A rare photo of Farhan al-‘Olayyan

A rare photo of Farhan al-‘Olayyan al-Faraj made it today on the Facebook page of the Shumaylat section of the Fadaan Bedouin tribe. He is the man on the left of the photo. The young man in the middle is Tamir son of Nuri son of Miqhim ibn Mhayd, who went on to become the Shaykh of the Fadaan tribe during the 1980s and 1990s. Starting from the late 1950s and well into the 1980s, Farhan al-‘Olayyan, acting as the agent of the Mhayd Sheykhs, organized the purchase and the shipment to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia of several hundreds of the best desert-bred mares in Syria, the large majority from the ‘Anazah Bedouin tribes. Most of them went as gifts to Aal Saud princes and other senior government officials in Saudi Arabia. Some of the Bedouins who would not sell willingly were coerced into selling. In the span of those three decades, the Kingdom granted Saudi citizenship to tens of thousands of ‘Anazah Bedouins that were Syrian citizens, as well as monetary and other material incentives to settle in Saudi Arabia. All the Sba’ah and the Fad’aan, and most of the Hsinah and Wuld Ali moved to Saudi Arabia.…