A Tribe of Arabia and its Destiny in Iraq
Shaikh Ghazi has the kind of intelligence and judicious frame of mind that is typical of the seasoned tribal leaders in the country. As a member of the most important family in the Shammar tribe, he undoubtedly has been exposed to tribal politics from an early age; shaykhs made it a point to preside over tribal councils with their young children in attendance. The virtues of learning the skills of diplomacy and fair play as well as good administration were prized beyond measure among the tribes, and who better but the sons and nephews of shaykhs to learn those lessons in the immediacy of the tribal elder’s assembly house?
The Shammar tribe in Iraq is an offshoot of the original Shammar tribal confederation in Najd, or central Arabia. They were nomads that depended on the camel, and less so, on the horse as their primary mode of transportation, as well as livelihood. The camel-breeding and horse-rearing tribes of the interior of Arabia were considered the aristocrats of the desert; although they supplied town markets with young camels, camel milk and hides, they were NOT viewed as merchants, and, until they were forced to settle in tribal towns in the early twentieth century, the Shammar saw themselves as the last people on earth to turn their hand at agriculture. This tradition carried over to Iraq, to which a large migration of Shammar tribes took place in the seventeenth century. Under the Ottoman re-centralization of Iraq in the nineteenth century, the Shammar, as well as a great many pastoralist and semi-nomadic tribes in the country were placed under heavy pressure to settle in towns, and start growing crops. It is safe to say that the Shammar were probably one of the last tribes to agree to this forced change; although many of their clans did take up agriculture in the last part of the century, the leadership kept up its resistance to the Ottoman military and political offensive for a very long time.
So it is surprising to note that by the mid-twentieth century, the Shammar had become keen farmers. In the northern Jazira, where water was always more plentiful than in the south, they became rich landlords, growing barley and corn; recently, they’ve begun to plant potatoes. In turn, prosperity allowed them to turn to other pursuits. The most interesting leader of the tribe was perhaps not Shaykh Ajil, the paramount shaykh of the Shammar in the thirties and forties but his second son, shaykh Ahmad (that is, Shaykh Ghazi’s uncle) who, by all accounts, was one of the most talented chieftains in Mosul (northern Iraq, where one section of the Shammar live). Shaykh Ahmad Ajil Al-Yawer was made paramount shaykh of the Shammar tribe while still a young man, edging out his elder brother, Sufuq.
At the famed Baghdad College, run by American Jesuits, shaykh Ahmad Ajil Al-Yawar cut a dashing figure; he was tall, with a broad smile. A classmate recalls that even at the age of fifteen, he was paying regular courtesy calls on Prime Ministers and Cabinet officers. With the quiet confidence of a real leader, shaykh Ahmad cultivated allies for his tribe, always threatened by other tribes in the vicinity, or urban politicians in Mosul. But it was really only in 1959 that Shaykh Ahmad came to national prominence.
After the Iraqi monarchy was overthrown in 1958, a republican regime came to power, headed by Abdul-Karim Qassem. Qassem was an Iraqi Nationalist who made an expedient alliance with the largest political movement in Iraq, the Communist Party. In 1959, both the Iraqi Nationalist group under Qassem and the Communists moved against the Arab Nationalists, then an important party in Iraq, and especially in the northern town of Mosul. Shaykh Ahmad had some connections with the Arab Nationalists, and was earmarked for elimination by Qassem’s allies. Fleeing the city in his vintage Rolls Royce (which carried the license plate, “Mosul 5”), Shaykh Ahmad’s car was fired upon by military aircraft as it was racing through the desert. The bombing of the Rolls Royce nearly killed Shaykh Ahmad; it was only by sheer luck that he was pulled out of the car still alive. After that, he may have become more cautious, as did most of the politicized Iraqis of his generation.
Shaykh Ahmad was a bon vivant and a great conversationalist, a man who enjoyed good friends, as well as the occasional cigar. His second wife was a German who bore him a daughter, Yasmin. He lived in Iraq as he lived in Europe, a dignified, courtly man with an immense pride in being Iraqi. He died of cancer in the late 70’s in Rome. His nephew, shaykh Ghazi, reminds me of him. In his plain-spokeness, his respect for tradition and his political savvy, he hearkens back to an earlier generation of men who came to grips with their destiny in Iraq in a forceful and yet measured way. They built, but others destroyed what they had built. It is now up to shaykh Ghazi and the other political alliances in the country to rebuild the foundations of Iraq, and to make them permanent.