Abd al-Aziz Ibn Saud
Abd al-Aziz Ibn Saud ruled Saudi Arabia from 1925 to 1953. He unified various tribes from the Red Sea to the Persian Gulf beginning in 1902 and named a new country after himself in 1925. He was the first Monarch of Saudi Arabia and was also known as Ibn Sa'ud.
Abd al-Aziz Ibn Saud was born in Rijadh into the House of Saud, which had historically maintained dominion over interior highlands of Arabia known as Najd. Saud followed his family in exile in Kuwait following the conquest of the family's lands by the Rashidi. The Rashidi were a historic house of the Arabian Peninsula, the most formidable enemies of the House of Saud at the time.
Ibn Saud spent the remainder of his childhood in Kuwait. Abd al-Rahman had a stipend from the Turkish government of 60 Turkish pounds a month and Ibn Saud went on several profitable raids in Najd as he grew into adulthood. He attended the daily Majlis of the Emir of Kuwait, Mubarak al Sabah, from who he learned much about the world.
His family was influenced by and supported the Wahhabi movement, an Islamic movement named after Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahhab. In 1924 ibn Saud conquered Mecca and Medina, taking away the Muslim holy cities from the Hashemite dynasty which had controlled the cities for more than 700 years.
In 1939, Ibn Saud, sent a special envoy, Khalid al-Hud, to meet with Hitler,[1][2][3] (after meeting Ribbentrop[4]), where Hitler stated that one of the reasons Nazi Germany had an interest in the Arabs was because they were "jointly fighting the Jews".[5]
When the Yalta conference ended in 1945, U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt met with Ibn Saud in Egypt. Ibn Saud had only one thing on his mind, Palestine. At this visit, according to President Roosevelt's own account, Roosevelt assured him that "no decision would be taken with regard to the basic situation in that country (Palestine) without full consultation with both Arabs and Jews." He assured Ibn Saud that "I would take no action in my capacity as Chief of the Executive branch of the government, which might prove hostile to the Arab people." [6]
See also
References
- From the Encyclopedia of Eastern History: Biographies
- ↑ 22 Jun 1930. ARAB ENVOY TO HITLER "Good Friends of England"
- ↑ Saudi Arabia Plot With Hitler Revealed — J. Jewish News of Northern California, 3 August 1956
- ↑ Karsh, E. (2010). Palestine Betrayed. United States: Yale University Press. p. 1939 [1]
- ↑ Herf, J. (2009). Nazi Propaganda for the Arab World. United States: Yale University Press, p. 34. [2]
- ↑ Documents on German Foreign Policy, 1918-1945, from the Archives of the German Foreign Ministry. (1956). United States: U.S. Government Printing Office. (No. 541). p.743 [3]
- ↑ New York Times, October 19, 1945.
