The Fall of the Ottoman Empire
The Fall of the Ottoman Empire
reviewing important stuff in history that impacts the present-day Muslim world
I’m going to review the history, since it’s been a while since we had our heads in this stuff. I have taken this from my post back in December, you can review the footnotes for sources and the very lengthy (like, it’s 27 minutes long) post [here].
So, after the Ottoman Empire collapsed and The League of Nations appointed the British to rule the lands of the dead empire—what did happen? Let’s review some of that history to remind ourselves how we got to the present.
Partitioning of the MENA region — the French Mandate for Syria + Lebanon, the British Mandate for Iraq, the British Mandate for Palestine = Mandatory Palestine + Transjordan, Kingdom of Hejaz (precursor to KSA), Kingdom of Yemen, British Protectorates of Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar.
Hussein bin Ali of Hejaz, Emir of Mecca and leader of an Arab revolt against the Ottoman Empire, declares himself king of Arabs in 1916, refuses to sign the Versailles Treaty and the British-allied Sauds defeat him and annex his territory in 1925. The Palestinian flag we know of today was designed for the Arab Revolt of 1916 against the Ottoman Turks.
From 1889 to 1926 the Committee of Union + Progress ruled the Ottoman Empire as a one party state and carried out several campaigns of ethnic cleansing—Armenian, Greek, Assyrian.
In 1928 rabidly anti-Jewish + anti-Western + anti-modernity + political Islamist + a fanboy of the Salafist Rashid Rida—Hassan al-Banna—forms the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist group shilling for pan-Arab nationalism and which had a secret military arm. (Would this be like an Arab Islamist Sinn Féin, maybe?) al-Banna promoted the idea of the jihad of the sword (terrorism) over the jihad of the heart (emotional intelligence) and sought to recreate the 7th century society in which Muhammad and His Companions lived.
Can I just point out that Rashid Rida + Hassan al-Banna, a couple a hyper masculine + fanatical + emotionally unintelligent Egyptian d1ckbags from nearly a hundred years ago, heavily influenced the culture of Muslim thought worldwide in dangerous + toxic ways still apparent today, 2021?
NB—the Balfour Declaration is signed in 1917 and at this time the word Palestinian does not mean exclusively Arab or Muslim, and Zionists took Palestine to mean the Jewish homeland.
Initially pan-Arab nationalists dreamed of restoring the ancient sacred lands of Bilad al-Sham, this encompassed modern-day Syria, Lebanon, Israel + Jordan. This left-hand region of the Hejaz people contrasts with the right-hand-region, al-Yaman, modern-day Yemen.
Mufti al-Husayni instigated the Nebi Musa riots of 1920, then fled to Damascus, where the French gave him refuge. He was tried and sentenced to 10 years in prison in absentia, and subsequently pardoned by the British, who appointed him high commissioner of Jerusalem in 1921. Jews received harsher sentences for their part in the riots than did Arabs, some sources report.
Three weeks after al-Husayni became Mufti of Jerusalem, riots in Jaffa and elsewhere killed 43 Jews.
al-Husayni became president of the Supreme Muslim Council in 1922, President of the Arab Higher Committee in 1936–with each position gaining more political power and forging a new kind of Palestinian national identity that firmly symbolised rejection of Jews.
al-Husayni took control of all religious money in Palestine, used his influence to control all Muslim schools + mosques and demand all Muslims pay him complete fealty. He demanded that Winston Churchill unite Syria, TransJordan, Palestine into a pan-Arabian state. When France won Syria, al-Husayni and the Arab leadership turned their nationalist anti-Jewish efforts toward Palestine.
Until 1936, when the British removed him from his post, the Mufti had engineered many riots and instigated much violence unrest with a view to harming Jews and blocking Zionism and the establishment of a Jewish homeland.
Arab rebels assassinated a British politician in 1937 in protest of the Peel Report on Partitioning Palestine and the British arrested all members of the Arab Higher Council including al-Husayni.
al-Husayni fled to Syria + Iraq, supported the pro-Axis revolt in 1936 and then fled to Berlin in 1941. He met with Hitler and Himmler. Contrary to the claims of Netanyahu and others, al-Husayni did not instigate the Final Solution, which was already conceived. Remember al-Husayni was a refuge, a man on the run from the British, he wasn’t calling the shots.
al-Husayni toured the Trebbin nazi camp. He made several radio addresses to Muslims, encouraged the killing of Jews and Allied forces, and mobilised anti-Jewish and pro-German support amongst Muslims. al-Husayni wrote several European leaders and urged them to bar Jewish immigration into their countries.
In 1943 Himmer praised al-Husayni and the battle of freedom-seeking Arabs against the Jewish invaders.
The British granted Jordan independence in 1946 and announced the end of the Palestinian Mandate would happen in May, 1948. They no longer had a interest in trying to manage the tribalism and civil warring between guerrilla fighting forces vying for nationalist agendas projected onto land. They and the UN recommend separate Arab and Jewish states.
When the formation State of Israel happened in 1948, Arab states began expelling Jews. Two decades after the formation of the State of Israel over 850,000 Jews had been forced to flee their homes in Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Morocco. The Iranian Revolution created a further 70,000 Jewish refugees. None of those Jews ever were granted the right of return to their homes and possessions.
How much of the 1948 Arab exodus from Israel happened because of the Arab leadership’s strategy of uncompromising aggression combined with the effects of their propaganda?
For instance—about rapes in the village of Deir Yassin. The Jewish community denounced the attack at Deir Yassin, many scholars have studied it and an Israeli film was made about it. The latest scholarly paper tells us that the siege at Deir Yassin village happened because of a 5 month-long Arab-imposed blockade of Jews living in the Old City, one which resulted in desperate food shortages.
Four days after reports of the Deir Yassin violence, Arabs attacked a Jewish medical convoy, killing 77 and injuring 23.
Arab leadership had made no secret of its overall desire to eliminate Jews from their midst. In no reality did Arab leadership ever want a Jewish homeland on what they believed was their Arab land.
1937, 1947, 1978, 2000, 2008 — each time Arab leadership rejected a two-state solution with Jewish leadership. Not to mention the 2006 election of Hamas by Gazans as a direct fcuk you to the Jews + Israel—Hamas considers Jews an enemy oppressor and aims to obliterate + dissolve Israel. This is not the behaviour of a collective of people who wants peace + harmony + with Jewish people in the Levant region.