Formation
Initially, the Committee consisted of:
- Amin al-Husayni, president - member of the al-Husayni clan, the former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, president of the Supreme Muslim Council
- Raghib al-Nashashibi - member of the Nashashibi clan, which was considered to be political rivals of the al-Husayni clan, and to hold moderate views when compared to the more militant views of the al-Husayni, member of the National Defence Party
- Jamal al-Husayni - brother of Amin al-Husayni and chairman of the Palestine Arab Party, member of the Supreme Muslim Council
- Yaqub al-Ghusayn - member and representative of the Youth Congress Party, member of the Supreme Muslim Council, deportee
- Abd al-Latif Salah - founder of the National Bloc
- Husayin al-Khalidi - founder and representative of the Reform Party, deportee
- Awni Abd al-Hadi - the leader of the Istiqlal (Independence) Party, who was appointed General Secretary
- Ahmed Hilmi Pasha - treasurer, deportee
On 15 May 1936, the Committee called for nonpayment of taxes, for a general strike of Arab workers and businesses, and demanded an end to Jewish immigration. The strike was called off in October 1936 and the violence abated for about a year while the Peel Commission deliberated and eventually recommended partition of Palestine. With the rejection of this proposal, the revolt resumed during the autumn of 1937.
On 26 September 1937, the Acting British District Commissioner of Galilee, Lewis Yelland Andrews, was assassinated in Nazareth. The next day Britain outlawed the Arab Higher Committee, and began to arrest its members. Amin al-Husayni managed to escape arrest, but was removed from the presidency of the Supreme Muslim Council.
Read more about this topic: Arab Higher Committee
Famous quotes containing the word formation:
“Out of my discomforts, which were small enough, grew one thing for which I have all my life been grateful—the formation of fixed habits of work.”
—Elizabeth Stuart Phelps (1844–1911)
“It is because the body is a machine that education is possible. Education is the formation of habits, a superinducing of an artificial organisation upon the natural organisation of the body.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895)
“... the mass migrations now habitual in our nation are disastrous to the family and to the formation of individual character. It is impossible to create a stable society if something like a third of our people are constantly moving about. We cannot grow fine human beings, any more than we can grow fine trees, if they are constantly torn up by the roots and transplanted ...”
—Agnes E. Meyer (1887–1970)