Family sheikh zayed and early life:
Sheikh Zayed was born around 1918 in Abu Dhabi. He was the youngest son of Sheikh Sultan bin Zayed bin Khalifah Al Nahyan. His birth date is also reported to be 1916. His father was the ruler of Abu Dhabi from 1922 until his assassination in 1926. Zayed was named after his grandfather, Sheikh Zayed bin Khalifa Al Nahyan ("Zayed the Great"), who ruled the emirate from 1855 to 1909. At the time of Zayed's birth, the sheikhdom of Abu Dhabi was one of seven Trucial States along the coast of the lower coast of the Persian Gulf. He was raised and lived for the first fifty years of his life in Al Ain. As Zayed was growing up, there were no modern schools anywhere along the coast. He received only a basic instruction in the principles of Islam, and lived in the desert with Bedouin tribesmen, familiarising himself with the life of the people, their traditional skills and their ability to survive under the harsh climatic conditions.
His eldest brother, Sheikh Shakhbut bin Sultan Al Nahyan, became ruler of Abu Dhabi in 1928 after their uncle, Saqr bin Zayed Al Nahyan, was also assassinated. Their mother was Sheikha Salma bintButti. She extracted a promise from her sons not to use violence against each other, a promise which they kept.
Attitudes:
Sheikh Zayed was determined to bring the Emirates into federation. His calls for cooperation extended across the Persian Gulf to Iran. Sheikh Zayed advocated dialogue as the means to settle the row with Tehran over three strategic Persian Gulf islands which Iran seized from the (future) UAE Emirate of Sharjah in 1971. The islands remain in Iranian hands, despite over three decades of UAE diplomatic initiatives.
He was considered a relatively liberal ruler, and permitted private media. However, they were expected to practice self-censorship and avoid criticism of Zayed or the ruling families. Freedom of worship was permitted, and to a certain extent allowances were made for expatriate cultures, but this did not always sit comfortably in the eyes of the wider Arab world with Zayed's role as a Muslim head of state.
Zayed did not shy away from controversy when it came to expressing his opinions on current events in the Arab world. Troubled by the suffering of Iraqi civilians, he took the lead in calling for the lifting of economic sanctions on Iraq imposed by the United Nations in the aftermath of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990, despite Kuwaiti displeasure and opposition.
Zayed was considered one of the wealthiest men in the world. A Forbes estimate put his fortune at around US$ 20 billion. The source of this wealth could be almost exclusively attributed to the immense oil wealth of Abu Dhabi and the Emirates, which sit on a pool of a tenth of the world's proven oil reserves. In 1988, he purchased, for £5m, Tittenhurst Park at Sunninghill, Berkshire as his English home.
Zayed Centre:
Controversy over the opinions of the Zayed Centre caused the Harvard Divinity School to return Sheikh Zayed's $2.5 million gift to the institution in 2000 as "tainted money." Former United States president Jimmy Carter accepted the Zayed International Prize for the Environment in 2001. The award included a monetary prize of $500,000 from the Zayed Centre, and Carter stated in his acceptance speech that the award carried extra significance to him, since it was named after his personal friend, Sheikh Zayed.
There was similar controversy when the London School of Economics accepted a large donation by the Zayed Centre, to build a new lecture theatre in the New Academic Building in 2008. Despite student protests,[citation needed] the gift was accepted with the Sheik Zayed Theatre being the second largest lecture hall on the campus.
Harvard's equivocation, the Carter controversy, and the engendering negative publicity, prompted Sheikh Zayed to shut down the centre in August 2003, stating that the Zayed Centre "had engaged in a discourse that starkly contradicted the principles of interfaith tolerance."
Final years and death:
In 1999, while he was hospitalized and undergoing a series of tests, the people of the UAE wrote him a personal thank-you letter. He underwent a kidney transplant in 2000 at the Cleveland Clinic in the U.S.
On 2 November 2004, Zayed died at the age of 86. He was buried in the courtyard of the new Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi.
His eldest son, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, took an increasing role in government beginning in the 1990s. Directly after his father's death, he was ratified as the Ruler of the United Arab Emirates by his fellow rulers on the Supreme Council.
Sheikh Zayed was born around 1918 in Abu Dhabi. He was the youngest son of Sheikh Sultan bin Zayed bin Khalifah Al Nahyan. His birth date is also reported to be 1916. His father was the ruler of Abu Dhabi from 1922 until his assassination in 1926. Zayed was named after his grandfather, Sheikh Zayed bin Khalifa Al Nahyan ("Zayed the Great"), who ruled the emirate from 1855 to 1909. At the time of Zayed's birth, the sheikhdom of Abu Dhabi was one of seven Trucial States along the coast of the lower coast of the Persian Gulf. He was raised and lived for the first fifty years of his life in Al Ain. As Zayed was growing up, there were no modern schools anywhere along the coast. He received only a basic instruction in the principles of Islam, and lived in the desert with Bedouin tribesmen, familiarising himself with the life of the people, their traditional skills and their ability to survive under the harsh climatic conditions.
His eldest brother, Sheikh Shakhbut bin Sultan Al Nahyan, became ruler of Abu Dhabi in 1928 after their uncle, Saqr bin Zayed Al Nahyan, was also assassinated. Their mother was Sheikha Salma bintButti. She extracted a promise from her sons not to use violence against each other, a promise which they kept.
Attitudes:
Sheikh Zayed was determined to bring the Emirates into federation. His calls for cooperation extended across the Persian Gulf to Iran. Sheikh Zayed advocated dialogue as the means to settle the row with Tehran over three strategic Persian Gulf islands which Iran seized from the (future) UAE Emirate of Sharjah in 1971. The islands remain in Iranian hands, despite over three decades of UAE diplomatic initiatives.
He was considered a relatively liberal ruler, and permitted private media. However, they were expected to practice self-censorship and avoid criticism of Zayed or the ruling families. Freedom of worship was permitted, and to a certain extent allowances were made for expatriate cultures, but this did not always sit comfortably in the eyes of the wider Arab world with Zayed's role as a Muslim head of state.
Zayed did not shy away from controversy when it came to expressing his opinions on current events in the Arab world. Troubled by the suffering of Iraqi civilians, he took the lead in calling for the lifting of economic sanctions on Iraq imposed by the United Nations in the aftermath of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990, despite Kuwaiti displeasure and opposition.
Zayed was considered one of the wealthiest men in the world. A Forbes estimate put his fortune at around US$ 20 billion. The source of this wealth could be almost exclusively attributed to the immense oil wealth of Abu Dhabi and the Emirates, which sit on a pool of a tenth of the world's proven oil reserves. In 1988, he purchased, for £5m, Tittenhurst Park at Sunninghill, Berkshire as his English home.
Zayed Centre:
Controversy over the opinions of the Zayed Centre caused the Harvard Divinity School to return Sheikh Zayed's $2.5 million gift to the institution in 2000 as "tainted money." Former United States president Jimmy Carter accepted the Zayed International Prize for the Environment in 2001. The award included a monetary prize of $500,000 from the Zayed Centre, and Carter stated in his acceptance speech that the award carried extra significance to him, since it was named after his personal friend, Sheikh Zayed.
There was similar controversy when the London School of Economics accepted a large donation by the Zayed Centre, to build a new lecture theatre in the New Academic Building in 2008. Despite student protests,[citation needed] the gift was accepted with the Sheik Zayed Theatre being the second largest lecture hall on the campus.
Harvard's equivocation, the Carter controversy, and the engendering negative publicity, prompted Sheikh Zayed to shut down the centre in August 2003, stating that the Zayed Centre "had engaged in a discourse that starkly contradicted the principles of interfaith tolerance."
Final years and death:
In 1999, while he was hospitalized and undergoing a series of tests, the people of the UAE wrote him a personal thank-you letter. He underwent a kidney transplant in 2000 at the Cleveland Clinic in the U.S.
On 2 November 2004, Zayed died at the age of 86. He was buried in the courtyard of the new Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi.
His eldest son, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, took an increasing role in government beginning in the 1990s. Directly after his father's death, he was ratified as the Ruler of the United Arab Emirates by his fellow rulers on the Supreme Council.
sources :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krn9UhkF3Sg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zayed_bin_Sultan_Al_Nahyan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krn9UhkF3Sg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zayed_bin_Sultan_Al_Nahyan