Pierre Gemayel

Pierre Gemayel

Sheikh Pierre Gemayel (Arabic: الشيخ بيار الجميّل‎) (6 November 1905 – 29 August 1984) (last name also spelt Jmayyel, Jemayyel or al-Jumayyil, Sheikh is an honorific title in Arab countries), was a Lebanese political leader. He is remembered as the founder of the Kataeb Party (also known as the Phalangist Party), as a parliamentary powerbroker, and as the father of Bachir Gemayel and Amine Gemayel, both of whom were elected to the Presidency of the Republic in his lifetime. He opposed the French Mandate over Lebanon in the late 1930s and early 1940s, and advocated an independent state, free from foreign control. He was known for his deft political maneuvering, which led him to take positions which were seen by supporters as pragmatic, but by opponents as contradictory, or even hypocritical. Although publicly sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, he later changed his position due to Palestinian support of the Lebanese National Movement and its calls to end the National Pact and establish non-sectarian democracy.