33 Facts About Abdullah Rimawi

Abdullah Rimawi was the head of the Ba'ath Party in Jordan in the 1950s.

Abdullah Rimawi served as Foreign Affairs Minister in Suleiman Nabulsi's government in 1957.

Abdullah Rimawi fled Jordan in 1957 as the result of a crisis between the leftist government he was a part of and the royal family.

Abdullah Rimawi was born in 1920 in the town of Beit Rima, near Ramallah, during the period of British Mandatory rule in Palestine.

Abdullah Rimawi attended primary school in his hometown and secondary school at the Arab College in Jerusalem, graduating in 1937.

Abdullah Rimawi then enrolled at the American University of Beirut where he studied Western political theory and the rise of nationalism in the Asian continent.

Abdullah Rimawi graduated with a BA in mathematics and natural science in 1940.

In 1945, the Arab Higher Committee was reestablished and Abdullah Rimawi was appointed head of its Public Instruction Department.

Abdullah Rimawi was a vocal opponent of the Palestine Partition Plan devised in 1947 which proposed the division of Palestine into two separate Arab and Jewish states.

In January 1948, during the Palestine War, Abdullah Rimawi issued a broadcast from AHC radio dismissing claims by the Haganah that "wealthy Arabs" were fleeing their homes.

Abdullah Rimawi stated many Palestinians were simply leaving to join Arab fighters' camps to train themselves for war.

That same year, Abdullah Rimawi had joined the Holy War Army of Abd al-Qadir al-Husayni in 1948.

Rimawi and Abdullah Na'was founded the social, cultural and political al-Baath newspaper in 1948, although at that time neither officially joined the Ba'ath Party.

Abdullah Rimawi, who was popular in the Ramallah-Jerusalem area of the West Bank, publicly opposed the 1949 Armistice Agreements between Israel and Transjordan.

Abdullah Rimawi initiated his political career in 1950 when he was elected to the Jordanian Parliament as an independent representative of the District of Ramallah.

The party's regional command conference, in which Abdullah Rimawi was selected as the party's secretary-general, was held in 1952.

King Hussein had since succeeded his father Talal who had briefly become king following the assassination of Abdullah I Using his influential relationship among Palestinian circles, Rimawi assisted the Egyptian military attache in Jordan in setting up the country's first Palestinian fedayeen units whose purpose was to perform armed raids on Israeli territory.

Abdullah Rimawi was effective in recruiting party members across Jordan and increasing popular support for the Ba'ath Party's Arab nationalist ideas in cities on both sides of the Jordan River, as well as in parliament.

Abdullah Rimawi was able to retain his parliamentary seat until 1956.

Abdullah Rimawi condemned the censorship which he claimed was intended to protect the position of Glubb Pasha, the British commander of the Jordanian Army whose role in the 1948 War was constantly put under scrutiny by the government.

Abdullah Rimawi was the main force behind al-Nabulsi's efforts to replace the annual British subsidy to Jordan with aid from Arab states.

Abdullah Rimawi, meanwhile, was developing a close relationship with the influential Arab nationalist army chief-of-staff and an ally of the king, Ali Abu Nuwar.

He, Abu Nuwar, and Abdullah Rimawi Na'was were all sentenced to 15 years in absentia.

The plot was foiled when in that same month, Abdullah Rimawi's plans were discovered by Jordanian authorities.

Abdullah Rimawi was a strong supporter of Sarraj and President Nasser while the majority of the party's leadership was becoming increasingly opposed to their policies.

In September 1959, during a general convention of the Ba'ath Party in Beirut, Lebanon, Abdullah Rimawi was dismissed from his post in the party's National Command.

The stated aim of the convention, which Abdullah Rimawi did not attend, was to "purge opportunistic elements" in the party administration.

The BNC accused Abdullah Rimawi of "disrupting" the party and committing other "grave violations," while not reporting for questioning regarding those acts by the BNC.

Abdullah Rimawi was accused of by Jordanian authorities of personal involvement in an assassination attempt against then-Jordanian Prime Minister Hazza' al-Majali in January 1960.

Syria seceded from the UAR in 1961 following an anti-Nasser coup and Abdullah Rimawi moved to Cairo as a result.

Abdullah Rimawi strongly condemned the Ba'athist national command for supporting the secession and together with numerous Syrian and Palestinian party members who defected in protest of the regional command's position and the head of the Iraqi branch Fuad al-Rikabi, they formed a new pro-Nasser gathering called the Socialist Unionists Movement.

In 1971, a year after Nasser's death, Abdullah Rimawi was pardoned by King Hussein and returned to Jordan.

Abdullah Rimawi was one of the last of several former staunch opponents of the monarchy to return from exile between 1961 and 1971.