\u201cInjustice turns the oppressed into heroes\u201d — Libyans still remember these fateful words by iconic resistance leader Omar al-Mukhtar (1862-1931), who spent the last 20 years of his life fighting the Italian occupation of his country.<\/p>\n
Eighty-six years has passed since al-Mukhtar\u2019s martyrdom, but he remains alive and well in Libya\u2019s collective memory — not only due to his role as resistance fighter, but also due to his impressive personal qualities and trademark wire-rimmed glasses.<\/p>\n
On Sept. 16, 1931, the 73-year old resistance leader was hanged by the Italian occupation authorities after refusing to accept their terms of surrender. Ever since, he has remained a symbol of resistance against impossible odds for successive generations of Libyan youth.<\/p>\n
Early life<\/strong><\/p>\n A member of the Al-Manfah, one of eastern Libya\u2019s most prominent tribes, Omar al-Mukhtar was born in 1862 in the village of Zawiyat Janzur on Libya\u2019s eastern coast.<\/p>\n He lost his father when the latter died making the perilous journey to the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia to perform the Hajj pilgrimage.<\/p>\n According to his father\u2019s will, he was raised to manhood by Sheikh Hussein Ghariani, a religious scholar and friend of the family. Al-Mukhtar then travelled to eastern Libya\u2019s Al-Jaghbub Oasis, which at that time served as headquarters for the Senussian Dawa, an Islamic reformist movement founded by Sheikh Mohammed ibn Ali Senussi.<\/p>\n He stayed there for eight years, learning theology and Islamic science from Muslim scholars of the Senussian movement, including celebrated scholar Sheikh Al-Mahdi al-Senussi.<\/p>\n In 1897, al-Mahdi appointed him governor of Libya\u2019s eastern town of Zawiyat al-Qusour, where he became known for his wisdom, fairness and ability to resolve disputes.<\/p>\n During this period, al-Mukhtar became known as \u201cSidi Omar\u201d, or \u201cSir Omar\u201d — a title granted only to the movement\u2019s greatest sheikhs and scholars.<\/p>\n Later, al-Mukhtar travelled to Sudan, where he served for several years as a deputy to Al-Mahdi al-Senussi.<\/p>\n Following the latter\u2019s death, al-Mukhtar was appointed — once again — as sheikh of Zawiyat al-Qusour in a move welcomed by the Ottoman empire (which governed Libya at the time) due to his well-earned reputation for just leadership.<\/p>\n -Pen to rifle<\/strong><\/p>\n Al-Mukhtar, however, eventually transformed from a religious scholar into a resistance fighter against British, French and — later — Italian colonial forces.<\/p>\n His armed struggle first began against British forces deployed along Egypt\u2019s border with Libya. He also fought French colonial forces who tried to invade southern Sudan and Chad in 1900.<\/p>\n During a war declared by Italy in 1911 against the Ottoman Empire, al-Mukhtar became known as the \u201cSheikh of the Mujahideen\u201d after mobilizing 1,000 fighters from Zawiyat al-Qusour before joining the Ottoman army in eastern Benghazi.<\/p>\n In 1912, Rome declared Libya an Italian colony. For the next 20 years, al-Mukhtar led the Libyan resistance against the Italian occupiers, who suffered heavy losses as a result of his novel hit-and-run tactics.<\/p>\n Many of these clashes took place in and around Libya\u2019s northeastern city of Derna, including a two-day battle in 1913 that left 70 Italian soldiers dead and hundreds of others injured. In 1930, Italian forces clashed with the mujahedeen in a major battle after which they discovered al-Mukhtar\u2019s horse and trademark wire-rimmed glasses.<\/p>\n It was at this point that Italian Army Commander Marshal Rodolfo Graziani made his famous statement: \u201cToday we took al-Mukhtar\u2019s glasses; tomorrow we will take his head.\u201d<\/p>\n On September 11, 1931, during clashes with the Italian cavalry, two horses were killed out from under al-Mukhtar, according Libyan eyewitnesses.<\/p>\n After one of his fighters addressed him as \u201cSidi Omar\u201d in the heat of battle, he was quickly identified by Italian occupation forces, who finally managed to arrest him.<\/p>\n Three days later, on Sept. 14, Graziani arrived to Benghazi, where he hastily convened a \u201cspecial tribunal\u201d tasked with trying al-Mukhtar.<\/p>\n The following day, the resistance hero was sentenced to death by hanging.<\/p>\n During the \u201ctrial\u201d, when the Italians offered to let him leave the country if he called on his mujahedeen to abandon their armed struggle, al-Mukhtar uttered his most famous words:<\/p>\n \u201cMy forefinger, which attests at each prayer that there is no God but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, cannot write a single word of falsehood. We will not surrender; we will be victorious or we will die!\u201d<\/p>\n On the morning of Sept. 16, 1931, in Salouq (located some 50 kilometers south of Benghazi) al-Mukhtar was brought, handcuffed, to the gallows.<\/p>\n He read the Shahada — the first pillar of Islam and a testimony of faith — in the presence of 20,000 people who had gathered to witness the great leader\u2019s death.<\/p>\n Al-Mukhtar\u2019s remarkable life — at least its final phase — was depicted in the 1980 film \u201cLion of the Desert\u201d starring Anthony Quinn. <\/p>\n In a testament to the lingering political sensitivities that the figure of Al-Mukhtar still evokes, the film remained banned in Italy until 2009 – worldbulletin<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cInjustice turns the oppressed into heroes\u201d — Libyans still remember these fateful words by iconic resistance leader Omar al-Mukhtar (1862-1931), who spent the last 20 years of his life fighting the Italian occupation of his country. Eighty-six years has passed since al-Mukhtar\u2019s martyrdom, but he remains alive and well in Libya\u2019s collective memory — not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":61027,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[],"better_featured_image":{"id":61027,"alt_text":"","caption":"","description":"","media_type":"image","media_details":{"width":535,"height":340,"file":"2017\/09\/Umar-Mukhtar.png","filesize":239099,"sizes":{},"image_meta":{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0","keywords":[]}},"post":61026,"source_url":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/Umar-Mukhtar.png"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61026"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/61027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buletinonlines.net\/v7\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nUnder Ghariani\u2019s tutelage, young Omar soon succeeded in memorizing the entire Quran by heart.<\/p>\n
\n
\nTrademark glasses<\/strong><\/p>\n