Bab el-Oued is a neighbourhood in Algiers

Algiers

' is the capital and largest city of Algeria. According to the 1998 census, the population of the city proper was 1,519,570 and that of the urban agglomeration was 2,135,630. In 2009, the population was about 3,500,000...

, the capital of Algeria

Algeria

Algeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria , also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of Northwest Africa with Algiers as its capital.In terms of land area, it is the largest country in Africa and the Arab...

, along the coast north of the city centre.

During the existence of French Algeria

French Algeria

French Algeria lasted from 1830 to 1962, under a variety of governmental systems. From 1848 until independence, the whole Mediterranean region of Algeria was administered as an integral part of France, much like Corsica and Réunion are to this day. The vast arid interior of Algeria, like the rest...

, Bab el-Oued became the main neighbourhood of poor pied-noir

Pied-noir

Pied-Noir , plural Pieds-Noirs, pronounced , is a term referring to French citizens of various origins who lived in French Algeria before independence....

s, including many poor fishermen. Towards the end of the Algerian War of Independence

Algerian War of Independence

The Algerian War was a conflict between France and Algerian independence movements from 1954 to 1962, which led to Algeria's gaining its independence from France...

, the neighbourhood became the stronghold of the Organisation de l'Armee Secrete, until OAS attacks on the French Army led them to assault and purge the neighbourhood. Soon after, Algeria became independent, and the pied noir population fled the country. The neighbourhood was rapidly reoccupied by Muslim Algerians.

The neighbourhood again gained notoriety during the leadup to the Algerian Civil War

Algerian Civil War

The Algerian Civil War was an armed conflict between the Algerian government and various Islamist rebel groups which began in 1991. It is estimated to have cost between 150,000 and 200,000 lives, in a population of about 25,010,000 in 1990 and 31,193,917 in 2000.More than 70 journalists were...

 (which broke out in 1991) as a stronghold of the Islamic Salvation Front

Islamic Salvation Front

The Islamic Salvation Front is an outlawed Islamist political party in Algeria.-Goals:...

, or FIS. Its population in 1998 was 102,200.

Notable residents

• On June 20, 1956, a photographer and journalist named Gaston Tolila was shot in Bab-el-Oued. He worked for the Journal d'Alger and was well liked and respected by friends and colleagues. He was shot by terrorists in the middle of his afternoon coffee.
• Abdul Abdullah Yahia, the leader of the Air France Flight 8969
  Air France Flight 8969
  Air France Flight 8969 was an Air France flight that was hijacked on 24 December 1994 by the Armed Islamic Group at Algiers, where they killed three passengers, with the intention to crash it on the Eiffel tower in Paris. When the aircraft reached Marseille, the GIGN, an intervention group of the...
  
   hijacking that was successfully stopped by the French GIGN.