Abdelkrim El Khattabi

Abdelkrim El Khattabi (born towards 1882 with Ajdir with the Morocco and deceased the February 6th 1963 with the Cairo in Egypt), of its complete name Mohamed Ben Abdelkrim El Khattabi (Arab: RTL [rear ''' محمدبنعبدالكريمالخطابي '''; Amazigh: ), was a Riffian military chief, Rif, Berber zone in the North-East of the Morocco. He became the chief of a resistance movement against the France and the Spain in Morocco, then the icon of the independence movements fighting against the Colonialisme. He will take the torch of resistance after the defeat of Mouha or Hammou Zayani, his/her companion the fqih Belarbi Alaoui says Sheik Elislam adopted the cause of Abdelkrim to continue the fight against Spanish and French.

Biography

Born with Ajdir in Morocco, wire of a Cadi (Arabic judge) of the clan Has Yusuf of the tribe Has Ouriaghel (or Waryaghal), Abd el-Krim was informed in traditional zaouïas and Spanish schools, finally its education at the old university of Quaraouiyine to Fès, followed three years to Spain where he studied the mine and military technology. Between 1908 and 1915 he was journalist with the daily newspaper of Melilla, where he recommended secularity and the co-operation with the Westerners in order to release Oumma of the ignorance and of under development.

It entered the Spanish administration, and was named Cadi chief of Melilla in 1915. At that time there, it started to be opposed to the Spanish domination, and in 1917 it was imprisoned to have said that Spain should not extend beyond the already occupied territories (which in practice excluded the majority from the zones uncontrolled of Rif) and expressing its sympathy to the German cause during the First World War. To be itself escaped shortly after, it returned in Ajdir in 1919 and, with his brother, it started to link the tribes of Rif in a independent République of Rif. For this cause, it tried to alleviate the enmities between the existing tribes.

In 1921, like an unexpected repercussion their efforts to destroy the power of Raisuni, a local brigand, the Spanish troops approach the unoccupied sectors of Rif. Abdelkrim sends to their general Manuel Fernández Silvestre a warning: if they cross the Amekran river, he would regard it as an act of war. Fernández Silvestre would have laughed by taking note of the message. The general installs a military station on the river with Abarrán. The same day in the middle of the afternoon thousand Riffian had encircled it; 179 Spanish soldiers were killed, forcing the remainder with the retirement. The days which followed after several bloody skirmishes for the troops of Fernández Silvestre an unexpected event produced. Indeed scorning Abdelkrim, Fernández Silvestre decides to defy it, and with: 3000 Abdelkrim men manages in two days thanks to the trick to overcome Spain. For Spain, the Bataille of Anoual was a true disaster. It lost there close to: 16000 soldiers, recovered: 24000 wounded 150 guns and: 25000 rifles. Moreover, 700 Spanish soldiers were made prisoners. It is also about the first defeat of a European colonial power, having an army modern and equipped well in front of the resistant ones without resources, organization, logistics nor intendance.

The victory of Anoual had an immense repercussion not only in Morocco but also in the whole world. It had immense psychological and political consequences, since it was going to prove that with reduced manpower, a light armament, but also an important mobility, it was possible to overcome traditional armies.

Extremely of its success, Abdelkrim proclaims in 1922 the République confederated of the Tribes of Rif, a Berber embryo of State . This republic had a crucial impact on the international opinion, because it was the first republic resulting from a war of Décolonisation at the 20th century. It created a Parliament made up of the chiefs of tribes which voted a government to him.

In 1924, the Spain withdraws its troops in its possessions along the Moroccan coast. The France, which in any event had claims on Rif Southerner, realized that to let another colonial power be made overcome in North Africa by natives would create a dangerous precedent for its own territories, and returned in the conflict. Trying to join all the Moroccan lifeblood to constitute the core of a Moroccan liberation movement preliminary to a vast movement of decolonization, Abdelkrim required of the Sultan Moulay Youssef to rejoin its cause. But this one, because of the pressure of the French general residence with Reduction, refused to fight against the colonial powers.

The entry of France in war is not made wait but the pressure of the public opinion as well European as international, subjugated by this Riffian resistance, the task makes more difficult and led to the reference of the general resident the marshal Hubert Lyautey.

Starting from 1925, Abdelkrim fights the French forces directed by Philippe Pétain with the head of: 200000 men and a Spanish army ordered personally by Miguel Primo de Rivera, is on the whole of: 450000 soldiers, began operations against the Republic of Rif. The intense combat lasted one year, but thereafter the French Armies and Spanish combined - using, inter alia weapons, the yperite - were victorious forces of Abdelkrim.

Abdelkrim goes as prisoner of war, requiring so that the civilians be saved. It of it will be nothing, the colonial powers cannot tolerate that such a rising remains unpunished. Thus as of 1926 of the planes provided with Mustard gas will massively bombard whole villages making of the Morrocans of the Fronts the first civilians gauzes in the History, beside Iraqi Kurdish gauzes by the British. One estimates at more: 150000 the civil number of deaths during the years 1925 - 1926, but no credible figure can be advanced.

In 1926, Abd el-Krim is exiled with the Réunion, where one initially installs it until in 1929 with the Morange Castle, in the heights of Saint-Denis. A few years pass. It becomes living rural district of Three-Basins, in the west of the island, where it buys grounds and builds a beautiful property. It saw twelve to fifteen years there. In May 1947, having finally had the authorization to settle in the south of France, it embarks on board a ship of the Maritime Messageries coming from South Africa and Marseilles with 52 people of its entourage and the coffin of his/her grandmother, Katoomba.

Arrived at Suez where the boat makes stopover, it succeeds in escaping and passed the end of its life in Egypt, where it will chair the “Committee of release for the the Arab Maghreb”. Mohamed Ben Abdelkrim El Khattabi dies in 1963 with the Cairo where its skin still rests. With leaving independence, the repression of a revolt of Rif makes more: 8000 died between 1958 and 1961. He refused to return to Morocco after independence, but its skin was brought back there at the request of the king Hassan II.

See too

Other figures of Moroccan resistance:

External bond

Portrait of Ben Larbi Alaoui, Sheik Al Islam

Biography of Abdelkrim El Khattabi

Random links: