The Qatar National Unity Front was co-founded by Abdullah Al Missned, a wealthy businessman, and a tribal leader and government official named Hamad Al Attiya in response to the 19 April shooting.[1][11] It soon gained popularity among Arab nationalists, individuals sympathetic to the Ba'ath Party, Qatari workers and low-ranking Al Thani officials.[3][11] The movement was strongest in the northern city of Al Khor.[4] Ibrahim Shahdad, a professor of modern history, suggests that the actual inception date of the National Unity Front was not in April 1963 but in the late fifties, a period when many secret nationalist cells were established.[7]