Abd al-Qadir
(1807-1883) Algerian religious and military leader credited with unifying Algerian territory into a state through his campaign against French Colonization.
Considered a hero of anti-colonial resistance by many contemporary Algerians, Abd al-Qadir created an Arab-Berber alliance to oppose French expansion in the 1830s and 1840s. He also organized an Islamic state that, at one point, controlled the western two-thirds of Algeria's inhabited land.
Abd al-Qadir's ability to unite Arabs and Berbers owed in part to the legacy of his father, the head of the Hashim tribe in Mascara and leader of the Qadirayya regional political body, which opposed the Turkish sultanate. As the French expanded westward into territories of Algeria, in 1832 Abd al-Qadir led attacks on French-occupied Oran, taking the city within six months. In 1837, the French signed the Treaty of Tafna with Abd al-Qadir, acknowledging his sovereign authority over an area encompassing two-thirds of Algeria.
Source: Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience, (1999) Edited by, Appiah, Kwame Anthony, & Gates, Henry Louis.
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