One single incident changed Hassen’s life upside down from a thief to a warrior. The incident started when his Friends in the town of Kalaa Kbira asking him to return the cows of a widow, that someone else stole. he promised to get them back at whatever cost. Hassen started collecting and buying information on the heist and find out that a well-known Tunisian traitor working with the French military was behind it. The traitor was a native of the same town of Kalaa Kbira well known and protected by the French government. Hassen did not give up even though he knew the mission was almost impossible. For months, hundreds of kilometers and a cost that required him to sell portion of his father’s land, he was moving from town to town collecting information on the cows and their whereabouts until he got to them before crossing the Algerian boarders.
The motto of the town of El Ouardanine “Foreigners are always welcomed, safe and protected”. In the early thirties, a young man short, white and with blue eyes came alone to the town and asked to talk to the people, his name was Habib Bourguiba. The people appreciated his courage and allowed him to give a speech. The next day in his speech Mr. Bourguiba asked the support of the town’s outlaws (he later gave them the name “Waled El LIL” or “Sons Of The Nights”). After the speech he was introduced to their leader Hassen Abdelaziz and since that day he got the support and protection of one of the most powerful man in the country. Bourguiba, later, went to Ksar Hellal’s meeting with strong ideas but mostly backed by strong and feared allies.
In 1946, El Ouardani went to Algeria in order to synchronize a resistance with Ahmed Ben Bella and other Algerian leaders. After visiting Algeria, he decided with Bourguiba that Tunisia should start the fight alone. He started forming his team, most of them were from his old guard the “Sons Of The Night”. Two of them were being charged for a felony and Hassen asked members of the Destourian party to find a way to get them out. Before going in front of the judge Mohamed Farhat, a junior prosecutor at that time, changed their crime on file for a misdemeanor drunk in public and they were set free.
In the first meeting of the Fellagha leaders with Bourguiba, El Ouardani proposed and got unanimous acceptance that the Fellagha should be composed of independent groups controlled by different leaders based on region. This strategy had two major benefits it would give the French occupation army the impression that the uprising is all over the country at the same time it would be impossible for the French to control the entire leadership by either corruption or imprisonment.