Yaqub al-Ghusayn

Yaqub al-Ghussein
يعقوب الغصين
Yaqub al-Ghusayn (Yacoub Bey Ghussein) in 1943, Keeper of the Bustami Shrine
President of the National Congress of Arab Youth
In office January 1932 – ?
Member of the Arab Higher Committee
In office 1936–1937
Member of the Supreme Muslim Council
In office 1937–?
Personal details
Born	1899 Ramla, Palestine
Died	27 December 1948 Jerusalem
Political party	Youth Congress Party
Alma mater	University of Cambridge
Occupation	Landowner, politician

London Conference, St. James' Palace, February 1939. Arab Palestinian delegates (foreground), Left to right: Fuad Saba, Yaqub Al-Ghussein, Musa Alami, Amin Tamimi, Jamal Al-Husseini, Awni Abdul Hadi, George Antonious, and Alfred Roch. Facing the Palestinians are the British, with Sir Neville Chamberlain presiding. To his right is Lord Halifax, and to his left, Malcolm MacDonald

Yaqub al-Ghusayn (Arabic: يعقوب الغصين, Ya‘qoub al Ghussein) (1899–1948) was a Palestinian landowner from Ramla and the founder of the Youth Congress Party.

Early life and education

He got his initial education at the Sultani School in Jerusalem from where he graduated in 1917. He later graduated in law from the University of Cambridge, UK. He worked as an inspector at a railway station until the British Mandate, before moving to the field of business and agriculture.

Family and personal life

He was married to Thuriya Nuseibeh, also a Palestinian noble, and they had 11 children; Talat, Khaled, Abdel-Kareem, Tawfiq, Aida, Khalida, Heya, Motia’a, Khadija, Nuzha and Fatoum.

Political career

Ghusayn was member of different youth societies in Palestine before he himself established the Muslim Youth Society in Ramleh in 1927. He was elected president of the first National Congress of Arab Youth, held in Jaffa in January 1932. He was a member and representative of his party in the Arab Higher Committee from its formation in 1936. In 1937 he became a member of the Supreme Muslim Council. On 1 October of the same year he was exiled by the British to the Seychelles Islands for being a member of the Arab Higher Committee. The Arab Higher Committee was outlawed by the British on 27 September 1937, following the assassination of the Acting British District Commissioner of Galilee, Lewis Yelland Andrews. Ghussein was the first Palestinian leader to be exiled by the British.

He was also a member of the Palestinian delegation to the London Conference at St. James's Palace in February 1939.

Ghusayn reconstituted his faction in 1945. He died in Jerusalem on 27 December 1948.

References

• Levenberg, Haim (1993). Military Preparations of the Arab Community in Palestine: 1945-1948. London: Routledge. ISBN 0-7146-3439-5