Gazelle : The Palestinian Biological Bulletin (ISSN 0178 – 6288) . Number 112, April 2014, pp. 1-10. | Page 2

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The museum is organized in the following departments: Natural History
Department, Space Science Department, Planetarium, Electronics Department,
Machinery Department, Zoology Department, Aviation Department and a
Health hall (Wikipedia).
One of the various Halls was the Fish Hall. It contains a big collection of local
fishes, which was caught off the Arabian Gulf coast of Kuwait (Khalaf 1987).
A Coelacanth Fish (Latimeria chalumnae Smith, 1939) is displayed at Hamad
Mohammad Al-Atiqi (Museum Director 1972-1988) Hall. The Coelacanth was a
gift from the Government of the Islamic Federal Republic of the Comoros to the
then Kuwaiti Foreign Minister (and now the Emir of Kuwait) H.H. Al-Sheikh
Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, who in turn gave it as a gift to the Science
and Natural History Museum in August 1976.

The Coelacanth (Latimeria chalumnae) at the Educational Science Museum, Kuwait
City, State of Kuwait. 22.09.2013. Photo by: Prof. Dr. Sc. Norman Ali Khalaf-von Jaffa.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/50022881@N00/10144997653/
The Coelacanths constitute a rare order of fish that includes two extant species in
the genus Latimeria: the West Indian Ocean coelacanth (Latimeria chalumnae
Smith, 1939) and the Indonesian coelacanth (Latimeria menadoensis Pouyaud,
Wirjoatmodjo, Rachmatika, Tjakrawidjaja, Hadiaty & Hadie, 1999). They follow
the oldest known living lineage of Sarcopterygii (lobe-finned fish and tetrapods),
which means they are more closely related to lungfish, reptiles and mammals
Gazelle : The Palestinian Biological Bulletin – Number 112 – April 2014