Faisal Husseini

Faisal Abdel Qader al-Husseini (17 July 1940 – 31 May 2001) was a Palestinian politician of the Jerusalem Husseini family, the leading Palestinian figure in East Jerusalem. He worked for the Palestine Liberation Organization from its founding, founded the Arab Studies Society, and ended his career as the Palestinian Authority's Minister for Jerusalem Affairs. ^{1 2}

He was born in Baghdad, where his father was in exile. He was the son of Abd al-Qadir al-Husayni, commander of the local Arab forces during the 1948 siege of Jerusalem, the grandson of Musa Kazim Pasha al-Husseini, a former mayor of Jerusalem, and a relative of Haj Mohammad Amin al-Husayni, the former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. He studied in Cairo, Baghdad and Damascus, and was a founding member of the General Union of Palestinian Students in 1959. ¹

Husseini went to work for the PLO upon its establishment in Jerusalem, as deputy manager of its Public Organisation Department from 1964 to 1965. He then received military training at the Damascus Military College and joined the Palestinian Liberation Army in 1967. ¹

In 1979 Husseini founded the Arab Studies Society and became its chairman, and he was a member of the National Guidance Committee. In 1982 he became a member of the Supreme Muslim Council in Jerusalem. Israel repeatedly placed him under house and city arrest between 1982 and 1987, and imprisoned him several times between April 1987 and January 1989, while he remained active in the First Intifada. ¹

He subsequently served as a Palestinian spokesperson, head of the Jerusalem National Council, adviser to the Palestinian delegation to the 1991 Madrid Middle East Peace Conference and the talks that followed, head of the Fatah faction in the West Bank, and a Palestinian Authority minister without portfolio. His last post was Minister for Jerusalem Affairs, based in East Jerusalem. ¹

Journalists considered Husseini a pragmatist. He taught himself Hebrew and appeared regularly on Israeli radio and television to present the Palestinian point of view. ¹

Husseini died of a heart attack in Kuwait on 31 May 2001, while trying to mend relations between the Kuwaiti government and the PLO, broken since the 1991 Gulf War. After his death Israeli police seized his headquarters, the Orient House. He was buried in the family tomb in the Khatuniyya in Jerusalem, where his grandfather and father had also been buried. ¹

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