He is the son of Mullah Mohammad, son of Mullah Faqe Karim, son of Kwekha Shaswari, son of Mohammad Khan, the elder of Zangana.
Mullah Ali Zaliawi/Zalwawi was born in 1890 in the Zaliaw village of Sangaw region.
Their family, known as the nobility (Al Abdulrahman Agha of Zangana), goes back to the nobles of Zangana.
His mother was originally from Egypt and her name was Amina, daughter of Kwekha Qadir, son of Mullah Mohammed, son of Mullah Ibrahimi, son of Mullah Hussein. The Caliph sent him to Iraqi Kurdistan for religious affairs and he became a great religious scholar there. Now there is a village named after him in Chamchamal district, which is the village of Mullah Hussein.
Mullah Ali Zaliawi says in some of his memoirs that our grandfather (Kwekha Shaswar) had a mosque, mullah and madrasa in Zalwa village, until the 1980s, but unfortunately the Ba'ath government destroyed it.
Zalwawi writes that at the age of seven, he studied in his mosque and madrasa in Zalwa village with his father (Mullah Mohammed).
Zalwawi was fluent in Arabic, Turkish and Persian. At the age of 14, he worked in calligraphy, leaving behind dozens of manuscripts.
Zalwaw completed his religious studies in Sulaymaniyah in the mosque and monastery of Mr. Ahmadi Sheikh. His friends were the late Mullah Mustafa Barzani, the great poet Qani', Sheikh Abdul Wahab Jaf and Mullah Abdullah.
After graduating, Sheikh Zalwawi returned to his village and became the Imam, Khatib and Qazi of Zalwawi village and Sangaw district in general. He was asked religious questions from all the surrounding villages and he answered them very well.
He has dozens of religious books and has also translated many books into Kurdish including (Tanbiya al-Ghafilin), (Tafsir al-Ahlam), (Qe al-Anbiya) and wrote a book on his family history entitled (History of our family in Sangao). This book deals with the history of the Zangana tribe and the Zangana of Ban Sangaw.
Zaliawi died on 18-03-1989 and was buried in Shorija cemetery in Kirkuk.[1]