Meanwhile, Sayf al-Islam Ahmad had managed to get away from Taizz and made for Hajjah, where he gathered the tribes around him, proclaimed himself Imam with the title of al-Nasir and within a month of the assassination had easily regained control of Sana'a and executed the principal perpetrators of the rebellion.

[citation needed] An assassination attempt on the life of Imam Ahmad in March 1961 left the latter gravely crippled, so in October Sayf al-Islam al-Badr took over effective control of the government.

A week later rebels shelled his residence, Dar al-Bashair, in the Bir al-Azab district of Sana'a whence on September 26, 1962, Abdullah as-Sallal, whom al-Badr had appointed commander of the royal guard, staged a coup, and declared himself president of the Yemen Arab Republic.

His uncle Sayf al-Islam al-Hasan, who had been abroad and had been proclaimed Imam at the news of al-Badr's alleged demise, immediately gave allegiance to him together with all the princes of the Hamid al-Din family.

[citation needed] Soon the entire tribal confederation of Bakil along with most of Hashid who occupied the central and northern highlands of Yemen and who had been Zaydis for centuries joined enthusiastically the cause of the Imam and the princes to fight the revolutionary regime.

He went to England, where he lived quietly in a modest house in Kent, only going abroad to visit the holy cities of Mecca and Medina and to call on relatives and friends in that part of the world.