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Palestine's ambassador to Iran retires after four decades

Yusef Jalali
Press TV, Tehran

He is referred to as the head of ambassadors in Iran. Salah al-Zawawi has retired after completing his fortieth year as the Palestinian ambassador to Iran. He finished his tenure in January, when he was succeeded by his daughter Salam al-Zawawi.

Here at the Tehran office of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, the former Palestinian envoy was honored for his four decades of activities.

Following the victory of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Iran ended its alliance with Israel and officially recognized Palestine as a state. This was followed by shutting down the Israeli embassy and turning it over to the Palestinian Liberation Organization.

Al-Zawawi was among a delegation headed by then PLO chief, Yasser Arafat, who came to Iran days after the revolution and symbolically took over the keys of the embassy.

Al-Zawawi is one of the founding members of Fatah political party and the second Palestinian ambassador to Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

He has held the post in Iran since 1981, and before that he served as the Palestinian ambassador to Algeria, Brazil and Kenya.

Throughout his career, al-Zawawi took major steps to shed light on the Israeli occupation of Palestine, which has been ongoing for more than seven decades.

After four decades of serving as Palestine's envoy to Iran, al-Zawawi is now retiring, but unlike any other ambassador, he is not going to live his retired life in his country, as he is one of the millions of Palestinian diaspora who are denied the right to return to their homeland.


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