one to the heirs of the late Uthman al-Hourani, former director of education in Hama (Decision No. 302, dated 21 February of this month), one to the family of the late Nicola Deeb, an official at the Ministry of Economy (Decision No. 303, same date), and one to the family of the late Saleh Aqeel, granted a lump-sum pension of 400 Syrian lira (Decision No. 303).

The late Saleh was our own colleague in the Chamber of Deputies for the Qalamoun region, and became a Minister of State in the cabinet Sabri al-Asali formed on 31 December 1956 from members of the National Front, after the People's Party refused to take part in it.

He showed clear enthusiasm for union with Egypt, and this cabinet's own term ended with the announcement of the Union, on 6 March 1958.

Khalid al-Azm records in his memoirs that Saleh Aqeel "was deeply affected by his own name being left off the list of Union ministers, and this distress ultimately brought on the heart attack that took his life."[1]

Sunday, 14 February

President Gamal arrived by sea, by way of Latakia.

(This particular visit would last twenty-three uninterrupted days.) He made his way to visit Qamishli, Deir ez-Zor, and al-Hasakah, and the Protocol Directorate contacted me to travel to Aleppo, so that we would be there to receive him on Wednesday. There is no doubt he came here for two reasons:

The first: to renew contact with the people of the Northern Region, letting them know that their own president was setting aside part of his own time for them, listening to their requests and complaints in person, and resolving government matters that could not otherwise be resolved with proper speed in his own absence.

The second: to study, in person, the general situation, both politically and from a security standpoint, following the resignation of the Baathist ministers, and their own move to begin working in secret against the Union, to tear it down as a political system, having turned against it entirely.

The governor of Homs, the former officer Mustafa Ram Hamdani, told me that Mustafa Hamdoun had once come to him, at the head of his own military unit, and broached with him "putting an end to this Union, dominated as it is by the Egyptians." But Hamdani warned him against committing this sin, one history would never forgive them for.

The Union was then still in its very first months.

Mustafa Ram Hamdani is known for his own honesty and integrity, and proved a rare administrative competence during his time as governor of Homs, remaining a faithful soldier of the founding Union.

Monday the 15th

We spent this evening at the home of the late Dr. Talas, brother-in-law of General Sami al-Hinnawi, leader of the second coup, who in 1949 overthrew Husni al-Za'im, leader of the first coup, that tank-driven episode ending with al-Za'im's own execution, along with that of his prime minister, Dr. Muhsin al-Barazi.

Our hosts told us that General al-Hinnawi had passed by their own home right after his coup succeeded, only to fly into a furious rage when they told him of al-Za'im's and al-Barazi's own execution, threatening to abandon the coup altogether and return home.

These same hosts, Dr. As'ad having passed away only a few months before, told us that al-Hourani had believed al-Hinnawi would achieve union with the Hashemite throne in Baghdad, and so had proposed to him that they cooperate in bringing about this project, with al-Hourani serving as the king's own deputy, As'ad Talas as prime minister, and al-Hinnawi sending an ambassador to whichever state he himself preferred. But he refused to abandon his own brother-in-law.

As'ad Talas, at the time of his brother-in-law's coup, was Secretary-General of the Foreign Ministry (from which Muhsin al-Barazi had removed him, over a personal enmity between the two), but he held real influence over al-Hinnawi, a man known for his own simplicity and good-heartedness.

Tuesday the 16th

At dawn on this very "warm" day, I left Damascus to be present for Abdel Nasser's reception in Aleppo. Along the hundreds of kilometers to it, I watched, with my own eyes, the effects of the drought upon the landscape, filled with the deepest sorrow, for I felt as though the very earth were cracking apart in fury, in dark, sickly shades of yellow. Not a blade of grass, not a drop of water, only a clear sky and a blazing sun.

We were in the middle of February, the very season when the first shoots of new growth should appear, and it is the flocks' own custom, at this time, to strut about in great numbers, their bodies heavy and full. But all I saw along the way were a few scattered sheep, searching for anything to feed on among the rocks and gravel, truly heartbreaking sights.

Meat prices had fallen, for livestock owners could no longer afford to feed their own animals, and so offered them for sale to anyone at all, at whatever price was offered. I was told by more than one person that some peasants simply abandoned their own sheep at the market, when they found no buyer, since they could no longer even afford to bring them back home.

I had lunch at al-Maymas in Homs, at the invitation of a friend of mine whose European wife had passed away, Mr. Omar Fawzi Issa, a fellow student of mine at the Sorbonne, who had left him five children, and he had made himself a solemn promise to be both father and mother to them.

Our own people tend to be wary of European wives, and experience has often confirmed their wariness. But this one was among the rare, virtuous few, and the exception, as they say, only confirms the rule.

Wednesday the 17th

We went out to al-Nayrab Airport to receive the President, joined in this reception by Rushdi al-Kikhya, Nazim al-Qudsi, and Ahmad Qanbar, and our own meeting was a warm one.

Al-Qudsi had by then become chairman of the board of the "Arab World Bank," founded by a joint Syrian-Lebanese-Palestinian business group, and I had played an influential role in his securing this post. The board had come to visit me, sounding out the government's own view of his appointment, and I assured its members the government would be pleased to see a man of such standing and respect at the head of this Arab bank. Once his appointment was decided, he held a reception for them in Dummar and invited me to it, and though the timing did not suit me, since I was tied up discussing the budget in the Council of Ministers, he insisted so firmly on my own attendance that I found myself forced to ask for the ministerial session to be postponed, out of respect for him.

My own attendance carried a special significance, since the Central Bank fell under our own ministry, and the "Arab World Bank" would fall under its supervision as well.

Ahmad Qanbar had likewise become director of the Aleppo Cement Company, and its board, which had come to see me for the very same purpose, was assured that the government firmly supported his own nomination for the post, for he was a strong, honest, and decisive administrator, a reputation he had earned during his repeated terms as Minister of Interior.

With these two great political figures placed at the head of two great economic enterprises, the Union state had gained both their own competence and, perhaps, their own support as well.

What I know of them, and of Rushdi al-Kikhya, is that all three voted for the Union in genuine sincerity. Indeed, Rushdi al-Kikhya, who had submitted his own resignation from the Chamber of Deputies before the Union, one the chamber had never acted upon, attended the session voting on the Union and voted in its favor, joining the national consensus.

It must also be noted that al-Qudsi and Qanbar were themselves in real need of this work, given their own limited financial means, a fact that honors them, and honors us as well, for neither of them opened his own pocket to be stuffed with dollars, pounds, or riyals.

I had also proposed to Rashad Barmada, the fourth brother within the party, that he accept the post of Director General of the Government Cases Department, which had replaced the Ministry of the Treasury's own lawyer. Rashad had been one of these lawyers before this new department was created, and accepted the post with real relief, for he needed the position just as much as the state needed him. In accepting this post, he gave up his own private legal practice entirely.

Such were the men of the People's Party.

At the airport, I ran into Mr. Alaeddine al-Jabiri, brother of the late Majd al-Din al-Jabiri. He had visited me in Damascus, explaining his own dire financial situation after Agrarian Reform had taken his lands, and asked me to stand by him on the Supreme Reform Committee, so that a single village might be kept in his own possession, to live off.

When I brought him the good news, his own happiness knew no bounds.

My own guiding principle in government has always been that an official must never make himself an enemy of his own community, but must instead work to apply the law properly, without stopping short at the strict letter of its own severity, tempering the dry concept of justice with humane touches, ones flexible interpretation so often allows, though never so far as to accept the excuse of the milkman who watered down his milk, claiming instead that he had merely "milked his water" a little.

After a brief reception at the airport, the motorcade made its way to the Doctors' Syndicate building in the al-Aziziyah quarter.

We stood beside the President on the balcony, overlooking an open field the governor had chosen for its capacity to hold the hundreds of thousands of Aleppans who had gathered there to greet the country's own president.

As far as the eye could see, the surging crowd defied description.

The people of Aleppo are known for their own love of Arab unity, and their devotion to their own general principles. Their love is love in full, and their hatred is hatred in full.

And they had, without doubt, loved Abdel Nasser.

They remained loyal to the Union even after collaborators brought it down, proving their own loyalty with the forty martyrs, students and workers, killed by George Mahassel's own tanks in front of the ferry building.

I greeted him with a welcoming address, as the only son of the city in the government, and everything I said in it expressed my own genuine feelings, and still does.

I quoted a few lines from Hafez Ibrahim's own poetry, as follows:

"Whether it traces its lineage to Egypt or to the hills of Syria,

here lies its own nobility, and there its own glory and lineage.

Two pillars of the Arabic tongue, whose lands still beat,

for them, the heart of the crescent moon itself.

Should some calamity befall the Nile Valley,

the towering mountains of Syria would tremble in response.

And should some grieving soul cry out from the heights of the Pyramids,

a mourner in the hills of Aleppo would answer him."

Hafez's own verse, in which I replaced the word "Lebanon" that stands in the original with "Aleppo," to suit the occasion, worked its own magic, like fire through dry brush, and the President stayed as a guest at Hajj Sami Sayem al-Dahr's own "palace" in the Muhafaza quarter.

Thursday the 18th

We attended the inauguration of the new railway line, at the village of al-Wadihi, accompanied by Field Marshal Amer, Minister Ali Sabri, al-Sarraj, Kahhaleh, and others.

Five hundred million lira had been set aside for it, to link Aleppo with Deir ez-Zor, al-Hasakah, and Qamishli to the east, and Idlib and Latakia to the west.

This had long been a dream of ours, to move people and the seasonal produce of the Jazira and the Euphrates region's own farmland to the places where it was consumed, without financial strain, and without spoilage.

The President kept his own promise on it from the previous year, and inaugurated it this year.

Muhammad al-Alem, Minister of Communications, showed great joy at this achievement, expressing it in the welcoming address he gave, honoring the occasion.

Friday the 19th

We prayed the Friday prayer at the Great Umayyad Mosque, built along the model of the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, in comparable circumstances.

I used to visit it often in my own childhood, praying the noon or afternoon prayer there, especially in Ramadan, for it stands at the very center of the city, and on my way to secondary school as a pupil, I would pass in front of it, through the covered markets, before the wide street now ending at the "Turkish" prison gate was ever opened.

Reaching the mosque was, in truth, a real ordeal, given the sheer size of the crowd, though my own arrival was made easier by the fact that the crowd recognized me.

Before we reached the prayer hall, my friend Sheikh Muhammad al-Hakim, Aleppo's own eloquent mufti, asked me what he might say in his sermon that would serve the city's own interest, and I advised him to focus on the subject of "Aleppo University."

He handled the subject brilliantly and eloquently, and did not fail to remind anyone willing to listen that Aleppo province contributed 52 percent of the state's own revenues to its treasury. The President gave me a meaningful look of approval, for I had spoken with him at length on this very subject at his own home some time before.

The preacher reminded the President of Palestine, comparing him to Saladin, and urged him to leave to history what the Ayyubid left it, foremost among his own victories being the liberation of Jerusalem.

I was watching Abdel Nasser's own face, and could sense, as he listened to al-Hakim's own eloquent flow, the full weight of historical responsibility bearing down upon his shoulders.

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Endnotes:

[1] Vol. 3, p. 176.