Ahmad Izzat Pasha al-Abed with Emir Faisal in Geneva in 1919

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Image Source: Al-Abed page on Facebook

Ahmad Izzat Pasha al-Abed had been the private adviser and confident of the Ottoman Sultan Abdulhamid II. Among his achievements were the Hijaz Railway, the electricity of Damascus, the telegraph system, and the Victoria Hotel in Damascus. Due to his closeness with Abdulhamid, he managed to achieve all of these feats, and secured the appointment of his son Mohammad Ali as the Ottoman Ambassador to Washington DC. He was exiled from Istanbul after the Ottoman coup of 1908 and remained in Egypt and Europe until his death in Cairo in 1924. Faisal at the time was touring Europe during and after the Paris Peace Conference of January 1919.