 | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (June 2023) |
Husni al-Za'im | |
|---|---|
| حسني الزعيم | |
 | |
| 9th President of Syria | |
| In office 11 April 1949 – 14 August 1949 | |
| Preceded by | Shukri al-Quwatli |
| Succeeded by | Hashim al-Atassi |
| 23rd Prime Minister of Syria | |
| In office 17 April 1949 – 26 June 1949 | |
| Preceded by | Khalid al-Azm |
| Succeeded by | Muhsin al-Barazi |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 11 May 1897 Aleppo, Aleppo Vilayet, Ottoman Empire |
| Died | 14 August 1949 (aged 52) Damascus, Syria |
| Profession | Statesman, soldier |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance | |
| Branch/service |  Ottoman Army French Army Syrian Arab Army |
| Years of service | 1917–1949 |
| Rank |  Brigadier General |
| Battles/wars | |
Husni al-Za'im (Arabic: حسني الزعيم Ḥusnī az-Za’īm; 11 May 1897 – 14 August 1949) was a Syrian Kurdish military officer and who was head of state of Syria in 1949. He had been an officer in the Ottoman Army.[1] After France instituted its colonial mandate over Syria after the First World War, he became an officer in the French Army. After Syria's independence in 1946 he was made Chief of Staff, and was ordered to lead the Syrian Army into war with the Israeli Army in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. The defeat of the Arab league forces in that war shook Syria and undermined confidence in the country's chaotic parliamentary democracy, allowing him to seize power in 1949. However, his reign as head of state was brief, he was tried and executed in August 1949 by his former coup co-conspirators. Al-Za'im infamously executed Lebanese intellectual Antoun Saadeh in July 1949.
- ^ Rejwan, Nissim (2008), Arabs in the Mirror: Images and Self-Images from Pre-Islamic to Modern Times, University of Texas Press, p. 152, ISBN 978-0292774452