• The Dajani Family

The prominent Dajani family is deeply rooted in the history of Palestine, and especially in the Holy City of Jerusalem, wherein it was entrusted by the “Supreme Gate” of the Ottoman Empire as the Custodian of Prophet David’s Mausoleum at the Mount of Prophet David-- referred to also as Mount Zion.

According to the Bible, there is a site in Palestine called “Dagoon”, which distributed the sweet-smelling Tamer-Hennah (a small flower). This possibly indicates an ancient origin of the family in Palestine, especially as the site “Dagoon” seems to have developed into “Beit Dajan”, a village still existing in Palestine in the neighborhood of the port city of Jaffa. Apparently members of the Dajani family moved to the Arabian Peninsula with time, where they established new roots for the family.

The family has a very close-knit fabric with the families of Jerusalem and Palestine. Originally from the heartland of the Arabian Peninsula, the Dajanis have their origins in Arabia, and a large number of the family, under the leadership of Sufist Sheikh Ahmed Dajani, joined the Islamic armies which conquered Spain in the 15^th century. Later Sheikh Ahmed Dajani established himself in Morocco and Mauritania where his followers belonged to the Tejani tribes who are widely spread in North Africa. The kinsmanship still exists and is recognized by both branches of the family in Jerusalem and North Africa.

Sheikh Ahmed Dajani led pilgrims to Jerusalem where he was recognized as a reputed religious leader. As a reward for his services to the people of Jerusalem, the Ottoman Empire appointed him as the custodian of Prophet David’s Mausoleum, which included a large hall recognized as the Last Supper of Jesus Christ and his Disciples. The place remains as a site for annual visits by the followers of the Catholic Christian denomination.

A branch of the family lived in a conglomeration of apartments around the Mausoleum bearing the additional name Daoudi [Dawudi], Arabic reference to David. When Ibrahim Pasha, son of Mohammed Ali Pasha the Great, of Egypt, visited Jerusalem in 1831, the Dajani family built a special hall close to the Mausoleum for his residence. This hall is still known as the Ibrahimiyya. When Sultan Abdel Majid of the Ottoman Empire visited Jerusalem towards the end of the 19^th century, a special hall was built for his residence which is still known as the Majidiyya.

Members of the Dajani family maintained the tradition of offering a free dinner to pilgrims passing through Jerusalem to and from Mecca-- until the end of the British Mandate and the occupation of the site by Israel-- as the family was granted large areas of land held in trust. A tythe of the produce was paid to the family to spend it on charitable services. The tythe was collected by Ottoman administrators and continued to be collected under the British Mandate, and later by the Jordanian administration until the June 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

Considered an upper middle class family, its members excelled in many professions and in trade activities and chambers of commerce and industry. Numbering more than 10,000 individuals, they are spread in many parts of Arab and foreign countries as well as in Jerusalem. The Dajani family established a cultural and educational center as well as a football team, which included in its membership Christian and resident Greek sportsmen, among others. The football team won the Palestine Arab Cup in 1944.

Many members of the Dajani family held important functional, political and economic roles in the city. They mainly concentrated on professional services. Under the Jordanian government many members of the Dajani family occupied ministerial positions while others occupied seats in the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies.

Sheikh Hussein Bin Salim al-Dajani (1788-1858) was the Grand Mufti of Haifa and in 1863, Abdel Rahman Affendi al-Dajani became the first Mayor of the Municipality of Jerusalem which at the time was the second municipality to be established in the Ottoman Empire after the Municipality of Istanbul. Abdullah Shafik al-Dajani (1871-1927) was a well-known judge in Jaffa.

The first surgeon to obtain an F.R.C.S. diploma from London was Dr. Fuad Dajani, who built the first private hospital in Jaffa known as the Dajani Hospital.

Sheikh Ragheb al-Dajani was the first Palestinian to form Christian Muslim Societies in the different cities of Palestine in 1918 to speak on behalf of Palestinians against the Balfour Declaration of November 2, 1917.

The Christian Muslim societies later developed into the first Political National Conference of Palestine under the leadership of Musa Kazem Pasha al-Husseini, grandfather of Faisal Al-Husseini, who was in charge of the Jerusalem File within the Palestine National Authority (PNA). Its deputy leader, Aref Pasha Dajani (1860-1930), was in the early 1920s a former mayor of Jerusalem and the President of the Muslim-Christian Association. He played a major political role in both the Ottoman and British periods.

Among the outstanding members of the family was Subhi Taher Dajani, who was the first blind person to learn and introduce the Braille system of writing. He gained the Oxford and Cambridge School Certificate from the English College in Jerusalem and was the first blind student to be accepted by the American University of Beirut, where he graduated from. In 1934, he established the first school for the blind in Palestine and was the first to publish the Holy Koran in the Braille system for the benefit of the blind. He also established a library for the blind in Jerusalem. His brother, Dr. Mahmud Taher Dajani, established the Red Cross and Crescent Association in Jerusalem in 1947 with the support and cooperation of the veteran Jerusalem physician Dr. Tewfiq Canaan. He served as the Minister of Health in the Jordanian government. Another brother, Haj Ali Taher Dajani, served as a minister of transportation in the Jordanian cabinet in the mid 1960s. Their brother, Mohammed Taher Dajani, was elected in the late 1950s and early 1960s as a member of the Municipality of Jerusalem and the Arab Chamber of Commerce.

Kamel Dajani was the first to issue a newspaper in Jaffa called Al-Sabah (The Morning) dealing with the then current political issues.

Hassan Sidqi Dajani, one of the main leaders of al-Dajani-Nashashibi opposition, was assassinated in 1938 by the Husseini faction. In the 1940s and 1950s his son Omar Sidqi al-Dajani was a confident and political advisor of King Abdullah of Jordan. Said Wafa al-Dajani was a district officer in the British Mandate government, served in the Jordanian administration, and from 1965 was a Cabinet Minister several times. Kamal Dajani also was a Jordanian government minister in the 1960s, as were Nijm-ul-Din Dajani in the 1970s, after serving as Ambassador, and Raja'i Dajani in the 1980s. Ahmed Sidqi Dajani, was a senior PLO functionary, a member of the PLO Executive Committee 1977-85, a member of the Palestinian National Council, a director of the PLO Research Center and co-founder of its organ Shu'un Filastiniyya [Palestine Affairs].

Sources: http://www.jerusalemites.org/people_and_land/families/6.htm; Yaacov Shimoni, Biographical Dictionary of the Middle East (New York: Facts On File, 1991), p. 70; Adil Manna', A'laam Filasteen fi awakhir al-'ahd al-Uthmani 1800-1918 [The Notatables of Palestine at the end of the Ottoman period] Beirut: Institute for Palestine Studies, 1995), pp.170-177.