Charged with bringing the Tunisian request for statehood to the United Nations, which was gathered in Paris in March 1952, he barely escaped arrest and deportation.

He then traveled across the world for more than three years, during which he was received by Gamal Abdel Nasser, President of Egypt, Jawaharlal Nehru, Prime Minister of India, and Zhou Enlai, Premier of the People's Republic of China.

In his view, the wholesale evacuation of French Troops from the entirety of Tunisian territory was an indisputable prerequisite for genuine national independence.

[3] Convened on October 8, under Bourguiba's leadership, the Neo-Destour caucus decided to open session and thereupon demand that Ben Youssef be expelled from the party.

Realizing that the relationship between Bourghiba and himself would forever be intractable, Ben Youssef, who was afflicted by eczema on his legs, took up residence in a hotel in Wiesbaden, West Germany on June 2, 1961, in order to use the local thermal baths.

[4] Less than twenty days after the conclusion of the Bizerte crisis and basking in patriotic fervour of the Tunisian people, Bourghiba judged that the moment had come to remove his principal political rival.

[4] Once Ben Youssef arrived in Frankfurt, he left his wife Soufia in a café on the Kaiserstrasse and went towards the Hotel Royal, situated on the same street.

He was taken to the University Hospital Frankfurt where he died around 22:45 without ever regaining consciousness[4] He was sent back to Cairo and entombed there, but his remains were later repatriated to Tunisia and re-interred in the Martyr's Square at Jellaz Cemetery.