Early in the Palestinian cause, Suleiman al-Taji al-Faruqi founded the newspaper "The Islamic University" to play an important role in the struggle of the Palestinian people and their preparation for the 1936 revolution.

The time was 1932, and Palestine is still boiling from the successive demographic changes that occurred after the Balfour Declaration (in 1917), which pledged to establish a national home for the Jews in Palestine, in front of the successive migrations of Jews towards Palestine, which was at that time part of the Ottoman Sultanate subject to the British mandate, in front of those migrations, there were many interpretations on the paths of the solution, and this newspaper was biased towards a clear solution expressed by its name "Islamic University", an idea that Sheikh Muhammad Abdo began to call for in Egypt, and influenced by his student Sheikh Al-Faruqi and returned to his country in Palestine, calling for it in the press at times, politics and law sometimes.

From resistance to disability to resistance to occupation

Al-Faruqi was born in 1882 AD in the city of Ramla in Palestine to a family whose lineage goes back to Al-Faruq Omar bin Al-Khattab, and at the age of nine he lost his sight, but this injury did not affect his past determination, and was not a stumbling block in the way of a young man characterized by sharp intelligence.

In one year, he memorized the Qur'an, and his father sent him to Al-Azhar Mosque in Egypt to be studied, so he spent there 9 years, during which he was apprenticed by Sheikh Muhammad Abdo, who paid attention to his sharp intelligence, brought him closer to him and cared about him, and made him act on his behalf in providing some of his lessons.

After that, Al-Faruqi returned to Palestine to leave again for Istanbul - the capital of the Ottoman Caliphate - on a new educational journey during which he obtained a law degree in 1909, during which he also learned Turkish (Ottoman), English and French, and during that period he did not leave the Islamic call, as he was sitting to interpret the Qur'an in the mosque of "Hagia Sophia", and he also began practicing law, so he became famous for his mastery of several languages and his defense of the poor and vulnerable.

While in Istanbul, his relationship with journalistic writing began, as he published in 1911 several articles in the newspaper "Palestine", which was issued in Jerusalem, in which he attacked the policies of Sultan Muhammad Rashad – who took power after a coup that overthrew his brother Sultan Abdul Hamid II – and tolerated during his reign the successive Jewish immigrations to Palestine, and one of these articles – entitled "The Danger of Zionism" – caused the newspaper to be censored, and he wrote in it, "You must be a patriot first and then loyal to the Ottomans."

Photo by Sheikh Suleiman Al-Taji Al-Faruqi, first issue of the Islamic University newspaper (Palestinian press)

During World War I, he returned to Palestine and founded there the "Ottoman National Party" which aimed to confront Zionist activities, and at that time he opposed the seizure of agricultural crops to finance the Ottoman army, and he also wrote a poem about the crash of an Ottoman plane over the shore of Jaffa, and the Ottoman governor Jamal Pasha exiled him to Konya with his brother Shukri.

From exile in Anatolia to Cairo again, where he joined the French Institute of Law to obtain a doctorate in 1919, and returned again to Palestine to continue working as a lawyer and then decided to establish the newspaper "Islamic University" in 1932.

As throughout his career until that moment, the Sheikh vowed his newspaper, which was published on a daily basis, to two main issues, the first of which is the call to resist Zionist migrations to Palestine, and to resist the English Mandate as a sponsor of those migrations, and the second is to call for the idea of an "Islamic League" that includes all Islamic countries in a coordinating entity that he sees as the gateway to the solution to the issues of the nation, especially the Palestinian cause.

Pregnant years

Two years before the publication of the newspaper (i.e. in 1930), the Syrian mujahid Sheikh Izz al-Din al-Qassam had arrived in Haifa a few years earlier after a long journey of armed resistance against the French occupation of his country, and after landing in Palestine, he began a new attempt there to establish a movement aimed at resisting Zionism and the British Mandate that sponsored it before fulfilling his promise to turn Palestine into a national home for the Jews.

"We do not want the East to be Islamic in all aspects of its life, but we want to take Islam as a slogan that brings it together and a name that includes it, and also includes the British crown, for example, the nations under its shadow without this annexation having an impact on the departure of each people from its belief and traditions, but it is the symbol and the goal"
Al-Faruqi in the first editorial of the newspaper

Al-Qassam succeeded at that stage, in which the newspaper was issued, in recruiting a number of peasants, who at some point reached a thousand and began work targeting the facilities and resources of the occupation and the Zionist presence in Palestine, and thus became a major target for the British Mandate authorities, until he was killed in 1935 when the newspaper "Islamic University" was 3 years old.

The newspaper had dedicated itself to supporting Sheikh al-Qassam's efforts and cause, and when he died, it became the main source of dissemination of his heritage, experience and journey, and continued to motivate Palestinians to continue the march.

With the killing of Sheikh al-Qassam with other circumstances on the ground, the environment had prepared for a revolution called the Great Arab Revolt in Palestine in 1936, which lasted 3 years and was a major concern for the British authorities, and the newspaper – which the British accused of spreading extremist ideas – constituted a major goal that must be eliminated in order to be able to eliminate the revolution, and indeed, they closed it in 1938, less than a year before the elimination of the "Great Revolution".

If Palestine was the first focus of the newspaper's attention, the issues of the Islamic world and the quest to bring it together and mobilize its intellectuals, writers and politicians were the second focus of its attention.

Different journalism and a clear vision

The newspaper, which was published daily in 8 pages, was not purely political, as it was a literary, cultural and news portal, and a platform for opinion journalism topped by prominent writers from across the Arab world.

One of the issues that Al-Faruqi paid attention to at that early time was the importance of having an authentic and independent narrative that did not rely on Western sources, so he moved away from relying on the cables of news agencies, and formed a team of correspondents in the Arab countries to report the event there to him through pure Arab eyes.

It was clear in the editorial of the first issue of his newspaper, which bore the title "The Line of the Newspaper", which puts in front of readers its goals, after referring to the defeats and betrayal suffered by the Islamic world, he said: "Therefore, we established this newspaper and all we hope to succeed to breathe the spirit of unity among the nations of the East, and to notice the need for acquaintance, harmony, then support, solidarity, and since the youth of the East and its violence was only the youth of Islam and its prosperity, there is no offense if the paved way to this end is to take Islam as a symbol for his meeting, for the title of his union, and for a goal to which he tends to be that nations that walk not to an end and tend not to a goal are rarely safe from stumbling blocks."

The idea of the Islamic University

Then he says in another place, explaining the idea of the Islamic University and the status of non-Muslims in it: "We do not yet want the East to be Islamic in all aspects of its life, but we want to take Islam as a slogan that brings it together and a name that includes it, and also includes, for example, the British crown of the nations under its shadow without this annexation having an impact on removing each people from its belief and traditions, but it is the symbol and the goal, but it is the slogan and the university, this East as long as its peoples take every way and sense a slogan. If the Islamic slogan of Muslims is a religion, then we want it for non-Muslims as a symbol and a goal, each has his religion and each has his traditions and the unity of the symbol and the goal does not take anyone out and does not injure a belief, but rather scatters everyone who works like him, and takes for his sake awakening his nation with the tongue of his choice adorning her with the fruit of harmony and the harmful denunciation, even if the nations matured, and they were guided in their national religion and those differences turned into bonds and poisoned to To have mercy and bonds, this eastern Islamic symbol was what unites forces and wants to endeavor, and this is what our newspaper is working on hopefully."

May God have mercy on Dr. Sheikh Suleiman Al-Taji Al-Faruqi, as his newspaper was a model for "national struggle journalism", and life extended until 1958 without stopping work or struggle, and during that period, he tried again to reissue the newspaper after World War II (specifically in 1949), but it was soon closed.