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State-Building Nationalism, secularism, and great power politics at the turn of the 20th century Some questions to consider: Islamists are in power in both Iran and Turkey. Why is Turkey so different from Iran? Why is the government in Egypt so different from the government in Saudi Arabia? Why has the military played an important role in the politics of Turkey? 1914 Two (major) political entities in the region: The Ottoman Empire (Egypt, Tunisia) Iran Ten years later… Turkey Egypt Iraq Transjordan (later Jordan) Syria Lebanon Saudi Arabia Iran The Ottoman Empire: the balance among linguistic, regional, and religious groupings was disturbed by European interventions and the internal political changes. The Ottoman decline: By the turn of the 20th century the Ottoman state became unstable. Keep in mind: The religious foundations of Ottoman rule. Legitimacy of the Ottoman Empire As long as loyalty to the empire appeared consistent with loyalty to the best interests of Islam (the ties of the ummah were paramount) most Arab Muslims accepted the legitimacy of the Ottoman rule. Modernism, Humanism, political liberalism, and the Enlightenment. A transition from communities of faith to national communities; Secular (universal) citizenship; Loyalty to the state and its institutions rather than to communal (mostly tribal) identities. Constitutional government; Anti-monarchism Religious pluralism, freedom, individualism; Unified legal, judicial, educational system; The expansion of the state instituions (bureaucracy, surveillance). The Ottoman swings in opposite direction: Constitutionalism; Religious restoration. Young Ottomans (bureaucracy): Secularization (legal, judicial, educational systems); Universal citizenship; The 1876 Constitution. Religious restoration (sultan Abdul Hamid II) Technological and administrative modernization, railways, post offices, warships but: Refurbished the long neglected title of caliph, Broadcasting pan-Islamic appeals, and Topped up the ranks of his administration with Arabs. Religious restoration and identity Pan-Islamisms Rather than: Ottomanism 1908 Widespread opposition to the sultan’s tyranny. A military rising in Monastir and Salonika (Rumelia); The sultan forced to call elections; The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) won a majority across the empire. The 1908 Young Turk “revolution” Officers demand that Abdul Hamid II restore the constitution. On July 24, 1908, the constitution was declared once again in effect. The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) government Overriding aim was the preservation of the empire, at whatever cost. They weren’t liberals but nor were they purely anti-colonial. The threats to the Ottoman Empire came from European powers or their regional allies, but the Young Turks did not reject the West culturally or politically. The 1909 counterrevolution Led by common soldiers and theological students in Istanbul who voiced their resentments against the influence of the Europeanized army officers Calling for the restoration of the shari’ah. Silenced by the Young Turks. Deposition of sultan Abdul Hamid II (succeeded by Mehmed V). A transformation of the Ottoman state was required: To give it a modern mass base (unifying patriotism). What ideological appeal could hold the populations divided by language, religion and ethnic origin of the Ottoman Empire together? The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) government Abolished the millet system (stressing its commitment to Ottomanism and to the ideal of preserving all Ottoman territory). But could not abandon the Islamic foundation on which imperial legitimacy had rested. Continued to stress the role of the sultan as caliph and to use Islamic symbols to buttress its own claims to legitimacy. Italian invasion (Libya) Of the North African province of Tripoli (October 1911) Ceding Tripoli, some Dodecanese Islands, including Rhodes National separatist movements: (Ottoman European provinces) Bulgaria proclaimed its final independence, Austria annexed the province of Bosnia, Crete declared union with the Greek mainland (1908); Albania proclaimed independence (1912); Ousted out of the Balkans (almost entirely) in 1912. During the Balkan wars about 100,000 Turks fled before the armies of Greece and Serbia; 15,000 Bulgars fled before the Greek army; 10,000 Greeks left Serbian and Bulgarian Macedonia; 70,000 Greeks left Western Bulgaria; 48,750 Muslims left western parts of the Greek peninsula, and 46,764 Bulgars lefts eastern parts of the Greek peninsula. In 1914, 265,000 Greeks were expelled from Turkey, and 85,000 deported to the interior. 115,000 Muslims left Greece, and 134,000 left other Balkan states for Turkey. The Arab cultural awakening (al nahdah) Syria: the source of the first expressions of pre-war Arabism. No organized political movement for national independence. Arabism Also a means through which some members of the Arab notable families protested against the CUP’s attacks on their political and economic status; A desire for Arab identity to receive greater recognition by the government. Political decentralization; cultural autonomy. Arab nationalism: Example: a Syrian reformer, Abd al-Rahman al Kawakibi (1854-1902), suggested that the Ottomans were responsible for the corruption of Islam. A glorification of the Arab role in the development of Islamic civilization. Kawakibi’s Arab nationalism: The virtues of Islam – its language, its Prophet, its early moral and political order – were Arab achievements. The decadence of Islam was caused by practices the Turks and other non-Arab peoples had introduced into the ummah. Arab nationalism: called for the Ottomans to relinquish their unjustified claim to the caliphate and to restore the office to its rightful possessors, the Arabs. The regeneration of Islam would begin with the establishment of an Arab caliph in Mecca whose responsibilities would be confined to purely religious matters. Egyptian nationalism Ahmad Lutfi al-Sayyid (1872-1963) Did not privilege Islam as the basis of national regeneration; One of the very first nation-state nationalists in the Arab world. The early (Arab) nationalists: Grappled with conflicting notions of what an Arab state might look like. Some imagined a kingdom centered in the Arabian peninsula. Others aspired to statehood in discrete parts of the Arab world. The CUP two-track policy: For public consumption, it proclaimed a civic nationalism, open to any citizen of the state, no matter what their creed or descent. On the other hand, it prepared for a more confessional or ethnic nationalism, restricted to Muslims or Turks. Turkish cultural movement - departure from Ottomanism (two main currents): Pan-Turkism (unifying bonds among all speakers of Turkish); QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. Turkism stressed the crucial Turkish contribution to the success of the Ottoman Empire; there was a pre-Islamic culture that distinguished the Turks from the other inhabitants of the empire. Prior to the First World War: Turkism did not develop into a coherent ideology defining specifically Turkish national state. But the discussion of a Turkish cultural heritage as distinct from the Ottoman one sowed the seeds for a Turkish nationalist movement in the postwar era. The Iranian constitutional revolution (1905-1911) and the Young Turk revolt: Similarity: a way to limit royal autocracy (absolutist monarchy). Difference: the Ottoman constitutional movement had been founded on a transformed bureaucratic elite and a reform-oriented officer corps. The Iranian movement was led by a coalition (merchants, ulama, European-oriented reformers). The Iranian constitutional revolution (1905-1911) and the Young Turk revolt: Another important difference: The Iranian movement was not secularizing constitutional movement. Constitutional clauses stated that Islam was the official religion of the state. The Iranian counterrevolution: Internal forces: The royalist used ulama loyal to the shah to denounce the constitutionalists as atheists and to arouse popular sentiment in favor of the monarchy. External forces: Effective division of Iran (Britain, Russia) World War 1 The Ottomans side with Germany, Austria Secret agreements Italy, Tsarist Russia, France, Arabs The Constantinople Agreement (1915) Britain, France, Russia. Awarded Russia the right to annex Istanbul and the Turkish straights. QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. The Sykes-Picot Agreement (1916) Recognized long-standing French claims to Syria by awarding France a large zone of “direct control.” Guaranteed the British position in Iraq. QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. The Sykes-Picot Agreement (1916): The independent Arab state lying in the two zones of British and French indirect influence. Palestine was to be placed under international administration. Sharif Husayn ibn Ali (the emir of Mecca) and the British British officials sought out a Muslim dignitary who might be persuaded to ally with the Entente powers (as a counterweight to the prestige of the Ottoman sultan-caliph). The emir of Mecca was selected from among those families claiming direct descent from the Prophet and thus bore the honorific title of sharif. Sharif Husayn ibn Ali (the emir of Mecca) QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. Sharif Husayn ibn Ali Claimed to represent all the Arab people. Distrusted the (Ottoman) CUP on both political and religious grounds. The CUP regime is atheistic; it ignores the Quran and the shari’a. Husayn-McMahon correspondence July 1915 - March 1916 An exchange of ten letters that lie at the root of a controversy over whether Britain pledged to support an independent Arab state. Husayn: Requested British recognition of an independent Arab state embracing the Arabian peninsula, the provinces of greater Syria (including Lebanon and Palestine), and the provinces of Iraq-- essentially the Arabic-speaking world east of Egypt -- in exchange for his commitment to lead an armed rebellion against the Ottomans. QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. Britain informed Husayn that The areas west of a line from Damascus, Homs, Hama, and Alepo could not be included in the proposed Arab state (because its inhabitants were not purely Arab!!!) The real reason: France claimed control over the Syrian coast. QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. Britain promised to provide Husayn with supplies, weapons, and funds for his revolt against the Ottomans. To recognize an Arab caliphate should one be proclaimed. Husayn committed himself to an all-out armed uprising, a denunciation of the Ottoman regime as an enemy of Islam and abandoning the Arab claim to coastal Syria. Husayn and Islamic solidarity: Tried to portray his action as a duty to Islam. Called on all Muslims of the empire to join him. Careful not to attack the caliph, Husayn urged Muslims to rise up and liberate their caliph from the clutches of the CUP. Palestine: McMahon’s language was so ambiguous and so vague that it gave rise to widely conflicting interpretations. Was Palestine included as part of the future independent Arab state? British officials later claimed that the region was part of the coastal Syrian territory that had been reserved for France and was thus excluded from the Arab state. The Balfour Declaration (1917) Britain agreed to favor the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine. In an effort to secure control over the territory adjacent to the Suez canal; appeal to US, Russian, and German Jewry. The Versailles Peace Agreements 19191923 Self-determination (selectively, as it turns out); Secret diplomacy, treaties; and The League of Nations. The Treaty of Sevres (August 1920) Anatolia: a partition of the original core of the Ottoman Empire (Italy and France were to divide southwestern Anatolia between them) The (Bosphorus) straits placed under the jurisdiction of an international commission. QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. The Treaty of Sevres (August 1920) cont. Granted Thrace to Greece. Recognized an independent Armenian state in eastern Anatolia and Russian Caucasia (with no aid). The Kurdish regions of eastern Anatolia would have a semiautonomous status (but with no aid). QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. The San Remo Conference (April 1920) Detached the Arab provinces from Ottoman authority and apportioned them between Britain and France. The former provinces were divided into entities called mandates. Britain received the mandates for Iraq and Palestine, France the mandate for Syria. Sharif Husayn Emerged from the war as king of Hijaz. QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. The Syrian Kingdom (1918-1920) and the creation of Transjordan: Amir Faysal formed an Arab government in Damascus; The government was staffed by young Arab activists with dreams of a united Syria and Palestine, by ex-Ottoman officials and military officers who converged on Damascus, and by prominent local Syrian notables. In March 1920, a general Syrian congress proclaimed Syria an independent state with Faysal as its king. The rebirth of an Arab kingdom on the site of the former Umayyad imperial capital. The declaration of Syrian independence A usurpation of French claims to the region and a violation of the Franco-British agreement to divide the Arab areas. Britain had to renounce any support, it may have been prepared to give Faysal and his Syrian kingdom. On July 24, 1920 the French forces defeated Faysal’s army, occupied Damascus, and forced the king of Syria into exile in Europe. Transjordan: Faysal’s brother, Amir Abdallah, led a tribal contingent from Mecca to Ma’an (a desert town east of the Jordan river). His presence in Ma’an had the potential to rally dissident tribes in the region. Transjordan: Abdallah was offered the opportunity to set up an administration in Amman under British administrative guidance; His territory would be part of the Palestine mandate, but it would be exempted from the stipulation of the Balfour Declaration. The emirate of Transjordan came into existence. QuickTime™ and a decompressor are needed to see this picture. From the Arab perspective Britain had made a pledge it did not honor; the Arabs had been misled and then betrayed. The British pledges to Husayn had been sacrificed to the requirements of Allied harmony and imperial selfinterest. Pushes for independent Arab states (1919-1920) The Syrian delegation to the Paris Peace Conference; The Egyptian demand to participate at te conference (Egypt’s Revolution of 1919). Egypt (1919): The ancient mosque university of al-Azhar became one of the centers of the uprising; A religious shaykh inside the mosque: “haranguing an audience of many hundred from the top of a pile of stones, telling them that hey must scorn death itself in their efforts to destroy the tyrant, and throw off his yoke, and promising Paradise to ‘Martyrs’ in the holy cause” The Ottoman Empire Embodied the achievements of the Islamic past, Also offered hope, that a distinctly Islamic state could survive in a world of expansionist European powers (the religious foundations of Ottoman rule). By 1920 Neither that state nor its Islamic institutions held sway in the Middle East. Its former Arab and Turkish subjects were left adrift.