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Ruhi al-Khalidi: A Palestinian scholar and historian, considered a pioneer of modern historical research in Palestine at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. He was among the first to document the conditions of the Islamic world during that era and to recognize the early signs of Zionist ambitions in Arab lands.
Ruhi al-Khalidi was born in Jerusalem in 1864. His father was a judge and a member of the General Council in Beirut. He received his primary education in Jerusalem and then continued his studies, moving between Lebanon and Turkey, until he settled in Istanbul. There, he joined the Imperial School to study administration and political science in 1887. After graduating in 1893, he returned Al-Khalidi went to Jerusalem and worked as a teacher. However, his overwhelming desire to continue learning led him to travel again to Turkey and then to Paris, where he enrolled at the Sorbonne University to study the philosophy of Islamic sciences and Oriental literature. Al-Khalidi was fluent in Arabic and Turkish and also had a working knowledge of French. He participated in the Congress of Orientalists held in Paris in 1897. In 1898, he was appointed Consul General in Bordeaux, France, and its dependencies.
Al-Khalidi contributed insightful and analytical articles to the Al-Hilal magazine in Cairo, which dealt with historical and political topics and literary comparisons. He signed them as "Al-Maqdisi" because the nature of his diplomatic work prevented him from revealing his real name. He continued to do so until the proclamation of the constitution in 1908, following the constitutional revolution in which he actively participated as a founding member of the Committee of Union and Progress, which spearheaded the call for the overthrow of the then-despotic Ottoman government. Later, al-Khalidi returned to Jerusalem and was elected as a representative of the city in the Ottoman Parliament (the Chamber of Deputies). He was re-elected in 1912 as Vice-President of the Chamber.
Muhammad Ruhi al-Khalidi passed away from typhoid fever and was buried in Istanbul in 1913, leaving behind a number of historical works and manuscripts, most notably: "The Causes of the Ottoman Revolution and the Young Turks" and "Chemistry Among the Arabs," in addition to several articles, some of which were compiled, as in the book: "A History of Literary Science Among the Franks and Arabs and Victor Hugo."
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