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Sector : Public Figures, Public Figures
Born in Jaffa in 1913 to a family from Tulkarem; nephew of Yousef Heikal; was raised in Jaffa and Tulkarem; graduated from the AUB with a BA in Commerce in 1934; worked in Jaffa in the citrus marketing business; was a member of the Jaffa Chamber of Commerce; co-founded Ash-Sha‘ab newspaper in Jaffa in 1947 and served as its editor-in-chief; was unable to return to Jaffa after the 1948 Nakba and lived in Tulkarem; was member of the Palestinian National Party until 1956; served on the Tulkarem City Council in 1961; became member of the first PNC in 1964; was elected mayor of Tulkarem on 27 Oct. 1963 and re-elected on 23 April 1972; served as Board Director of Al-Fajr newspaper in Jerusalem; was co-founder of the Red Crescent Hospital and Az-Zakat Committee in Tulkarem; was Board member of the Palestinian Housing Council; was the first person to publicly announce that the PLO is the sole and official representative of the Palestinian people in the early 1970s; was a founding member of the National Guidance Committee in November 1978; became Honorary Chairman of a cultural sports club in Tulkarem; was placed under house arrest by the Israeli authorities from 1980-82; opposed the Oslo Accords from the beginning; resigned from his mayoral position in 1998; died on 29 July 2001.Source