Djamila Bouhired, an icon of revolutionary struggle and resistance in the Arab world and in Algeria, one of the most prominent faces of the "Battle of Algiers", was chased and arrested by French forces in 1957, tortured and questioned before a biased trial in which the French judge Boinard pronounced the death sentence against her.
Her case provoked the world's outrage and the United Nations Human Rights Committee intervened to postpone and subsequently cancel her execution, Djamila Bouhired inspired many filmmakers, poets and artists and portrayed her resistance and courage for freedom and dignity.
Origins
Djamila Bouhired was born in 1935 in the old quarter of the Kasbah in Algiers, to an Algerian father and a Tunisian mother, and because she is the only girl among 5 young men, she received great attention from her father, who was educated and rejected French colonialism, taught her patriotism, and instilled in her the spirit of resistance.
In her childhood, she learned classical dance and horse riding, and after her school education she enrolled in an institute for sewing and detailing, and mastered the art of embroidery, but in her twenties she preferred to join the struggle and join the National Liberation Front.
Jamila Bouhired (centre) with Randa (right), wife of Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and PFLP leader Leila Khaled (French)
Revolutionary struggle
Djamila Bouhired joined the FLN in November 1956, with the help of her martyr uncle Mustapha Bouhired, who knew her as Biasif Saadi and Ali Lapointe, and was able to gain their trust because of her uncle's activism and the patriotism of her family.
When the Algerian revolution expanded from the mountains to the cities, and what is known as the "Battle of Algiers" began, Bouhired was entrusted with the task of contacting the bomb-makers and transporting them to whoever would be tasked with placing them in the European neighborhoods of Algiers.
Algerian beauties such as Djamila Bouazza, Djamila Boubacha and Samia Lakhdari were tasked with placing bombs in French cafes and cabarets, in accordance with the policy of the Liberation Front, which decided at the time to spread the war to the cities.
Accordingly, these attacks caused panic and terror among the population, and thus the jihadist Djamila Bouhired became the most important airport, due to her direct relationship with the Coordination and Implementation Committee of the Liberation Front and the leaders of the Battle of Algiers, in what was known as the "bomb case".
Djamila Bouhired during one of her visits to Damascus in 2009 (French)
Trial
Djamila Bouhired was arrested on Sphinx Street in the Kasbah on April 9, 1957, while trying to deliver a number of important documents to Yassif Saadi and Ali Lapointe, who, on charges of escaping, received a bullet in the shoulder.
Despite her wounds, she screamed so her colleagues could escape, then she was treated and operated on her chest, to extract the bullet she received, and the colonial authorities began interrogating her while she was in the hospital operating bed.
Her interrogation lasted 17 days, during which she was tortured with beatings, punching, humiliating and ironing with electricity cables in different parts of her body, but she remained steadfast, patient and determined to keep the names of her mujahideen and fedayeen friends.
When Dr. Janine visited her, she found that her wound had not healed due to the constant torture that left prominent marks on her body.
Jamila later explained the horror of the torture she was subjected to, saying, "I was tortured with electricity for 3 days straight, and I put electrical wires in my genitals, in my nostrils, in my ear openings, under my armpits, and on my breasts that were cauterized and my thighs, and the torture did not stop until I fainted and started delirious."
The colonial soldiers wanted to reach Yassif Saadi and Ali Lapointe, because they found in their possession letters from the leadership of the Liberation Front, and they also wanted information about the bombs and where they were manufacture, but they said nothing.
Her failure to disclose prompted them to arrest her 11-year-old younger brother, torture him to tell them the whereabouts of his sister's companions, and Yasif Saadi's nephew, but the boys told them nothing despite imprisonment and torture.
Professor Jacques Verges appointed a lawyer for Jamila under the law, and the latter rushed to obtain the record of her statements, which was fabricated and contained a confession to making bombs, and asked to meet with his client, but his request was rejected because of her secret imprisonment, and the judge harassed, insulted and insulted him, accusing him of treason.
Objecting to Verges' defense of Bouhired, the judge said French authorities were arresting doctors treating rebels, and lawyers defending them should have been arrested. The French authorities continued to harass the lawyer afterwards to the extent of an attempted murder.
The appeal hearing was set for September, but due to a new explosion at a club, the hearing was moved forward to mid-July 1957.
"New evidence" was added to the file, including some of her colleagues confessing to her after they were arrested, and she was sentenced for possession of explosives and destruction of buildings, attempted murder, complicity in murders, and joining a group of murderers.
Judge Renard was seeking the death sentence before the end of July 13, so that he could attend the military parade on July 14, the French national holiday, but the merits of the "bomb case" made it last until July 15, 1957.
Initially, the lawyers requested that investigations by the French military investigation team be excluded due to its harsh methods and its use of torture to obtain the statements of the accused, but the request was denied.
Although lawyer Jacques Verges reminded Judge Renard that France's case would be examined by the Commission on Human Rights in September 1957 and that it should not include incidents of torture, the judge became angry with the lawyer and prevented him from pleading.
Renard then sentenced Djamila Bouhired, then 22, to death, and when Jamila heard the verdict, she laughed and the judge shouted at her, "Don't laugh at the grandfather."
"Gentlemen, I know that you will sentence me to death, because those you serve are eager to see blood, yet I am innocent, you have based on an investigation report drawn up by the police and paratroopers, and you have concealed its true origin to this day, and the truth is that I love my country and want freedom, and that is why I support the struggle of the National Liberation Front."
"You are killing us, but do not forget that by doing so you are killing the traditions of freedom, and do not forget that by doing so you are tarnishing the honour of your country, and do not forget that you will never succeed in preventing Algeria from gaining its independence," she said.
Djamila Bouhired participating in one of the demonstrations of the Algerian popular movement in 2019 (French)
International condemnation
After the death sentence was pronounced, March 7, 1958 was set as the date for its execution, but the cables of condemnation and rejection that reached the United Nations Commission on Human Rights and the intervention of some Arab leaders made France retract the sentence and amend it to life imprisonment.
Djamila Bouhired was later transferred to French prisons, where she spent three years before Algeria gained independence on July 3, 5, returning to Algeria and marrying her lawyer, Jacques Verges.
Verges had defended a number of liberation revolution militants, and President Ahmed Ben Bella appointed her president of the Algerian Women's Union, but she preferred to resign after two years, and decided to stay away from the political arena permanently.
Return to Revolution Square
After 67 years, Djamila Bouhired returned to the capital's cafes to revive a new struggle against corruption in Algeria, joining young people protesting against the former regime, fulfilling a promise she made in 2013 to take to the streets if the late President Abdelaziz Bouteflika ran for a fourth term.
She accompanied the demonstrators in the so-called "Algerian Hirak" on April 27, 2019, who demanded the departure of Bouteflika and the symbols of the regime, and addressed them, saying, "It is time to do your part, young people, you must protect Algeria and liberate it from the hands of snakes and deadly creatures that did not know the value of Algeria."
Djamila also returned to the square to defend the right of students to demonstrate peacefully, and then refused to respond to the call for dialogue initiatives to provide solutions to Algeria in its current problems, justifying this by the need to make room for young people, and protesting her imprisonment of her brother.
In a statement in response to the change initiative, Bouhired said, "There is no dialogue with a regime that imprisons my brother the mujahid Lakhdar Bouregaa," and denied any relationship with the dialogue initiatives and affirmed her solidarity with the people's movement in pursuit of liberation and democracy.
Jamila Bouhired in literature and arts
The story of Jamila Bouhired inspired a number of artists and poets, as the Lebanese singer Fairuz sang her a song entitled "Letter to Jamila" written and composed by the Rahbani brothers.
The late Warda Al-Jazairia sang a song entitled "We are all beautiful", written by Michel Tohme and composed by Afif Radwan.
Egyptian director Youssef Chahine directed a film that tells her story and starring her entitled "Jamila", starring Magda, Rushdi Abaza and Mahmoud El Meligy, and it was a great public success.
But Jamila then refused to make a film about her life, commenting on Youssef Chahine's film, saying, "I never said a word about this film, but I said that they produced it while I was in the cell sentenced to death."
"Today, Algerian artists wanted to produce a film about me and I did not give them an answer with approval, so they told me but you agreed to make a film about you in Egypt, so I told them: I could not agree or reject because I was in the cell sentenced to death, and I wait for the jailer to come at every dawn to cut off my head, so where did you see Youssef Chahine until I agree?"
As for literature, Bouhired was an inspiration to many poets from different countries of the Arab world, and represented a symbol of revolution and struggle, and one of the most famous who wrote about her is the poet Nizar Qabbani, who wrote a poem entitled "Jamila Bouhired".
The poet Ahmed Abdul Muti Hijazi wrote a poem entitled "My Saint", and Najib Sorour wrote a poem entitled "Good Friday", intending the Friday in which Jamila was sentenced to death, as well as the Iraqi poet Badr Shaker Al-Sayyab.