took charge, with Saudi participation, of build-
ing much of the country’s infrastructure: roads,
airports, communications, electrical power, and
water system. When Abd al-Aziz died, he left a
country that was about to embark on a rapid and
far-reaching modernization program. Since that
time, Saudi Arabia has been ruled by his sons, in
alliance with the Wahhabi ulama. He is still held
in high esteem by his country.
See also aUthority; Wahhabism.
Further reading: Leslie J. McLoughlin, Ibn Saud:
Founder of a Kingdom (New York: St. Martin’s Press,
1993); Medawi Rashid, A History of Saudi Arabia (Cam-
bridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002)
Abd al-Nasir, Jamal See nasir, Jamal abd al-.
Abd al-Qadir al-Jazairi (1808–1883) Sufi
shaykh, leader of Algerian resistance to French
colonization, and hero of Algerian independence
Abd al-Qadir, the son of a Sufi shaykh of the qadini
sUFi order, was chosen by his father Muhyi al-Din
to lead the resistance to France’s slow-motion
colonization of algeria, which had begun in 1830.
From his base in the region of Oran, in the north-
west of Algeria, Abd al-Qadir led a fierce and pro-
tracted resistance. For about a decade, until 1842,
he controlled much of the Algerian hinterland and
had de facto recognition as ruler from both the
Algerian populace and the French army, which
negotiated with him. He implemented a number
of reforms during this time, inspired in part by
his admiration of Muhammad Ali (r. 1805–48),
the founder of modern egypt, whose reforms he
had witnessed at first hand during a visit to that
country. But French determination to conquer
the Algerian hinterland led to a brutal policy of
depopulation, in which the native Algerians were
forced off their land and into camps, with massive
destruction of their crops, livestock, and villages.
Eventually, in 1847, Abd al-Qadir surrendered to
the French in order to stop the catastrophic war.
After being exiled to France, he migrated to istan-
bUl and then to damascUs, where he would spend
the rest of his life. In Damascus, he became a large
landholder and influential personage, dispensing
patronage but also teaching Quran and sUnna at
the main Umayyad mosque.
Abd al-Qadir wrote works in which he pro-
moted rationalist explanations of the Quran and
Islam, and in this he was in the forefront of Arab
and Muslim reformers who sought to understand
their religion in light of the changed situation
imposed on them by modernity and the supremacy
of “science.” Toward the end of his life, he began
to propound a literalist reading of the scriptures,
which, while not contradicting his earlier empha-
sis on reason, marked a new direction for him. As
one of his biographers points out, however, this
combination of “rational” and “literal” approaches
to Islam and the Quran is typical of Salafi, or neo-
traditionalist, Islam. Abd al-Qadir is remembered
now, and was honored by Europeans during his
life, for his part in stopping a massacre (based on
local grievances) of Christians in Damascus in
1860, protecting many himself.
He is remembered by Algerians as the first
to mount organized resistance to the colonialKing Abd al-Aziz ibn Saud meets with President Roos-
evelt aboard the USS Quincy in the Suez Canal Zone,
February 14, 1945. (Courtesy of Dr. Michael Crocker/King
Abdul Aziz Foundation)
Abd al-Qadir al-Jazairi 3 J