Fatimah el-Sharif

Fatimah as-Senussi
Queen consort of Libya
Queen Fatima of Libya
Reign	24 December 1951 – 1 September 1969
Born	1911 Oasis of Kufra, Italian Libya
Died	3 October 2009 (aged 98) Cairo, Egypt
Burial	Hamza Cemetery, Medina, Saudi Arabia
Spouse	Idris I of Libya
House	Senussi
Father	Ahmed Sharif as-Senussi
Mother	Khadija bint Ahmad al-Rifi
Religion	Islam

Sayyida Fatimah el-Sharif (Arabic: فاطمة الشريف‎‎); after marriage, Fatimah as-Senussi (فاطمة السنوسي), ca. 1911 – 3 October 2009), was queen consort of King Idris of the Kingdom of Libya until the overthrow of the monarchy in 1969.

Fatimah el-Sharif was born in Italian Libya in 1911, the fifth daughter of Ahmed Sharif as-Senussi, the former chief (3rd) of the Senussi order of Sufism. Her father was active in resistance toward the colonial forces. Her mother Khadija, Ahmad Sharif's second wife, was a daughter of the influential general Ahmad al-Rifi.

In 1929, she was forced to flee on camel to Egypt from Marshall Rodolfo Graziani.

In 1931, she married her cousin Idris of Libya, then Emir of Cyrenaica and her father's successor, in Siwa Oasis. Their only son died in 1953, aged one day old.

Upon her husband's accession as King of Libya in 1951, Fatimah became Queen. In 1954, her nephew assassinated Idris' advisor Ibrahim al-Shelhi because of a rumour that Shelhi had convinced the King to divorce Fatima in favour of a marriage with his own daughter. Idris then ordered the execution of Fatima's nephew. When Idris decided to obey the demands to remarry in order to have an heir, Fatimah selected two women as prospective brides: he chose neither of them, but instead an Egyptian heir appointed by his premier, Alia Abdel Kader Lamloum, whom he married in 1955. As there was no divorce, Fatimah however refused to leave the royal residence in Tobruk, and after a couple of months, she and Idris reconciled.

Fatimah was in Turkey with her spouse at the time of Muammar Gaddafi's coup in 1969. With the help of the Turkish government they returned from the resort town of Borsa to Kanmena Yourla in Greece. On 13 September she wrote to their lifetime friend Eric Armar Vully de Candole, CBE, who held the post of Her Britanic Majesty’s Resident, Cyrenaica: "We could not answer your cables and letters as I was alone with my husband when the coup took place without any money at all until the Turkish Government came to our help, paid our hotel and arranged our journey to Greece." She wrote to Mr. de Candole again on 26 October: "The weather here is cold and Ramadan will soon start and we cannot perform fasting obligations in any European Country. It is the will of God and may it be for the benefits of all. We shall sail next Friday for Alexandria and the same day get to Cairo." She subsequently lived in Cairo from 3 November 1969 until her death.