Ben Youssef, Salah (1910–1961)

Tunisian nationalist and politician. Habib Bourguiba's chief assistant and secretary general of the Néo-Destour party from the mid-1930s, he was to represent the most serious and strongest challenge to the former's leadership. Exiled in Egypt from 1952 and influenced by pan-Arabism and pan-Islamism ideals, he bitterly opposed the deal between Bourguiba and the French authorities to grant Tunisia home rule and called for full independence. He was expelled from the party, and the widespread revolt that followed his expulsion nearly caused a civil war.

Defeated, he sought refuge first in Tripoli and later in Cairo, and was assassinated in Frankfurt in 1961.