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- Country of residence: Palestine
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Born in Jaffa in 1910, the founder of the Difaa Newspaper (the Defense), Ibrahim Shanti is without doubt one the most important figures in the establishment of Palestinian, Jordanian, and indeed Arab journalism. After graduating with a political science degree from the American University of Beirut in1932, Shanti went back to his home town of Jaffa to be at the forefront of the anti-colonial struggle against the British mandate in Palestine. In 1934 he established Al-Difaa, which not only was for forty years the most important newspaper in Palestine, but also became the only rival to Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram in the Middle East.
So strong was Al-Difaa’s impact, so resonating was Shanti’s voice in the hearts of tens of thousands of readers across the Arab world, that the British Government not only closed the paper countless times, but also incarcerated its owner and journalists on many occasions. His column Wijdaniant (existentialisms) wherein he often incited Arabs and Muslims to rise up to the challenges before them, was widely acclaimed and awaited, as was his Quick Comments section of the paper, in which he succinctly discussed the important events of the day with wit and wisdom. Immediately after its creation in1948, Israel exiled Shanti to Cairo and closed Al-Difaa’s offices in Jaffa. While his exile proved a bitter blow, Shanti was a relentless journalist who would move on to help establish papers in Cairo and Jordan. In 1950 he resigned after a brief stint as the Chairman of the Arab Bank, a post afforded to him by his friend Abdulhamid Shuman, to pursue his passion and reopen Al-Difaa’s doors in Jerusalem. After the occupation of Jerusalem in 1967, with the encouragement of the Jordanian government, Al-Difaa re-located to Amman, where it played a central role in elevating Jordanian journalism, and Shanti would be elected as the first President of the Journalists’ Union. Nonetheless, this prominence would be short lived as the Al-Difaa was permanently closed by orders of then Jordanian Prime Minister, Wasfi El-Tal on May 26th, 1971, as a punishment for an article that offended the government.
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