The Free Yemeni Movement 1935-1962

Table of contents :
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Editor’s Foreword
Personal Interviews by the Author
Abbreviations used in Footnotes
I. The Setting
II. The Emergence of Opposition
III. The Free Yemeni Movement in Aden: 1944-1947
IV. A Change of Imam: The Coup of 1948
V. The Yemeni Union
VI. The 1955 Coup-Attempt and the Politics of the
Yemeni Union
VII. The Yemeni Union and the Politics of Arab
Nationalism: 1956-1962
VIII. Conclusion
Appendices
1. The Constitution of the Grand Yemeni Association
2. The Sacred National Pact
3. The Constitution of the Yemeni Union
4. Our Hopes and Aspirations
5. Imam Ahmad’s Government of 30 August 1955
Selected Bibliography
Topic Index
Name Index

Citation preview

J. Leigh Douglas

The Free Yemeni Movement 1935-1962 Edited by Giovanni Chim ienti Ph D

The American University of Beirut Beirut Lebanon

The Free Yemeni Movement 1935-1962 by: J. Leigh Douglas Published by: The American University of Beirut © Copyright 1987, all rights reserved Printed in Beirut, Lebanon

THE MUTAWAKKIUTE KINGDOM OF YEMEN

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

xm

Editor’s Foreword

xv

Personal Interviews by theAuthor Abbreviations used inFootnotes I. The Setting

xvii

xix 1

The Traditional Economy and Social Structure, 1: The Sayyids, 2; The Tribes, 3; The Qadis, 4; The Merchants, 5; The Religious Structure, 6; The M utawakkilite Kingdom, 9

II. The Emergence of Opposition

23

The Competition for cAsir, 23: Training Missions Abroad, 24; Removal of Sayyids from Court, 28; The Shabäb, 29; The Im pact of the A rab Awakening, 30: Contact with other Arabs, 30; Arab Writings, 31; Early Opposition: H ay ’at al-Ni* ed a 's 'S IS N '5 -g "2 flh- «£ a tu 2s §

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Chapter II

THE EMERGENCE OF OPPOSITION

It was noted above that following the departure of the Turks in 1918 Imam Yahya sought to expand his control into the non-Zaydi areas and that he also sought to extend the boundaries of the Mutawakkilite Kingdom to include all of Greater Yemen: the British Protectorates in the south and the province of cAsir in the north also coveted by Ibn Saud .1 This led to bloody conflicts with both the British and the Saudis which were finally resolved in 1934. In these conflicts the Imam, like all his predecessors, relied on the northern tribes, supplemented by about 4,000 Yemeni auxiliaries who had been part of the former Turkish garrison; a number of former Turkish officers who had elected to remain behind when the Ottoman army left helped train the Imam's army .2

The Competition for cAsir3 Under Ottoman rule cAsir had been governed by the Turks as part of the vilayet (province) of Yemen. Nevertheless it was a divided territory, the northern part having traditionally been ruled by vassals of the Wahhabi rulers of the Najd, and the southern part ruled by Sayyid Muhammad al-ldnsl, who in 1915 became the first Arab ruler 1. ‘Greater Yemen’ is generally assumed to include the whole of southwest Arabia, i.e., the area within the present boundaries of the YAR, the province of cAsir now in Saudi Arabia and the present area of the PDRY, including Aden and the Hadramawt. Some sources also include Oman and a good part of the Empty Quarter, in other words everything ‘to the right’ of the Kacba in Mecca (cf. origin of the word ‘Yemen’ from the Arabic root Y-M-N meaning ‘to the right’). N. Lombardi (‘Divisioni amministrative del Yemen con notizie economic!» e demografiche’) cites a Yemeni publication, c//m alBuldän, published in Sanaa in 1941 describing Yemen as consisting of three parts: Independent Yemen, the Hadramawt and Oman, and cAsir. 2. Wenner, p. SO, gives the figure of 500 auxiliaries from the Hodeida garrison alone. 3. For a more detailed account of the competition for cAsir see Wenner, pp. 142147. 23

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to join the Allies. At the end of the war, the British rewarded al-Idrisi for his loyalty by giving him the Yemeni ports of Hodeida and alLuhayya. In 1920 northern cAsir was occupied by Saudi forces led by Amir Faysal Ibn cAbd al-cAz!z and the area was effectively absorbed into the new Saudi empire. Since his armies were engaged elswhere, Imam Yahya, who claimed both northern cAsir and the ports of Hodeida and al-Luhayya, could do little more than acquiesce to the British and Saudi actions. However when Sayyid Muhammad al-Idrisi died in 1923, the Imam annexed Hodeida and al-Luhayya and the coastal area extending to Midi to his own growing kingdom. Meanwhile Ibn Saud gained nominal control of southern cAsir. In 1933 Imam Yahya sent Yemeni troops into southern cAsir and the oasis of Najran, an important caravan town on the edge of the Empty Quarter and as well disputed by the rulers of the two newly emerging Arabian states. Fighting between the Yemeni and Saudi armies began in November 1933 and continued sporadically until the representatives of the two sides met at Abha in February 1934. The talks broke down when the Imam’s representative, Sayyid cAbdullah al-Wazir, pressed the Yemeni claim to Najran and cAsir. The conflict entered a new phase when in April Ibn Saud issued an ultimatum to the Imam demanding the withdrawal of his forces from both Najran and cAsir and, without waiting for a reply, dispatched one army along the Tihama to take Hodeida, while another took Najran. Within weeks Imam Yahya was obliged to send al-Wazir to a peace conference at T a’if and to accept Saudi demands for the withdrawal of troops as well as Yemeni claims to cAsir and Najran. The Imam had no choice but to accept this humiliating defeat, since he had no desire to see his own young kingdom absorbed into Saudi Arabia .4 Training Missions Abroad Imam Yahya’s defeat in the competition for cAsir had a number of important consequences relevant to the development of the FYM, by far the most important of which was that it forced him to compromise the policy of isolationism — his means of protecting the Zaydi faithful from the evils of foreign influence.5 The Imam, as leader of the Zaydi community, was obliged to maintain armed forces for the purposes of jihad, or Holy War, but the conflict with Saudi Arabia 4. The Treaty of Muslim Friendship and Arab Fraternity which ended the dispute to the advantage of Saudi Arabia was signed at T a 'if on 20 May 1934. 5. Stookey, Yemen, p. 190.

T H E E M E R G E N C E O F O P P O S IT IO N

demonstrated that his army was no match for the better equipped forces of Ibn Saud. Thus starting in 1935 he took advantage of the Treaty of Friendship signed with Iraq in 1931 to send a number of students for training at the Military Academy in Baghdad. All of those sent played roles of varying significance in the FYM, hence this group merits closer attention .6 As can be seen from Table 2, those sent to Baghdad were characterised by their youth, their relatively lowly birth, their urban origin, and by being, for the most part, Zaydis. This group, most in their teens, included many who had received their primary education at Madrasat al-Aytäm (The Orphan’s School); only two came from families of any consequence in Yemeni political life: Ahmad alMarwanl, from a minor sayyid family; and Hasan al-cAmrT, from the family of the Imam’s Prime Minister. None was from a big tribal family and, as far it is possible to tell without detailed biographical information which for the majority of Yemenis is not available, all of those sent were Zaydis with the exception of Muhammad cAbd alWaliyy and Saläm cAbdullah al-Razähl who were Shaficis from Dhubhän in al-Hujariyya.7 Given this composition, it would seem that Yahya was concerned to choose young, Zaydi, non-sayyids of urban origin who would pose no threat to his position. Ingrams’ explanation of the choice of Salläl for inclusion in the mission might well be applied to all of them: “because he was a Zaydi and intelligent, but, above all because he was a blacksmith’s son, neither a tribesman nor a sayyid, and therefore

6. The lists of those sent to Baghdad that have been published thus far are both inaccurate and incomplete. See, for example, A. Sa'Td, Al-Yaman Tärikhuh al-Siyäsiyya Mundhu Istiqläluh, p. 49; A. Sharaf al-Dïn, Al- Yantan cJbr al-Tärikh, pp. 248, 329; Naji, Al-Tarikh, p. 119; Wenner, p. 58, ftn 1; Sayyid Muçfafâ Sälim, Majalla t al-Hikma alYamaniyya wa Ijarakat al-Ifläh fi'l-Yaman 1938-1941, pp. 179-181. The list in Table 2 was compiled with the help of Ahmad al-Marwani, one of those sent to Baghdad (Int [LD]) and Int (LD): cAbdullah Yahya al-Sallal; use was also made of the Display of Yemeni Martyrs, National Museum, Taiz, 1979, and of Ingrams, The Yemen, p. i 19. 7. Salim, Majallat, pp. 414 and 178. The Habshis were originally from the Hadramawt and as they were recent immigrants to Yemen it can be assumed that they were also Shaficis; however there is reason to believe that they were not part of the official mission at all, but arrived in Baghdad six months after the second mission and were placed under the supervision of Zayd cAnan for the sake of convenience (Ibid., p. 179, ftn 1).

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T H E E M E R G E N C E O F O P P O S IT IO N

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at al-Nidal. In 1938 he was summoned to Sanaa by the Imam and asked to join a ‘committee for Yemeni history’ that the Imam was anxious to establish. The exact purpose of the committee is not clear, but the members comprised al-Warith, Sayyid Muhammad ibn Muhammad ibn Yahyä Zabärah, Sayyid Ahmad al-Mutac (leader and president of Hay'at al-Nidal) and Q äd!cAbdullah cAbd al-Kanm al-Jirâfî. The background of the committee members is significant, for, in addition to al-Mutac, two other members were connected with 39. See ‘Shuhadä’ al-mu'ärida ft shimäl al-wafan’, Majallat al-Hikma, (Feb. 1973) pp. 57-38 and M.A. Nu'män, Al-Tarikh al-Äthim,pp. 26-27. Both sources say that he was “imprisoned” in Taiz, but in interview Ahmad Nucman said only that his movements were restricted (Int [LD]). 40. Salim, Majallat, p. 29.

43

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THE EMERGENCE OF OPPOSITION

the reform movement: Both al-Warith and al-Jirafi were mentioned by al-Shami as having been associated with the F atat al-Fulayhi group in Sanaa .41 The Yemeni History Committee was set up under the auspices o f the Ministry of Education and its Minister, Sayf al-Isläm cAbdullah. Shortly after its first meeting, al-Warith and al-Mutac (also an inspector of the press)42 discussed the possibility of starting a magazine in Yemen along the same lines as those published elsewhere in the Middle East. After carefully considering the best way to go about it, it was agreed that al-Warith should approach Sayf'Abdullah, for he, unlike al-Mutac, had not previously been imprisoned by the Imam and, on the contrary, seemed at the time to be in the Imam’s favour. Al-Warith did so, producing copies of magazines published in Cairo and Damascus, and Sayf 'Abdullah agreed to approach his father on the matter. Apart from the fact that in general nothing was possible in Yemen without the Imam’s blessing, his approval was especially necessary in this case since there was only one printing press in Yemen, that which the Imam used for printing al-Iyman. Sayf 'Abdullah was able to persuade the Imam to permit the publication of a new magazine and al-Warith was appointed as its first editor; he, al-Muta' and another founding member of Hay'at al-Nidal, 'Abdullah al-'Azab, comprised the editorial board of the magazine. In terms of style and design, Salim suggests that the Board was influenced by the following Arab periodicals: al-Manär (published by Muhammad 'Abduh and his disciple Rashid Rida); al-Risäla (Ahmad Hasan al-Zayät); al-Fatah (Muhlb al-DIn al-Khatlb); al-Tamaddun al-Islämf (Shakïb Arslan); and al-Hikma al-Bayrütiyya.43 There were two competing interests at work in launching al-Hikma: On the one hand, the shabab, represented by al-Warith, al-Muta' and al-'Azab, wanted a forum for public debate of the major questions o f Islamic reform and the relationship between Islam and encroaching European materialism; these topics were occupying the minds o f liberal Arab thinkers in Egypt and the Levant and might serve as a platform from which to advocate the introduction of reforms in Yemen. On the other hand, Sayf 'Abdullah saw al-Hikma as a means of winning the support of the shabab; this might enhance his position 41. Int (AUB): Ahmad al-Shami, p. 13. 42. Salim, Majallat, p. 45. 43. Ibid., pp. 32, 46.

THE EMERGENCE OF OPPOSITION

vis-à-vis his brothers and the al-Wazir family in the contest then beginning to take shape for the succession to the imamate following Yahya’s death. Salim argues that the Imam was aware of 'Abdullah’s motive and condoned it because he was anxious for all his sons to occupy positions of influence from which they could demonstrate their suitability as rulers and thus fend off the ambitions of rival sayyid families.44 It is significant that the launching of al-Hikma coincided with the replacement of Sayyids cAli and 'Abdullah al-Wazir as the governors of Taiz and Hodeida provinces by Yahya’s sons, Crown Prince Ahmad and Sayf al-Islam 'Abdullah — a clear attempt to thwart rivals and further his dynastic ambitions for the Hamid al-Din family.45 Constraints on Publication A part from the fact that it was printed on the Imam’s press, alHikma suffered from a number of other constraints. First, it was published under the auspices of the Ministry of Education; this, coupled with the fact that it was prepared in the Ministry under the supervision of Sayf al- Islam 'Abdullah and appeared only with his sanction, means that it can only be regarded as an official publication. Second, it relied for its financial support on the Imam’s treasury; it received no money from subscriptions or advertising, and contributors were paid neither for their articles nor their effort in producing the magazine. Third, al-Hikma relied on the Imam for its distribution; it was sent by official messenger with al-Iyman and distributed to such officials and notables as the Imam thought fit to receive it .46 As a result of these constraints, the contributors to al-Hikma could obviously not openly attack the Imam’s regime or demand the introduction of reforms, nor could they discuss internal political developments. Aware of the danger of being forced to be just another journal like al-Iyman, composed of barren news reports and religious articles approved by the Imam, the editors of al-Hikma were obliged to tread carefully. The first issue of al-Hikma appeared in December 1938. Following al-Warith’s death in 1940, Ahmad al-Muta' took 44. Ibid., p. 37. 45. Al-Iyman, 145 (Rajab 1357 AH/Aug. 1938); PRO CO 725/70 78002 PIS 12 (20.8.40) para. 166. 46. Salim, Majallat, pp. 19-21. ‘Subscriptions’ were, however, deducted from the salaries of those officials to whom it was sent. The only person to receive a salary for his work on al-Hikma was Rashid Sinnü, the Lebanese ‘technical advisor’ on al-Iyman {ibid., p. 21).

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over as editor until the summer of 1941 when al-Hikma was forced to close after producing only 28 issues.47 The official explanation was the world paper shortage resulting from the war.48 However, it is more than possible that the Imam used this convenient excuse to silence the only organ voicing opposition, restrained as it was, to his rule. Though impossible to fully gauge the impact of al-Hikma, it was in fact the first ‘political’ magazine in Yemen, even if severely con­ strained by being printed, financed, distributed and supervised by the Imam’s Minister of Education. It would be illusory to think of alHikma as the fount of revolutionary thought in Yemen, as Baraduni suggests,49 but some measure of success may be gathered from the size of the movement it represented. A list of the main contributors— alWarith, al-Mutac, al-cAzab, al-cAnsi— shows that it was the heir to al-Mutac’s earlier Hay'at al-Nidal. Al-Kattba al-Ülä: N ucman and Zubayri in Cairo At the same time as al-Hikma was being published in Sanaa, another centre of opposition to Imam Yahya was developing in Cairo among Yemeni emigres, the most important among these being Ahmad Nucman and Muhammad al-Zubayri. Sayyid cAli Al-Wazir was appointed Governor of Taiz shortly after the withdrawal of the Turks in 1918 and immediately set about breaking up the administrative system that the Turks had used to govern their Sunni co-religionists. Consequently, several of his early moves involved conflicts with various members of the Nucman family.50 Among these was Ahmad, who says that it was around the time of his house arrest in 1936 that he became aware of his ambition to be a leader of his people; in 1937 he left Dhubhan and travelled to Cairo via Lahej and Aden .51

47. Salim states that it is still maintained by those who worked with al-Warith that he was killed by Imam Yahya because of his association with al-Hikma. For the various accounts of his death see Salim, Majallat, pp. 154-158 and al-Shammahi, Al-Yuman, pp. 188-189. 48. PRO FO 371/61439 E457/457/91 AIS 11 (Nov. 1946) para. 383. 49. Baraduni, Rihla, p. 54. 50. Int (LD): Ahmad Nucman. Ahmad’s uncle cAbd al-Wahhab was among those removed. 51. Ibid.

THE EMERGENCE OF OPPOSITION

Ahmad Nucman In going to Cairo it was Nucman’s aim to attend King Fuad I University to receive a ‘modern’ education, but because of his traditional Islamic education, he lacked entry qualifications and was refused admission. He tried to overcome this by going to see Sulayman Hazzim, who had headed the Egyptian mission to alHujariyya in 1936, but to no avail: “He asked me if I had a baccalaureate and I told him that I hadn’t. Then he asked me if I had a secondary school diploma and my answer was the same.’’52 This experience served to further embitter Nucman against the Imam’s regime, since if Yemenis lacked the opportunity of obtaining ‘modern’ qualifications, then how could they ever break out of the traditional system imposed upon them by the Imam's policy of isolationism? Without the appropriate certificates Nucman had no choice but to go to al-Azhar, an institution he was initially reluctant to attend because he felt it would only be a repeat of the education he had already received at Zabid. Once at al-Azhar, however, he was thrown into the mainstream of Arab politics and one of his first contacts there was Muhammad CAR al-Tähir, a Palestinian who had published a succession of newspapers in Cairo since his arrival in 1924; these had been widely circulated in the Arab world.53 Some of these papers had been smuggled into al-Hujariyya by Nucman’s brothers working in Aden, and Nucman had been impressed by the contributions of Shakib Arslan and Amin HusaynT, as well as by Tahir’s own articles criticising the Imam’s policy of isolationism. While studying at alAzhar, Nucman began to work on al-Tahir’s papers and through him was introduced to Amin Husayni and Shakib Arslan.54 Shakib Arslän Shortly after, Nucman was invited to work for Shakib Arslan, a Druze intellectual, an Arab nationalist and a pupil of Muhammad cAbduh. Having served as a Deputy in the Ottoman parliament from 1913 to 1918, he spent most of his time from 1918 until his death in 1946 in Europe, particularly Switzerland, “voicing the claims of Syria and other Arab countries”.55 Arslan was first and foremost an Arab 52. 53. because 54. 55.

Ibid. Al-Skûra, al-Shabäb and al^Alam. Each was in turn closed down by the British of al-Tahir’s anti-British line on Palestine. Int (LD): Ahmad Nucman. Ibid. Hourani, Arab Thought, p. 306.

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nationalist and shared al-Kawakibi’s view that it was the Arabs of the Peninsula who had most to offer the Arabs and Islam, since they had been least corrupted by European encroachment.56 His interest in Yemen began in 1934 when he visited Sanaa and Jedda in an attempt to mediate in the Saudi/Yemeni border war. Appalled at the backwardness of Yemen, he persuaded Imam Yahya to employ a number of Lebanese (all from Arslan’s Druze community) as advisors in his administration. It was partly in order to help Yemen that he also recruited Ahmad Nucman as his secretary.57 Ahmad Nucman worked as secretary to Shakib Arslan from shortly before the outbreak of World War II in 1939 until mid-1940 when he decided to return to Switzerland and asked Nucman to accompany him. Nucman, keen to go, discovered that, as with his educational certificates, his travel documents were inadequate, and the Swiss Embassy in Cairo refused him a visa.58 A few months after this disappointment Nucman left Cairo, arriving in Aden the last week of February 1941.59 Yemenis in Cairo Despite not having been admitted to King Fuad I University, Ahmad Nucman’s three years in Cairo were far from wasted. From being an unknown teacher in a remote village in distant Yemen, he was catapulted into the very centre of Arab politics and thought in Cairo through his association with Shakib Arslan and numerous Egyptian and Palestinian journalists. During this period Ahmad Nucman was not the only Yemeni in Cairo; when he left Yemen in 1937 he was accompanied by Muhi alDin al-cAnsi, whom we have already encountered in connection with his membership of Hay'at al-Nidal, his leadership of the first military mission to Baghdad and his participation in Majallat al-Hikma alYamaniyya. Soon after his return from Baghdad in early 1937 he had been arrested by the Imam, along with several other members of the mission, in the belief that a short term in prison would frighten him into being loyal. However rather than forcing al-cAnsi into being

56. Ibid., p. 300. 57. Int (LD): Najib Abu cIzz al-Din. 58. Int (AUB): Ahmad Nu'man p. 23. It is not known why Nu'm an’s passport was inadequate, but it is possible that the Imam had restricted it to travel to a particular destination, in this case Egypt. 59. RA. 231 (1.1.41) p. 26; PRO CO 725/77 78002/1941 PIS 10 (31.3.41) para. 384.

THE EMERGENCE OF OPPOSITION

loyal, his imprisonment only encouraged him to leave Yemen for Cairo where he and Nucman were joined by another former member of the military mission to Baghdad, Ahmad Hasan al-Hawrash.60 Other Yemenis in Cairo in the late 1930s included Muhammad CA1I alAhdal (from the Tihama), Muhammad Çâlih al-Masmarî (Yarlm) and Yahyä Ahmad Zabärah (Sanaa); in addition to these Yemenis from the north, there were a few from Aden and the Aden Protectorates: Ahmad cAbd al-Rahmän al-Jifn (Lahej), his cousin Muhammad CA1T al-Jifn (Lahej), Sayyid Sälim al-$äfi (Hadramawt) and CA1T Muham­ mad Luqman (Aden). While most were studying at al-Azhar or Dar al-cUlüm, Luqman was studying at the American University in Cairo.61 Being from a distant and relatively unknown part of the Arab world, these Yemenis rapidly attracted the attention and curiosity of prominent individuals and movements. The Yemenis from the northern Kingdom in particular were regarded as 'curiosities', since their lack of knowledge of the modern world contrasted sharply with the pro-European inclinations of Egyptian political and intellectual circles. On the other hand, their traditional Islamic education and their extensive knowledge of Arabic literature and poetry earned them great respect, especially from those like Shakib Arslan who shared alKawakibi’s view that only the Arabs of the Peninsula could be the saviours of Islam. Most of the Egyptians and Arabs that the Yemenis met were generally unaware of the backwardness of Yemen, of the Imam's ‘medieval’ regime and of his policy of keeping out everything ‘Western’, things that the Egyptians in particular had learned to value. Consequently, the Yemenis began writing articles for magazines and newspapers with the aim of informing other Arab peoples about Yemen and the plight of the Yemeni people. If the attention of the Arabs could be directed towards Yemen, criticism of the Imam’s regime by fellow Arabs might encourage him to introduce reforms.62 As well as contributing to al-Tahir’s newspaper, al-cAlam, they also wrote for al-Räbita al-cArabiyya and its sister paper, al-Sadäqa, both

60. Int (LD): Ahmad Nucman. Other students from Baghdad were also arrested lest they begin spreading the ‘foreign ideas’ the Imam feared them to have acquired. 61. Int (LD): cAli Muhammd Luqman. 62. Int (LD): Ahmad Nucman.

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owned and edited from 1939 onwards by cAbd al-Ghanï al-Rifacî, a Syrian raised in Yemen.63 While N ucman produced articles for al-cAlam, he also wrote pamphlets, including The First Moan (1938) and A Few Words on the Outrages o f cAli al-Wazir (1939), and the introduction to a book by Sayyid Husàyn al-Yamanï, The Journey o f H H Prince S a yf al-Islam the Great Crown Prince o f Yemen, published in 1937.64 A number of his articles were also published in the Aden weekly newspaper, Fatät al-Jazîra. Both pamphlets resulted from Ahmad N u'm an’s treatment at the hands of Sayyid cAli al-Wazir, the Governor of Taiz Province, a subject dealt with more fully below; like all Nucman’s writings, they were critical of the nature of government in Yemen, and they constitute the first attack on the Imam’s regime by a Yemeni. Meanwhile there had been a number of changes within Yemen; among the most important was the dismissal by Imam Yahya in August 1938 of those members of the al-Wazir family who held important government posts and their replacement by his sons. Sayyid cAbdullah al-Wazir was replaced by Sayf al-Islam 'Abdullah in Hodeida, and Sayyid cAli al-Wazir, the Governor of Taiz, was replaced by Sayf al-Islam Ahmad, the Crown Prince, with whom N u'm an had been corresponding since 1934 and to whom he had addressed The First Moan.65 (The effect of these moves on the Free 63. According to the catalogue at Dar al-Kutub in Cairo, al-Rabita al-^Arabiyya was originally published as a weekly political magazine by Amin Sa