Tall, dignified Shukri el-Kuwatly had been
called the George Washington of his country, but as Syria's first
elected President, ailing, aging El Kuwatly acted more like a
traditional, feckless Arab politician. He failed to stamp out
corruption, stood indolently by while food prices soared. When he sent
his army out to fight the Jews, the army was ignominiously beaten. For
months Damascus bazaars had buzzed with rumors that the army would
revolt. One night last week it did.Troops in armored cars occupied railways, telephone exchanges and border
stations. They arrested El Kuwatly in Damascus' military hospital,
routed Premier Khalid el-Azm out of bed and carried him off in his blue
silk pajamas. By morning most of the cabinet was locked up in Damascus'
Citadel, and Syrians got their first look at their new ruler.He was short, stumpy Brigadier Husni Zaim, who had fought against
Lawrence of Arabia in World War I and with the Vichy French in 1941.
Though Zaim was a veteran of many losing causes, he rose steadily,
first to chief of Syria's police, and finally to army chief of staff.
First rumors were that Zaim was an ardent nationalist, who would break
off truce negotiations with Israel, cancel the Trans-Arabian Pipeline
Co.'s rights to build a pipeline through Syria ,
and throw in his lot with Trans-jordan's King Abdullah, whose avowed
hope it is to build a “Greater Syria.” Zaim denied any such wild
intentions. His coup, he said, had “no foreign implications.”By week's end even some of Zaim's followers were wondering what the
domestic implications were. For a militant putschist, Zaim was getting
off to a slow start. First he tried to get Faris el-Khouri, former
Premier and Syria's delegate to the United Nations, to form a cabinet.
When El Khouri refused, Zaim dissolved parliament and appointed himself
temporary Premier at the head of a cabinet of “technicians.” Most
Syrians, sipping coffee in the bazaars and smoking their hubble-bubble
pipes, took hardly any notice of the change in government. In their
4,000-year history they had tasted the rule of Persians, Greeks,
Romans, Mongols, Turks and French; they were prepared to get used to
Zaim too.
