1. Pierre Gemayel opposed the French Mandate over Lebanon in the late 1930s and early 1940s, and advocated an independent state, free from foreign control.
14 Facts About Pierre Gemayel
1. 2.
Pierre Gemayel had a career in football in the 1930s, captaining the Lebanon national team as a player.
3.
Pierre Gemayel became the first Lebanese football referee to officiate matches internationally, and was the second president of the Lebanese Football Association, between 1935 and 1939.
4.
Pierre Gemayel was born on 6 November 1905 in Bikfaya, Lebanon into a Maronite family.
5.
On his return to Lebanon from Europe, in 1936 Pierre Gemayel founded Al Kataeb Al Loubnaniyyah party with Georges Naqqache, Charles Helou, Chafic Nassif and Hamid Franjieh, who was later replaced with Emile Yared, modelling the party after the Spanish and Italian Fascist parties he had observed there.
6.
Pierre Gemayel was influenced from the Sokol movement of Czechoslovakia during this visit to the Central Europe after the 1936 Olympic games, and employed the doctrine of this movement while founding the Kataeb party.
7.
In 1958, Pierre Gemayel was appointed deputy to then prime minister Rashid Karami.
8.
Pierre Gemayel reluctantly signed the Cairo Agreement of 1969 under enormous pressure from the international community, which allowed Palestinian guerrillas to set up bases on Lebanese soil, from which to carry out actions against Israel.
9.
Pierre Gemayel was to reverse his position on the Syrian intervention in the Lebanese Civil War of 1975 to 1990.
10.
On 11 October 1978, Pierre Gemayel bitterly denounced the Syrian military presence, and the Lebanese Front joined the Lebanese regular army in a successful "Hundred Days War" against the Syrian army.
11.
Pierre Gemayel saw his younger son, Bachir Pierre Gemayel, elected president of Lebanon on 23 August 1982, only to be assassinated on 14 September, nine days before his scheduled inauguration.
12.
Pierre Gemayel was still in office when he died of a heart attack in Bikfaya on 29 August 1984.
13.
Pierre Gemayel's body was buried next to Bashir Pierre Gemayel's grave in Bikfaya on 30 August 1984.
14.
Pierre Gemayel was married to Genevieve Pierre Gemayel, and they celebrated the 50th anniversary of their marriage in August 1984.