Image Source:
Mohammad Ali Eltaher Library and Website
Originally founded in complete secrecy, the League of National was
a coalition of fifty like-minded nationalists who wanted sovereignty,
independence, and unity of Arab lands. To drive out the French from Syria, they
needed an economic rebirth, preaching a certain degree of socialism . The League’s founder was a
young nationalist from Talkalakh, Abdul Razzaq al-Dandashi. Among its founders were the Damascus merchant
Uthman al-Sharabati, his son the MIT-trained Ahmad al-Sharabati, future prime minister Sabri al-Asali, Wasif Kamal a Palestinian intellectual from
Nablus, Jalal al-Sayyed a nationalist from Deir ez-Zour, the Syrian officer in
the Iraqi Army Mahmud al-Hindi, and the Boy Scout founder from Talkalakh, Ali
Abdul Karim al-Dandashi. The founders list also included the AUB professors
Constantine Zurayk and the Georgetown-trained George Tomeh, the educator Ahmad Munif al-Aidi, the
philosopher Zaki al-Arsuzi, the nationalist leader Fihmi al-Mahayri, and the
Atasi cousins Adnan, Makram, and Hilmi. Adnan al-Atasi, a Paris-trained
political scientist, was the son of Hashem al-Atasi.