Fahd bin Abdulaziz Al Saud فهد بن عبد العزيز آل سعود
King of Saudi Arabia Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Prime Minister of Saudi Arabia
King of Saudi Arabia
Reign	13 June 1982 - 1 August 2005
Predecessor	Khalid
Successor	Abdullah
Regent	Abdullah (21 February 1996 – 1 August 2005)
1st Minister of Education
In Office	1953–1962
Successor	Abdulaziz bin Mohammad Al al-Shaikh
6th Minister of Interior
In Office	1962–1975
Predecessor	Faisal ibn Turki I Al Saud
Successor	Naif bin Abdulaziz Al Saud
Issue
Faisal bin Fahd, Sultan bin Fahd Muhammad bin Fahd, Saud bin Fahd Khaled bin Fahd, Abdul-Aziz bin Fahd
House	House of Saud
Father	Abdul-Aziz
Mother	Hessa Bint Ahmed AlSudairy
Born	16 March 1920 Riyadh, Kingdom of Hejaz
Died	1 August 2005(2005-08-01) (aged 85) King Faisal Hospital, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Burial	1 August 2005 Al Oud, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Fahd bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, (Arabic: فهد بن عبد العزيز آل سعود‎ Fahd ibn ‘Abd al-‘Azīz Āl Su‘ūd) (16 March 1920 – 1 August 2005) was King of Saudi Arabia from 1982 to 2005.

King Fahd is the eighth son of Ibn Saud ^[1] and is the fifth king of Saudi Arabia. Fahd ascended to the throne on the death of his half-brother, King Khalid, on 13 June 1982. He was a member of Sudairi Seven. In fact, he was the eldest of Sudairi Brothers.

Fahd was appointed Crown Prince when Khalid succeeded their half-brother King Faisal, who was assassinated in 1975. Fahd was viewed as the de facto prime minister during King Khalid's reign in part due to the latter's ill health.

Fahd suffered a debilitating stroke on 29 November 1995, after which he was unable to continue performing his full official duties. His half-brother, Abdullah, then-Crown Prince, served as de facto regent of the kingdom and succeeded Fahd as monarch upon his death on 1 August 2005.

King Fahd is credited for having introduced the Basic Law of Saudi Arabia in 1992.

Early life[link]

At the age of 11 in 1932, Fahd watched as his father officially founded the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia by signing the Treaty of Jeddah.

Fahd's education took place at the Princes' School in Riyadh, a school established by Ibn Saud specifically for the education of members of the House of Saud. While at the Princes' School, Fahd studied under tutors including Sheikh Abdul-Ghani Khayat.

In 1945 Fahd travelled on his first state visit to New York City to attend the opening session of the General Assembly of the United Nations. On this trip Fahd served under his brother, King Faisal, who was at the time Saudi Arabia's foreign minister.

Early political positions[link]

In 1953, at the age of 32, Fahd was appointed Education Minister by his father. Also in 1953, Fahd led his first official state visit, attending the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II on behalf of the House of Saud.

Fahd had two brothers born before him, Nasser and Saad, who had prior claims to the throne but both were considered unsuitable candidates. By contrast, Fahd had served as minister of education from 1953 to 1960 and minister of interior from 1962 to 1968.

Fahd led the Saudi delegation to the League of Arab States in 1959, signifying his increasing prominence in the House of Saud — and that he was being groomed for a more significant role.

In 1962, Fahd was given the important post of Interior Minister and six years later, he was the first person appointed to the position of Second Deputy Prime Minister. After the death of King Faisal in 1975, Fahd was named first deputy Prime Minister and concurrently Crown Prince.

Family and progeny[link]

King Fahd was married at least four times. He had six sons and three daughters. His sons were:

• Faisal bin Fahd bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud (1946–1999) Died of a heart attack. Director-general of Youth Welfare (1971–99), Director-general at Ministry of Planning and Minister of State (1977–1999).
• Khalid bin Fahd (born 1947).
• Muhammad bin Fahd bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud (born 1950), governor of the Eastern province.
• Saud bin Fahd (born 1950), former deputy president of the General Intelligence Directorate
• Sultan bin Fahd (born 1951), Army Officer. Elevated to ministerial rank in November 1997. Former head of Youth Welfare.
• Abdul-Aziz bin Fahd bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, (born 1971), Fahd's favorite and youngest son and minister of state without portfolio. He is the son of Princess Jawhara al-Ibrahim, Fahd's fourth and, reportedly, favorite wife.^[2]

Reign[link]

King Fahd gave money for building mosques throughout the world. The Ibrahim-Al-Ibrahim Mosque, at Europa Point, Gibraltar, which opened in 1997, is one such mosque.

On 25 March 1975, King Faisal was assassinated by his nephew and King Khalid assumed power. Fahd, as next in the line of succession, became Crown Prince and First Deputy Prime Minister. Especially in the later years of King Khalid's reign, Fahd was viewed as the de facto prime minister. When King Khalid died on 13 June 1982, Fahd succeeded to the throne. He adopted the title "Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques" in 1986, replacing "His Majesty", to signify an Islamic rather than secular authority.

Foreign policy[link]

Fahd was a supporter of the United Nations. He supported foreign aid and had given 5.5% of Saudi Arabia's national income through various funds especially the Saudi Fund for Development and the OPEC Fund for International Development. He had also given aid to foreign groups such as the Bosnian Muslims in the Yugoslav Wars, as well as the Nicaraguan Contras, providing "a million dollars per month from May to December 1984."^[3] King Fahd had also been a strong supporter of the Palestinian cause and an opponent of the State of Israel.^[4] Fahd was staunch ally of the United States, and once said "After Allah, we can count on the United States." [1]

Grand Mosque Seizure, Iran, and Islamic education[link]

The 1979 Revolution in Iran radically transformed the political landscape in the Middle East, as the hereditary monarchy of the Shah of Iran was deposed in favor of a Shi'a theocracy. In the same year, anti-monarchist dissidents in Saudi Arabia seized the Grand Mosque in Mecca, and accused the Saudi royal family of being insufficiently Islamic and so unfit to rule the Kingdom. Fearing that the 1979 Revolution in Iran could lead to similar Islamic upheaval in Saudi Arabia, Fahd spent considerable sums after ascending the throne in 1982 to support Saddam Hussein's Iraq in its war with Iran.^[5] He also changed his royal title to "custodian of the two holy mosques", and took steps to support the conservative Saudi religious establishment, including spending millions of dollars on religious education, further distancing himself from his inconvenient past.^[6]

Recreational activities[link]

At the same time as King Fahd presided over a more strict Islamic policy at home he was known to enjoy luxurious living abroad, even in ways that would not be allowed in his own kingdom. He visited the ports of the French Riviera, in his 147-metre (482 ft) yacht, the $100 million Abdul Aziz. The ship featured two swimming pools, a ballroom, a gym, a theater, a portable garden, a hospital with an intensive-care unit and two operating rooms, and four American Stinger missiles.^[7] The king also had a personal $150 million Boeing 747 jet, equipped with his own fountain. In his visits to London he reportedly lost millions of dollars in the casinos and even was known to circumvent the curfew imposed by British gaming laws by hiring his own blackjack and roulette dealers to continue gambling through the night in his hotel suite.^[8]

Persian Gulf War, 1991[link]

In 1991, Iraqi forces under Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, placing the Iraqi army (then the largest in the Middle East) on the Saudi-Kuwaiti border. King Fahd agreed to host American-led coalition troops in his Kingdom, and later allowed American troops to be based there. This decision brought him considerable criticism and opposition from many Saudi citizens, who objected to the presence of foreign troops on Saudi soil; this is a casus belli against the Saudi royal family prominently cited by Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda.

Reform and industrialization[link]

In regards to reform, King Fahd showed little tolerance for reformists. In 1992, a group of reformists and prominent Saudi intellectuals petitioned King Fahd for wide ranging reforms, including widening political representation, and curbing the royal family's wasteful spending. King Fahd first responded by ignoring their requests and when they persisted, reformists were harshly persecuted, imprisoned and fired from their jobs.

During King Fahd's rule, the royal family's lavish spending of the country's wealth reached its height. In addition, the biggest and most controversial military contracts of the century, the Al-Yamamah arms deal was signed under his watch.^[9] The contract has cost the Saudi treasury more than $90 billion. These funds were originally allocated to building hospitals, schools, universities and roads. As a result, Saudi Arabia has endured a stagnation in infrastructure development from 1986 till 1999 when the new King, Abdullah, fully came into power.

Like all the countries overlooking the Persian Gulf, Saudi Arabia under King Fahd has focused its industrial development on hydrocarbon installations. Up to this day, the country is reliant on imports for nearly all its light and heavy machinery.

Rule after the 1995 stroke[link]

King Fahd was a heavy smoker, overweight for much of his adult life, and in his sixties began to suffer from arthritis and severe diabetes.^[10] He suffered a debilitating stroke in 1995 and became noticeably frail, and decided to delegate the running of the Kingdom to Crown Prince Abdullah. On 21 February 1996, he reassumed official duties.

After his stroke King Fahd was partly inactive, though he still attended meetings and received selected visitors. In November 2003, according to government media, King Fahd was quoted as saying to "strike with an iron fist" at terrorists after deadly bombings, although he could hardly utter a word because of his debilitating stroke and deteriorating health. However, it is Crown Prince Abdullah who took official trips; when King Fahd traveled it was for vacations, and he was sometimes absent from Saudi Arabia for months at a time. When his oldest son and International Olympic Committee member Prince Faisal bin Fahd died in 1999, the King was in Spain and did not return for the funeral.^[11]

In a speech to an Islamic conference on 30 August 2003, King Fahd condemned terrorism and exhorted Muslim clerics to emphasize peace, security, cooperation, justice, and tolerance in their sermons.^[12]

Awards[link]

King Fahd was awarded with Azerbaijani Istiglal Order for his contributions to development of Azerbaijan-Saudi Arabia relations and strategic cooperation between the states by President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev on 7 March 2005.^[13]

Death[link]

King Fahd was admitted to the King Faisal Specialist Hospital in the capital, Riyadh on 27 May 2005 for unspecified medical tests. An official (who insisted on anonymity) told the Associated Press unofficially that the king had died at 7:30 EDT on 1 August 2005. A member of the cabinet publicly announced his death on Saudi TV the same morning, and said that he died of pneumonia and a high fever.

Funeral[link]

He was buried in the last thawab (traditional Arab robe) he wore. Fahd’s body was carried to Imam Turki bin Abdullah Mosque, and funeral prayers were held at around 3:30 local time (12:30 GMT). The prayers for the late monarch were led by the Kingdom’s grand mufti, Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al Sheikh.

The "funeral prayer", during which mourners remain standing, was recited after afternoon prayers. The ceremony was replicated in other mosques across the Kingdom, where the "prayers for the absentee" were held.

The body was carried by King Fahd's son, Abdul Aziz bin Fahd, to the mosque and to the Al-Oud cemetery some two kilometers away, a public cemetery where Fahd’s four predecessors and other members of the Al Saud ruling family are buried.

Arab and Muslim dignitaries who attended the funeral were not present at the burial. Only ruling family members and Saudi citizens were on hand as the body was lowered into the grave.

Muslim leaders offered condolences at the mosque, while other foreign dignitaries and leaders who came after the funeral paid their respects at the royal court.

According to the regulations and social traditions, Saudi Arabia did not declare a national mourning period. Also, all government offices and public buildings were open as usual and the state flag was not lowered (since the flag of Saudi Arabia bears the Shahada, the Islamic declaration of faith, the flag's protocol requires the flag not to be lowered)

After his death, many countries declared mourning periods. Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Syria, Yemen, the Arab League in Cairo, and the Palestinian Authority all declared three-day mourning periods. Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates declared a seven-day mourning period and ordered all flags flown at half-staff. In Jordan, a national three-day mourning period was declared and a 40-day mourning period was decreed at the Royal Court.

Many foreign dignitaries attended the funeral, such as Vice President Dick Cheney, President Jacques Chirac. King Juan Carlos, Prince Charles, President Pervez Musharraf, King Abdullah II, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and the Singapore Senior Minister, SM Goh Chok Tong, Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya.

Wealth[link]

His wealth was estimated to be at $25 billion.^[14]

Wives[link]

• Janan Harb Al Saud (Widowed)^[15]
• HH Princess Al Anood bint Abdulaziz Bin Mousad al Saud (Deceased), mother of Prince Faisal bin Fahd
• HH Princess Al Joharah bint Ibrahim al Ibrahim, mother of Prince Abdulaziz bin Fahd
• HH Princess Joza'a bint Abdullah bin Abdulrahman al Saud
• HH Princess Al Joharah bint Abdullah al Sudairi (Deceased)
• HH Princess Modhi bint Turki bin Abdullah al Saud (Divorced)
• HH Princess Joza'a bint Sultan al Adgham al Subaie (Divorced)
• HH Princess Turfa bint Abdulaziz bin Mo'amar (Divorced)
• HH Princess Watfa bint Obaid bin Ali al Jabr al Rasheed (Divorced)
• HH Princess Lolwa al Abdulrahman al Muhana Aba al Khail (Divorced)
• HH Princess Shaikha bint Turki bin Mariq al Thit (Divorced)
• HH Princess Seeta bint Ghunaim bin Sunaitan Abu Thnain (Divorced)

See also[link]

	Saudi Arabia portal
	Biography portal

• King Fahd International Airport
• King Fahd Causeway
• King Fahd University for Petroleum and Minerals
• Malek Fahd Islamic School
• King Faisal University
• King Fahd Islamic Cultural Center

Soccer tournaments[link]

• FIFA Confederations Cup (former King Fahd Cup)
• King Fahd Cup 1992
• King Fahd Cup 1995

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Fahd of Saudi Arabia

• King Fahd Tribute Page
• Twenty Years of King Fahd from ArabNews.
• Saudi King Fahd is laid to rest (BBC News, 2 August 2005)
• Obituaries
  • [2] (BBC News, 1 August 2005)
  • [3] (The Times, 2 August 2005)
• International editorial reaction to Fahd's death
  • Late Saudi King Fahd Modernized Kingdom
• Saudi-American Forum, 16 January 2004

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Rifaat Ali al-Assad رفعت عالي الأسد
Rifaat and Hafez al-Assad
Vice President of Syria
In office 1984–1998
President	Hafez al-Assad
Personal details
Born	(1937-08-22) 22 August 1937 (age 74) Qardaha District, Syria[1]
Political party	Baath Party
Religion	Alawite
Military service
Allegiance	Syria
Service/branch	Syrian Army
Years of service	1970 - 1984
Commands	Defense Companies
Battles/wars	1970 Syrian Corrective Revolution Islamic uprising in Syria Hama massacre

Rifaat Ali al-Assad (Arabic: رفعت عالي الأسد‎; born 22 August 1937) is the younger brother of the former President of Syria, Hafez al-Assad, and the uncle of the incumbent President Bashar al-Assad, all of whom come from the minority Alawite Muslim sect. He was born in the village of Qardaha, near Lattakia in western Syria. He is perhaps best known for allegedly personally overseeing the Hama massacre of 1982.^[2]

Under Hafez's rule[link]

He played a key role in his brother's takeover of executive power in 1970, dubbed the Corrective Revolution, and ran the elite internal security forces and the Defense Companies (Saraya al-Difaa) in the 1970s and early 1980s.^[3][4] He had a pivotal role throughout the 1970s and, until 1984, many saw him as the likely successor to his elder brother.

In February 1982, as commanding general of the Syrian Army, he allegedly commanded the forces that put down a Muslim Brotherhood revolt in the central city of Hama, by instructing his forces to shell the city, killing thousands of its inhabitants (reports range from between 5,000 and 40,000,^[5] the most common suggestion being around 15-20,000). This became known as the Hama Massacre.^[5] The United States journalist Thomas Friedman claims in his book From Beirut to Jerusalem that Rifaat later said that the total number of victims was 38,000.^[6][5] Rifaat has denied having a leading role in the Hama massacre.^[3]

Attempted coup d'état[link]

When Hafez al-Assad suffered from heart problems in 1983, he established a six-member committee to run the country. Rifaat was not included, and the council consisted entirely of close Sunni Muslim loyalists to Hafez, who were mostly lightweights in the military-security establishment. This caused unease in the Alawi-dominated officer corps, and several high-ranking officers began rallying around Rifaat, while others remained loyal to Hafez's instructions. Rifaat's troops, now numbering more than 55,000 with tanks, artillery, aircraft and helicopters, began asserting control over Damascus, putting up posters of him; he was clearly launching a bid to succeed his brother. Tensions between forces loyal to Hafez and those loyal to Rifaat were extreme, but by early 1984 Hafez had returned from his sick bed and assumed full control, at which point most officers rallied around him. In what at first seemed a compromise, Rifaat was made vice-president with responsibility for security affairs, but this proved a wholly nominal post. Command of the 'Defense Companies' was transferred to another officer, and Rifaat was then sent abroad on "an open-ended working visit". His closest supporters and others who had failed to prove their loyalty to Hafez were purged from the army and Baath Party in the years that followed.

During the 1990s[link]

Although he returned for his mother's funeral in 1992, and for some time lived in Syria, Rifaat was thereafter confined to exile in France and Spain. He nominally retained the post of vice president until 1998, when he was stripped of this. He had retained a large business empire both in Syria and abroad, partly through his son Sumer. However, the 1999 crackdown, involving armed clashes in Lattakia, destroyed much of his remaining network in Syria; large numbers of Rifaat's supporters were arrested. This was seen as tied to the issue of succession, with Rifaat having begun to position himself to succeed the ailing Hafez, who in his turn sought to eliminate all potential competition for his designated successor, his son Bashar al-Assad.

In France, Rifaat has loudly protested the succession of Bashar to the post of president, claiming that he himself embodies the "only constitutional legality" (as vice president, alleging his dismissal was unconstitutional). He has made threatening remarks about planning to return to Syria at a time of his choosing to assume "his responsibilities and fulfill the will of the people", and that while he will rule benevolently and democratically, he will do so with "the power of the people and the army" behind him.

Groups and organizations[link]

Rifaat's son Sumer is the head of a minor pan-Arab TV channel, the Arab News Network (ANN), which functions as his father's political mouthpiece. He also claims to run a political party, of uncertain fortunes. Rifaat himself heads the United National Group (al-tajammu` al-qawmi al-muwahhid), which is another political party or alliance; it is known to have self-professed members among Rifaat's fellow exiles from Syria, but neither can be considered an active organization, even if they will regularly release statements in favor of Rifaat's return to Syria and protesting president Bashar al-Assad. Further, Rifaat founded the Arab Democratic Party in Lebanon in the early 1970s, a small Alawite sectarian/political group in Lebanon, which during the Lebanese Civil War acted as an armed militia loyal to the Syrian regime (through Rifaat).^[7] Ali Eid the general secretary of the party today, supports the Syrian president Bashar Al-Assad.

Foreign support for Rifaat[link]

Numerous rumors tie Rifaat al-Assad to various foreign interests.

Rifaat is considered close, by some observers, to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. Abdullah is married to a sister of Rifaat's wife, and Rifaat has on occasions—even after his public estrangement from the rulers in Syria—been invited to Saudi Arabia, with pictures of him and the royal family displayed in the state-controlled press.

It is claimed that Rifaat is reputed to have turned even to Israel asking for assistance, and that he has initiated contacts with exiled representatives of the Muslim Brotherhood.^{[citation needed]} After the Iraq war, there were press reports that he had started talks with US government representatives on helping to form a coalition with other anti-Assad groups to provide an alternative Syrian leadership, on the model of the Iraqi National Congress. Rifaat has held a meeting with the former Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi. Yossef Bodansky, the director of the US Congressional Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare, has stated that Rifaat enjoys support from both America and Saudi Arabia; he has been featured in the Saudi press as visiting the royal family in 2007. The Bashar regime remains wary of his intentions and carefully monitors his activities.

Rifaat was mentioned by the influential American think tank Stratfor as a possible suspect for the 2005 bombing that killed Lebanese ex-prime minister Rafiq Hariri and the string of attacks that has struck Beirut after the subsequent Syrian withdrawal. The goal would be to destabilize the Syrian regime. However, there has been no mention of Rifaat in the United Nations Mehlis reports on the crime.

In 2010, Rifaat was living in Mayfair, London.^[8][5] As of 2011^[update] he is living in Avenue Foch, Paris,^[9] while trying to sell off his real estate properties.^[10]

See also[link]

• Assad family

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Thomas L. Friedman (2012 (Revised Edition)). "4. Hama Rules". From Beirut to Jerusalem. Picador. ISBN 978-1250015495.