Personal Info
- Country of residence: Palestine
Information
He is considered one of the legends of the Palestinian press who contributed to building several journalistic institutions in the last century, and who placed on their shoulders the burden of carrying the Palestinian issue from its very beginnings at the beginning of the last century, and the subsequent sequence of events.
He founded the "Defense" and "Falesteen" newspapers, which were among the most important newspapers published in Arabic during the British Mandate of Palestine.
Ibrahim Al-Shanti, who was born in 1910 in Jaffa, studied at the American University of Beirut and obtained a degree in political science in 1933. During his university studies, he was a member of the “Al-Urwa Al-Wuthqa” group. When he returned to Palestine, he joined the editorial team of the “Al-Jami’ah Al-Islamiyya” newspaper, owned by its founder, Sheikh Suleiman Al-Taji Al-Farouqi.
He began publishing it under the title “Youth Talk,” and during that period he joined the “Istiqlal” Party.
His first attempt at journalistic publishing was in 1934 by issuing the Defense newspaper. Two years later, following the general strike in Palestine, he initiated the establishment of the “National Guard.” He was arrested by the British occupation authorities and thrown into the “Awja al-Hafeer” prison in the Negev.
After the Nakba of Palestine in 1948, he settled in Cairo and published the newspaper “Al-Qahira” with the participation of Asaad Dagher in 1953, which continued to be published until 1957. He
then returned to Jerusalem, and continued writing in his newspaper, “The Defense,” which resumed publication in Jerusalem in 1950, but it soon stopped. For a time in 1958, when he had to leave Jerusalem.
After the June War of 1967, he moved to Amman and published the newspaper “Al-Diffa” for the third time, and its publication continued until it stopped in 1970.
“Defense” and “Falesteen” were considered among the most important newspapers published in Arabic during the era of the British Mandate, but “Defense” gained fame and spread, after it succeeded in attracting well-known journalists, and an elite group of Arab writers, poets, and literary figures contributed to its editing, including: Ahmed Sami Al-Sarraj and Khair Al-Din Al-Zirkli from Syria, Abdul Karim Al-Karmi (Abu Salma) and Ibrahim Toukan from Palestine. Ibrahim Al-Shanti met the poet Ibrahim Touqan while studying at the American University of Beirut, where Ibrahim Touqan worked as a teacher of the Arabic language.
and “The Defense” was the mouthpiece of the “Istiqlal” Party, which had pan-Arab tendencies. Since its inception, the newspaper has been concerned with publishing bold news and articles expressing the state of popular discontent with the Zionist movement, due to its encouragement of Jewish immigration to Palestine. It was also a platform for attacking British colonialism, which was considered the root of the affliction that Palestine was suffering from, while Zionism was the branch. At the outbreak of World War II, the newspaper remained neutral towards the warring parties.
In 1964, the first National Conference was held in the city of Jerusalem, from which the first Palestinian National Council emerged, and Ibrahim Al-Shanti was chosen to be a member. At this conference, the establishment of the Palestine Liberation Organization was announced as the leader of the Palestinian Arab people, and Ahmed Al-Shugairi was elected President of the Palestine Liberation Organization.
and in recognition of his pioneering role in the Jordanian, Palestinian and Arab press, Ibrahim Al-Shanti was elected in 1969 as head of the Jordanian Journalists Syndicate.
In addition to his journalistic activity, Al-Shanti was famous for his sentiments that he published, and he dealt with them in all matters in a distinguished manner, and if they were collected in a book, it would place him among the ranks of writers with styles.
He died in the Jordanian capital, Amman, in 1979, at the age of 69, after suffering from an illness that did not last long. His name was awarded the Jerusalem Medal for Culture and Arts in 1990.
At his memorial ceremony, his fellow journalists praised him, saying that Ibrahim Al-Shanti had “the purest pen...for the most sacred cause.” Journalist Fahd Al-Rimawi called him “a man of positions,” “the owner of the ancient national pen,” and “the owner of the honorable pen.”
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