Salah al-Din al-Bitar
Encyclopedia
Salah ad-Din al-Bitar (born Damascus
Damascus
Damascus , commonly known in Syria as Al Sham , and as the City of Jasmine , is the capital and the second largest city of Syria after Aleppo, both are part of the country's 14 governorates. In addition to being one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, Damascus is a major...

 1912, died Paris 21 July 1980), was a Syrian
Demographics of Syria
Syrians today are an overall indigenous Levantine people. While modern-day Syrians are commonly described as Arabs by virtue of their modern-day language and bonds to Arab culture and history...

 politician who, with Michel Aflaq
Michel Aflaq
Michel Aflaq was a Syrian philosopher, who is credited with being the ideological founder of ba'athism, a hybrid of Arab nationalism and Arab socialism.-Early life:...

, founded the Arab Ba'th Party in the early 1940s. During their student days in Paris in the early 1930s, the two worked together to formulate a doctrine that combined aspects of nationalism
Nationalism
Nationalism is a political ideology that involves a strong identification of a group of individuals with a political entity defined in national terms, i.e. a nation. In the 'modernist' image of the nation, it is nationalism that creates national identity. There are various definitions for what...

 and socialism
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...

. Al-Bitar later served as prime minister in several early Ba'thist governments in Syria, but became alienated from the party as it grew more radical, and in 1966 fled the country. He lived most of the rest of his life in Europe, and remained politically active until he was assassinated by unknown persons in 1980.

Origins and youth

Historian Hanna Batatu
Hanna Batatu
Hanna Batatu was a Palestinian American Marxist historian specialising in the history of Iraq and the modern Arab east. His work on Iraq is widely considered the pre-eminent study of modern Iraqi history.Born in Jerusalem in 1926, Hanna Batatu emigrated to the United States in 1948, the year of...

 records that Salah ad-Din al-Bitar was born in the Midan area of Damascus
Damascus
Damascus , commonly known in Syria as Al Sham , and as the City of Jasmine , is the capital and the second largest city of Syria after Aleppo, both are part of the country's 14 governorates. In addition to being one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, Damascus is a major...

 in 1912, the son of a reasonably well-off Sunni Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...

 grain merchant. His family were religious and many of his recent ancestors had been ulama
Ulema
Ulama , also spelt ulema, refers to the educated class of Muslim legal scholars engaged in the several fields of Islamic studies. They are best known as the arbiters of shari‘a law...

 and preachers in the district's mosque
Mosque
A mosque is a place of worship for followers of Islam. The word is likely to have entered the English language through French , from Portuguese , from Spanish , and from Berber , ultimately originating in — . The Arabic word masjid literally means a place of prostration...

s. Al-Bitar thus grew up in a conservative family atmosphere, and attended a Muslim elementary school before receiving his secondary education in Maktab Anbar
Maktab Anbar
Maktab Anbar is an old house in the center of Old Damascus near the Umayyad Mosque and a short distance from the Street Called Straight. The house was built as a private residence by a local Jewish notable Mr. Anbar in the mid 19th century...

. He was also exposed to the political vicissitudes of the time, as Midan played a leading role in the Great Syrian Revolution of 1925 against the French, who were then the mandatory
League of Nations mandate
A League of Nations mandate was a legal status for certain territories transferred from the control of one country to another following World War I, or the legal instruments that contained the internationally agreed-upon terms for administering the territory on behalf of the League...

 power in Syria. The district was heavily bombarded with considerable loss of life and physical damage.

Higher education

Al-Bitar traveled to France in 1929 to study in the Sorbonne
University of Paris
The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...

. There he became acquainted with Michel Aflaq, like him the son of a Midan grain merchant, albeit from a Christian Orthodox family. The two were greatly interested in the political and intellectual movements of the time, and began applying the nationalist and Marxist thought they encountered to the situation of their homeland. Al-Bitar returned to Syria in 1934, and took up an appointment teaching physics
Physics
Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...

 and mathematics
Mathematics
Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...

 at the Tajhiz al-Ula, where Aflaq was already a teacher.

Early political activity

In the course of the next two years, al-Bitar and Aflaq along with some other associates edited for a period a review entitled al-Tali`a (the vanguard). According to historian Hanna Batatu
Hanna Batatu
Hanna Batatu was a Palestinian American Marxist historian specialising in the history of Iraq and the modern Arab east. His work on Iraq is widely considered the pre-eminent study of modern Iraqi history.Born in Jerusalem in 1926, Hanna Batatu emigrated to the United States in 1948, the year of...

, this displayed more concern with social issues than with the national question, and the political orientation of the two young activists was closer to the Syrian Communist Party
Syrian Communist Party
The Syrian Communist Party was a political party in Syria, founded in 1944. It became a member of the National Progressive Front in 1972...

 than to any of the other groups on the political scene in Damascus. They would become disillusioned with the Communists in 1936, after the Popular Front
Popular Front (France)
The Popular Front was an alliance of left-wing movements, including the French Communist Party , the French Section of the Workers' International and the Radical and Socialist Party, during the interwar period...

 government came to power in France; although the French Communist Party
French Communist Party
The French Communist Party is a political party in France which advocates the principles of communism.Although its electoral support has declined in recent decades, the PCF retains a large membership, behind only that of the Union for a Popular Movement , and considerable influence in French...

 was now part of the government, the colonial power's approach to its subject nations was not appreciably different. The Syrian party's stance in these circumstances did not impress the young nationalist activists.

In 1939, Aflaq and al-Bitar began to attract a small following of students, and in 1941, the pair issued leaflets agitating against French rule, using the title al-ihyaa' al-'arabi - "the Arab Resurrection". Their first use of the name al-ba'th al-'arabi, which has the same meaning, came some time later; it had already been adopted by Zaki al-Arsuzi
Zaki al-Arsuzi
Zakī al-Arsūzī born Latakia June 1899, died Damascus July 1968) was a Syrian political activist and writer, and is widely regarded as a main inspiration for the Ba'ath Party...

, a nationalist activist from Iskandarun province
Hatay Province
Hatay Province is a province in southern Turkey, on the Mediterranean coast. It is bordered by Syria to the south and east and the Turkish provinces of Adana and Osmaniye to the north. The province is part of Çukurova, a geographical, economical and cultural region that covers the provinces of...

 in north-western Syria who had come to Damascus in the wake of his native area's annexation by Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

.

On 24 October 1942 both al-Bitar and Aflaq resigned from their teaching positions, now determined to devote their full efforts to the political struggle. They slowly gained supporters, and in 1945 the first elected Bureau of the Arab Ba'th Movement was formed, including both of them. The following year, the organisation gained a substantial number of new members when most of the former supporters of Zaki al-Arsuzi, led by Wahib al-Ghanim, joined it.

On the leadership of the Ba'th Party

In 1947 the first party congress was held in Damascus, and al-Bitar was elected secretary general. Aflaq took the pre-eminent position of amid, sometimes translated as "doyen"; under the constitution adopted at the congress, this made him effective leader of the party, with sweeping powers within the organization.

In 1952 Syria's military dictator, Adib al-Shishakli, banned all political parties. Al-Bitar took refuge in neighboring Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...

, along with Aflaq. There they came into contact with Akram al-Hawrani
Akram al-Hawrani
Akram al-Hawrani |transcribe]]d Hourani or Hurani) , was a Syrian politician who played a prominent role in the formation of a widespread populist, nationalist movement in Syria and in the rise of the Ba'th Party...

, a far more seasoned politician who had recently established the Arab Socialist Party and boasted a considerable following among the peasantry of the Hama
Hama
Hama is a city on the banks of the Orontes River in west-central Syria north of Damascus. It is the provincial capital of the Hama Governorate. Hama is the fourth-largest city in Syria—behind Aleppo, Damascus, and Homs—with a population of 696,863...

 region in central Syria as well as a valuable foothold in the military
Military
A military is an organization authorized by its greater society to use lethal force, usually including use of weapons, in defending its country by combating actual or perceived threats. The military may have additional functions of use to its greater society, such as advancing a political agenda e.g...

 officer corps. The three politicians agreed to unite their parties, and co-operated in the overthrow of al-Shishakli in 1954, following which a congress ratified the merger of the two parties into the Arab Socialist Ba'th Party. The rules and constitution of al-Bitar and Aflaq's party were adopted unchanged. All three were elected to the party's new National Command, along with a supporter of al-Hawrani.

Power politics in Syria, 1954 - 1963

Following the overthrow of al-Shishakli, Syria held its first democratic elections in five years. Al-Bitar was elected as a deputy for Damascus, defeating the secretary general of the Syrian Social National Party, one of the Ba'th's bitterest ideological enemies. He became Minister for Foreign Affairs in 1956 and held the post until 1958. Along with other Ba'thists, he agitated in favour of the unification of Syria with Nasser
Gamal Abdel Nasser
Gamal Abdel Nasser Hussein was the second President of Egypt from 1956 until his death. A colonel in the Egyptian army, Nasser led the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 along with Muhammad Naguib, the first president, which overthrew the monarchy of Egypt and Sudan, and heralded a new period of...

's Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...

, and when unification took place in 1958 he became Minister for Guidance of the new United Arab Republic
United Arab Republic
The United Arab Republic , often abbreviated as the U.A.R., was a sovereign union between Egypt and Syria. The union began in 1958 and existed until 1961, when Syria seceded from the union. Egypt continued to be known officially as the "United Arab Republic" until 1971. The President was Gamal...

 (UAR). Like many of the other Syrian politicians who had initially supported unification, he found the experience disenchanting, and resigned his position the following year.

When a right-wing coup in Syria put an end to the UAR, al-Bitar was one of sixteen prominent politicians to sign a declaration in support of the secession. Al-Hawrani also signed, but al-Bitar was still known as a Ba'thist whereas al-Hawrani's secessionist position was well-known. Much of the party's base was outraged by al-Bitar's action, although he quickly retracted his signature. The Ba'th splintered in the aftermath of the secession, with a large part of its base turning to Nasserism
Nasserism
Nasserism is an Arab nationalist political ideology based on the thinking of the former Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser. It was a major influence on pan-Arab politics in the 1950s and 1960s, and continues to have significant resonance throughout the Arab World to this day. It also...

. Al-Bitar remained close to Aflaq, who retained the party leadership with a pro-reunification line, albeit a more cautious one than that of the Nasserists or the Arab Nationalist Movement
Arab Nationalist Movement
The Arab Nationalist Movement , also known as the Movement of Arab Nationalists and the Harakiyyin, was a pan-Arab nationalist organization influential in much of the Arab world, most famously so within the Palestinian movement.-Origins & Ideology:The Arab Nationalist Movement had its origins in a...

 (ANM), and indeed a more cautious one than much of the party's membership wished for.

In government with the Ba'th

In 1963, a military coup by pro-reunification officers removed the secessionist regime from power. The officers included many Ba'thists, but also initially Nasserists and other elements. They established a National Revolutionary Command Council (NCRC) as the supreme organ of power in the land, and this body offered al-Bitar the position of prime minister at the head of a coalition cabinet made up of the various pro-reunification forces. Al-Bitar took up the appointment, and was later appointed to the NCRC as well.

However, the military Ba'thists who had taken control were not in tune with Aflaq and al-Bitar. They were of a younger generation, and a more radical disposition, traits they shared with an increasingly influential element of the civilian party membership in both Syria and Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

. Later that year, the radical elements gained control of the party at the Sixth National Party Congress. The Congress approved a far-left programme evidently inspired by Soviet socialism, and condemned what it termed "ideological notability" inside the party - an implicit attack on Aflaq and al-Bitar. The latter resigned the premiership, which passed to a military moderate Ba'thist officer, Amin Hafiz
Amin Hafiz
Amin al-Hafiz was a Syrian politician, general and member of the Ba'th Party.-Early life:Al-Hafiz was born in the city of Aleppo....

. Al-Bitar was restored to the position the following year when the ruling group decided to adopt a more conciliatory approach following massive riots in Hama, which the army had to suppress.

However, al-Bitar was clearly not in any sense in charge of Syria - rather, he was acting as the face of a regime with which he was ideologically and personally out of sympathy.

Downfall, exile and death

On 23 February 1966 a bloody coup d'état
Coup d'état
A coup d'état state, literally: strike/blow of state)—also known as a coup, putsch, and overthrow—is the sudden, extrajudicial deposition of a government, usually by a small group of the existing state establishment—typically the military—to replace the deposed government with another body; either...

 led by a left-wing Ba'athist faction headed by Chief of Staff Salah Jadid
Salah Jadid
Salah Jadid was a Syrian general and political figure in the Baath Party, and the country's de facto leader from 1966 until 1970.- Rise to power :...

, overthrew the Syrian Government. A late warning telegram of the coup d'état
Coup d'état
A coup d'état state, literally: strike/blow of state)—also known as a coup, putsch, and overthrow—is the sudden, extrajudicial deposition of a government, usually by a small group of the existing state establishment—typically the military—to replace the deposed government with another body; either...

 was sent from President Gamal Abdel Nasser
Gamal Abdel Nasser
Gamal Abdel Nasser Hussein was the second President of Egypt from 1956 until his death. A colonel in the Egyptian army, Nasser led the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 along with Muhammad Naguib, the first president, which overthrew the monarchy of Egypt and Sudan, and heralded a new period of...

 to Nasim Al Safarjalani
Nasim Al Safarjalani
Nasim Al Safarjalani comes from a prominent Arab Syrian family from Damascus, Syria.-Origins and youth:...

 (The General Secretary of Presidential Council), on the early morning of the coup d'état. The coup sprung out of factional rivalry between Jadid's "regionalist" (qutri) camp of the Ba'ath Party, which promoted ambitions for a Greater Syria
Greater Syria
Greater Syria , also known simply as Syria, is a term that denotes a region in the Near East bordering the Eastern Mediterranean Sea or the Levant....

 and the more traditionally pan-Arab, in power faction, called the "nationalist" (qawmi) fraction. Jadid's supporters were also seen as more radically left-wing.
Members of the party's other fractions fled; al-Bitar was captured and detained, along with other members of the party's historic leadership, in a government guest house. When the new rulers launched a purge in August that year, al-Bitar managed to make his escape and flee to Beirut
Beirut
Beirut is the capital and largest city of Lebanon, with a population ranging from 1 million to more than 2 million . Located on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coastline, it serves as the country's largest and main seaport, and also forms the Beirut Metropolitan...

.
In 1969, al-Bitar, President Amin al-Hafiz, Nasim Al Safarjalani
Nasim Al Safarjalani
Nasim Al Safarjalani comes from a prominent Arab Syrian family from Damascus, Syria.-Origins and youth:...

, Khaled Al Hakim and others were sentenced to death in absentia
In absentia
In absentia is Latin for "in the absence". In legal use, it usually means a trial at which the defendant is not physically present. The phrase is not ordinarily a mere observation, but suggests recognition of violation to a defendant's right to be present in court proceedings in a criminal trial.In...

 by a special military court headed by later Syrian Defence Minister, Mustafa Tlass
Mustafa Tlass
Lt. Gen. Mustafa Tlass is a Syrian politician and a long time minister of defense, now retired.-Rise to power:Tlass was born in the Syrian town of al-Rastan near the city of Homs to a prominent Sunni Muslim family. He joined the Ba'ath Party at the age of 15, and met Hafez al-Assad when studying...

, and Interim Syrian President and Vice President of Syria Abdul Halim Khaddam
Abdul Halim Khaddam
Abdul Halim Khaddam is a Syrian politician who was Vice President of Syria from 1984 to 2005.-Early life and career:Abdul Halim Khaddam was born on 15 September 1932 in Baniyas, Syria. Abdul Halim was one of the few Sunni Muslims to make it to the top of the Alawite-dominated Syrian leadership...

.
In 1978 al-Bitar was pardoned by then President Hafiz al-Asad after the latter came to power in 1970. However, despite a brief return to Damascus he was not reconciled with al-Asad, and in 1978, after a meeting with him ended without agreement, he launched a press campaign against the Syrian government in power from his exile in Paris, attacking it in a new magazine which he entitled al-Ihyaa' al-'arabi in an echo of the name he and Aflaq had first adopted almost forty years earlier. He was also rumored to be in contact with Syrian opposition figures in Baghdad
Baghdad
Baghdad is the capital of Iraq, as well as the coterminous Baghdad Governorate. The population of Baghdad in 2011 is approximately 7,216,040...

.

On 21 July 1980 Salah ad-Din al-Bitar was shot dead in Paris. The identity of his actual killer was never discovered, but it was reported that Hafiz al-Asad had ordered the assassination. At the time al-Bitar had reported to local authorities in France that he had repeatedly received death threats by mail and phone. He took personal measures by limiting his moves. In response to a personal request by Nasim Al Safarjalani
Nasim Al Safarjalani
Nasim Al Safarjalani comes from a prominent Arab Syrian family from Damascus, Syria.-Origins and youth:...

, a colleague and a close friend, to leave France to a safe haven, he promised to do so.

On the morning of his assassination he received a phone call to meet a journalist at his newspaper al-Ihyaa' al-'arabi office. As he was exiting the elevator to enter his office, his assassin fired two shots to the back of his head. He reportedly died at the scene. The journalist meeting was a setup.

At the time of the assassination, al-Bitar was holding a diplomat passport issued by Yemen. The media initially reported the assassination as a Yemeni diplomat assassination only to later identify the victim as the Syrian Prime Minister.

al-Bitar was later buried in Baghdad
Baghdad
Baghdad is the capital of Iraq, as well as the coterminous Baghdad Governorate. The population of Baghdad in 2011 is approximately 7,216,040...

, Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

.

Sources

  • Asad: the struggle for the Middle East, Patrick Seale, University of California Press
    University of California Press
    University of California Press, also known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish books and papers for the faculty of the University of California, established 25 years earlier in 1868...

    , Berkeley, 1990. ISBN 0-520-06976-5
  • The Old Social Classes and New Revolutionary Movements of Iraq, Hanna Batatu, al-Saqi Books
    Saqi Books
    Saqi Books is an independent UK publisher co-founded in 1984 by author and feminist Mai Ghoussoub to "print quality academic and general interest books on the Middle East". It now claims to be "the UK's largest publisher of Middle Eastern and Arabic titles"...

    , London, 2000. ISBN 0-86356-520-4

External links

  • Letter from US socialist leader Norman Thomas
    Norman Thomas
    Norman Mattoon Thomas was a leading American socialist, pacifist, and six-time presidential candidate for the Socialist Party of America.-Early years:...

     to Salah al-Din al-Bitar
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