Malik Dohan; the Iraqi Politician Who Witnessed the Ba'ath Party and Supported Arab Unity
The former Iraqi minister and politician, Malik Dohan Al-Hassan, lived for a century, he was a witness to the fluctuation of Regimes in Iraq, until the American occupation in 2003.
As this man was one of the founders of the political process, after the overthrow of the rule of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, led by Saddam Hussein.
Dohan Al-Hassan passed away in the Jordanian capital, Amman, on May 23, 2021, at the age of one hundred and two years, after holding several positions in Iraq, where he was Minister of Culture and Guidance in 1967, he assumed the position of Minister of Justice in the first government after the American occupation in 2004.
Nationalist Thought
Malik Dohan Al-Hassan was born in 1919 in the village of (Abu Ashush) in the Hashemite District, Babylon Governorate, he grew up in the house of well-known sheikhs among the middle Euphrates clans, as his father belongs to the Al-Wawi clan, one of the branches of the Al-Jabour tribe, which is widespread in Iraq and Levant.
Malik's father was a prominent deputy in the House of Representatives during the royal era in the years (1936/1943), the man retained his position until his death in 1962, and also participated in the struggle against the British occupation of Iraq in the revolution of the twentieth.
Malik Dohan studied in Katatib, where he learned to read and write, then he entered the Western Primary School in the city of Hilla in Babylon, while for high school, he was the first in his class, which qualified him to enter the College of Law at the University of Baghdad in 1943.
He was attracted to the nationalist thought since he was a college student, where the nationalists and the Ba'athists formed one movement and one current, they are met from the other side by the Iraqi communist movement.
He graduated from the Faculty of Law in 1947, and received a scholarship to France, where he completed his postgraduate studies at the Universities of Paris and Montpellier, until he obtained a doctorate in law, then he worked as a university professor at the College of Law in Iraq, until the coup against the monarchy in 1958.
He was a huge fan of the late Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, as was a symbol of Arab nationalism in the sixties of the twentieth century, and a supporter of Arab unity.
He has been involved in political work since his youth, as he belongs to the nationalist thought, and a member of the Arab Socialist Party, where he believes that one of the reasons for the hatred of the Ba’ath Party for his party is the convergence in the name.
On the reason for his orientation to the nationalist thought, Dohan Al-Hassan says: “I feel that I am an Arab and reject the communism, as their thought eliminates sub creativity, even in the discussion they are reckless, and if you do not accept their opinion, you are an agent of colonialism”.
A Witness to a Century
Dohan Al-Hassan witnessed the fall of the monarchy in Iraq on July 14, 1958, and dragged the leaders of the royal family in the streets of Baghdad. However, despite his nationalistic orientation, he rejected what happened to them, as these was morally unacceptable and considered a provocation.
He was a fan of King Ghazi I (the ruler of Iraq) for as his national orientation, he talks on his own radio about British colonialism, Dohan believes that the king was killed, and it was not a traffic accident, as is known, because the British did not want of him, and they had a big role in killing him, as he put it.
After the success of the July 14 military coup led by leader Abd al-Karim Qasim, the nationalists tended to support the former president, Abd al-Salam Arif, and the Communists to support Qasim.
Malik Dohan Al-Hassan's position was in favor of Abd al-Salam Arif, and we resented the rule of Abd al-Karim Qasim, as he was “a dictatorial” and individually ruled, he did not even accept the formation of a council to lead the revolution, with his companion officers, after the coup against the monarchy, he established a Sovereignty Council that was only formal, it takes decisions that Qasim does not recognize and takes others. Dohan Al-Hassan is hostile to the Communist Party, as it carried out killing operations during the era of Abdul Karim Qasim in the cities of Mosul and Kirkuk, which claimed the lives of many innocent citizens, in addition to the representation of their corpses and dragged them in the streets.
After Abd al-Salam Arif's coup against Qasim in February 1963, Dohan Al-Hassan supported Arif's access to power, as he supported Arab nationalism, and established unity with Syria and Egypt.
But he says that Aref opposed me being the captain of teachers, and he followed several methods to prevent me from running in the syndicate elections because I am a Shiite, and he is known for his “sectarianism”, he wanted someone else to fill this position.
Despite his opposition to the way of rule by Abd al-Salam Arif, and later, as the latter offered him the position of minister, he refused.
Dohan describes Abd al-Salam Arif as a very honest president, Abd al-Salam Arif and his brother the late Iraqi President Abd al-Rahman Arif, because they did not place any of their relatives in positions and functions of the Iraqi state.
In 1967, Malik Dohan Al-Hassan became Minister of Culture and Guidance in the fourth ministry of Taher Yahya in 1967 and 1968, during the era of the late Iraqi President Abd al-Rahman Arif.
Political Prisoner
With the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party coming to power in 1968, Dohan al-Hassan was put in prison with all members of Tahir Yahya's government, where he spent 18 months in prison.
As for his opinion of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, he believes that the Americans who brought them to power in Iraq, to end the occurrence of any Arab unity in the Arab region, especially the tripartite union between Iraq, Egypt and Syria.
Dohan Al-Hassan says that the Russian ambassador, Vasili, in Iraq, told him personally that a coup would happen against the rule of Abd al-Rahman Arif in 1968, the Americans will bring the Ba’ath Party to rule the country, and standing against Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser.
Dohan explained during a television interview in 2012 that “The Russian ambassador admitted to me the existence of Russian intelligence work in Iraq, and that he received an intelligence report about the imminence of a military coup, on the one hand of major country against the Abdel Nasser Regime, but he did not name this country, which is America”.
In light of the information he received, Dohan Al-Hassan suggested at the time to Prime Minister Yahya Taher to carry out a coup against President Abd al-Rahman Arif, but he refused, then they informed the president of what was being planned for him, but he underestimated the role of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, he described them in the colloquial language as “Al-Makarid”, which means poor.
After Ahmed Hassan Al-Bakr came to power on July 17, 1968, Dohan believed that he was honest in trying to establish the Arab unity with Syria during the era of the Ba’ath Party in 1978, its leader being Syrian President Hafez al-Assad.
But according to Dohan Al-Hassan, Saddam Hussein, who was then the Vice President of Iraq, when he knew that he had no place in the stage of Arab unity between Syria and Iraq, he isolated Al-Bakr and ended the unity attempt.
Dohan Al-Hassan opposed Saddam Hussein's Regime, and remained in opposition until the American occupation of Iraq, the overthrow of the Ba'ath Regime in 2003, where he held the position of head of the Iraqi Bar Association in 2003-2004.
In 2004, Malik Dohan Al-Hassan assumed the position of Minister of Justice in the interim government headed by Iyad Allawi, at the time, he was 85 years old, and this is the last position he will hold in his political life.
On July 17, 2004, the convoy of the Iraqi Minister of Justice, Malik Dohan Al-Hassan, was attacked by a car bomb in western Baghdad, it was driven by a suicide bomber among the minister's convoy, the minister was not injured but four of his bodyguards were killed.
In the last stages of his life, Malik Dohan Al-Hassan assumed the leadership of his clan, "Al-Wawi" in the Babylon Governorate, which is considered the only Shiite branch of one of the largest Sunni tribes in Iraq and the region.
