Fawzi al-Qawuqji

Fawzi al-Qawuqji
Fawzi al-Qawuqji in 1936
Native name
فوزي القاوقجي
Born(1890-01-19)19 January 1890
Tripoli, Ottoman Empire
(present-day Tripoli, Lebanon)
Died5 June 1977(1977-06-05) (aged 87)
Beirut, Lebanon
Allegiance
Service / branchArab Liberation Army
Years of service1912–1949
RankGerman Army Colonel (WWII)
CommandsArab Liberation Army 1948–1949
Battles / wars
AwardsIron Cross, Second Class

Fawzi al-Qawuqji (sometimes spelled Fauzi el-Kaukji - Arabic: فوزي القاوقجي;‎ 19 January 1890 – 5 June 1977) was a Lebanese-born Arab nationalist military figure in the interwar period.[1] He served briefly in Palestine in 1936 fighting the British Mandatory suppression of the Palestinian Revolt. [2] A political decision by the British enabled him to flee the country in 1937. He was a colonel in the Nazi Wehrmacht during World War II, and served as the Arab Liberation Army (ALA) field commander during the 1948 Palestine War.

  1. ^ The Arabs and the Holocaust: The Arab-Israeli War of Narratives, by Gilbert Achcar, (NY: Henry Holt and Co.; 2009), p. 92: "Arab nationalism's leading military figure in the interwar period ... served as a commander in all the Arab national battles of the period."
  2. ^ Matthew Hughes, Britain's Pacification of Palestine: The British Army, the Colonial State, and the Arab Revolt, 1936–1939 Cambridge University Press, 2019 pp. 20, 98