God Bless Your Soul.

I was in Kuwait the day he passed away, my brother tried to wake me up at 6 AM telling me that he passed away! and since my brother has a great sense of humor and I was so tired from the night before I thought that he was just trying to wake me up by telling me something so absurd, to get me all worried. but wait a second, he wouldn't joke about death! That's when I woke up! We had to go to the cemetery that morning because my cousin's one year old son passed away the night before! I picked up my phone from the nightstand and found 7 messages!!! I thought how come? I slept at 4 AM! who would send me that many messages so early in the morning! and in less than 2 hours when everyone is supposed to be sleeping.. I opened them and each one of them confirmed what my brother had just told me! I was shocked! so shocked that I was speechless.. I went upstairs to the living room and I found my parents there, standing in the middle of the room, so early in the morning.. no one said a word, but the look on everyone's face was enough to tell that the loss is big.. I was born a few years after he was named Emir of the State of Kuwait, and I just found out that 65% of Kuwaitis were born during his reign... Baba Jaber, that's what we all called him! he wasn't just the Emir.. he was our father! Jaber has been through a lot with us, beginning with the assassination attempt by one of the neighboring countries' terrorist groups that was going to take him away from us in 1985, through the invasion of Kuwait and to the re-building of Kuwait after it's liberation. I still remember him coming on Saudi TV when I was in my uncle's house in Khobar , Saudi Arabia telling us that Kuwait will be back, and I still remember the day I was in my uncle's house in Riyadh when he gave his speech infront of the United Nations asking the countries that love peace to help Kuwait in it's crisis, and I still remember him when he gave his second speech after the liberation thanking the leaders of the world for what they did and everyone stood up and clapped for him in respect for him! The speech was touching, enough to have been printed in every Kuwaiti's memory, every Kuwaiti remembers that speech and they all cried when he cried at the podium of the UN that day. I've been reading a lot of articles about the father of Kuwait, in the past few days, and I couldn't stop the tears from falling whenever I read more about him! it's such a great loss. he was the model leader, Modest and Wise. Wise enough to have made the Next Generations Fund which saved Kuwait during the invasion, and wise enough to stand up behind his idea of creating the Gulf Co-Operation Council (GCC) and calling the initiative to start the United Arab Emirates which was his idea along with his brother Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al-Nahyan God bless his soul. and wise enough to start the Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development when he was the Minister of Finance, which not only gives long term low interest loans to Arab countries but to all developing nations that required help. Modest enough to live in a less than ordinary house, modest enough to joke with the kids, and modest enough to drive his own car before the attempt on his life, he drove an old model middle class car just because he didn't want Kuwaitis to think that he's better than them, but he wanted them to know that he's an equal! he's one of them! he's the father of the Kuwaiti House! I've been lucky to have met him in person on numerous occasions, I still remember the first time I met him when I was just a little kid. and I met him at least several times a year since that. but not in the last 4 years due to the fact that I moved to Dubai. I've been reading a lot about him in the past few days, I thought that I knew a lot about him already! but after reading what was written, I realized that what I knew was nothing compared to what he has done! God blessed us with this ruling family, starting from the day the Kuwaiti's chose Sabah The First, to run the day to day tasks and solve problems between Kuwaitis when the merchants were off to India and East Africa in the 1700's, to this day when Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad is recommended by the cabinet to succeed Sheikh Saad Al-Abdullah Al-Salem where the Kuwaitis proved to the world how civilized they are and that we have a constitution that we go back to to solve our problems, and that the democracy in Kuwait is not just a word we say! Now, The Parliament voted today to oust Sheikh Saad due to his critical health conditions, the cabinet nominated Sheikh Sabah to succeed him. and in the next few days the parliament would vote for or against the cabinet's choice and if they vote for Sheikh Sabah then he would be our next Emir, but if they vote against, the cabinet would have to recommend 3 candidates from the ruling family and the parliament (which is elected by the people) would vote and the one with the highest number of votes would be our next Emir! After they do that, the same process will be repeated to nominate the Crown Prince. Sheikh Jaber will always be remembered as the leader we all loved, he guided us through the hard times along with Sheikh Saad, and we shall always remember and respect them and wish Sheikh Saad a quick recovery. God Bless Kuwait! God Bless Bu Mubarak! Please click on the topic of the article to watch the speech of Khalifa Ali Al-Khalifa the editor in chief of Al-Watan newspaper during the march from Dasman (The residence of Sheikh Jaber) to the cemetery where he was burried.