Hamza Boubakeur

Hamza Boubakeur or Hamza Al-Sid-Boubakeur, born on 15 June 1912 in Geryville (then French Algeria) as Aboubakeur ben Hamza ben Kadour, deceased on 4 February 1995 in Paris, was a French politician and Muslim cleric.

He was appointed (di)rector of the Great Mosque of Paris by SFIO Prime Minister Guy Mollet in 1957, replacing Si Kaddour Benghabrit, and kept this position until the appointment of Sheikh Abbas Bencheikh el Hocine in 1982. Hamza Boubakeur is the author of a French translation of the Quran. He is also the father of Dalil Boubakeur, since 1992 himself rector of the Great Mosque of Paris.

Hamza Boubakeur was elected as MP of Department of Oasis in the first legislature of the French Fifth Republic from 1958 to 1962 and President of the General Council of this French Algerian Department.

After his death, he was buried in the sand in the middle of the Sahara in 1995.