Chapter 15: The Colonial Powers in Arab Lands

The Arab Uprising and the First World War

On June 10, 1916, Mecca was occupied by a fraction of the Turkish forces, only about 1,400 men. With the onset of the hot summer, the governor-general and the bulk of the forces had moved to Taif, the summer station of Hijaz. When Sharif Husayn gave the signal at dawn, the several Turkish barracks and garrison posts were simultaneously attacked with rifle fire (the Arab forces had no artillery). After three days, on June 12, the smaller Turkish posts surrendered. The deputy governor-general and his soldiers were quartered in the apartment reserved for prisoners of war and were treated with great courtesy and consideration. The main barracks and the fort of Jiad, which were equipped with heavier artillery, resisted for another three weeks until two artillery companies of the Egyptian army in the Sudan arrived in Mecca and started shelling the fort. When they opened a breach in one of its sides, the Arab forces stormed the fort with conspicuous bravery and took it on July 4, 1916 (Ramadan 4). The fort’s forces, consisting of thirty officers and 1,120 soldiers, surrendered on July 9.

In Jedda, a force of 3,500 tribesmen led by Sharif Muhsin attempted to enter the city; however, the Turkish garrison of about 1,500 forced them back. The Arabs were forced to change their offensive plan to a siege until they received support from British warships and seaplanes. The ships shelled the external Turkish positions and the seaplanes dropped bombs outside the perimeter of the walled city. These attacks forced the garrison to surrender on June 16.

The men under the command of Emir Abdullah advanced toward Taif, while another group advanced northward and captured Rabegh and Yanbo. Qunfida was captured with the help of the British navy. Abdullah decided to impose a siege rather than to take Taif by assault, although he had the Egyptian batteries with him. The siege lasted until September 21, when the governor-general surrendered. By that point the revolt had taken six thousand prisoners and seized a fair amount of weaponry.

Although the Arab forces had failed to capture Madina, the immediate military objectives of the revolt were all achieved with the fall of Taif in the later part of September 1916. The following three months were the most difficult period in the history of the revolt. The Turkish garrison in Madina, which held fourteen thousand men well equipped with artillery, was a great threat to the revolt . At one point of the campaign it appeared that this force might try to recapture Mecca. This danger was dispelled in January 1916, when Faysal led an army northward and occupied the port of Wajh. This achievement reduced the Turkish forces in Madina to a stationed garrison that was no longer a threat. Raids on the Hijaz railroad became more frequent and more effective. The raiders began by tearing up the line and destroying bridges; then they learned how to blow up trains and engines. They also became able to attack stations and capture garrisons. After Faysal’s forces occupied Wajh, Abdullah and Ali were able to establish a tight siege around the city. They intercepted a well-armed Turkish force on its way to Yemen carrying bags of gold. In April they intercepted a convoy of three thousand camels laden with food and clothing, carrying supplies to Ottoman ally Ibn Rashid. Between June and September 1916, several British and French advisers arrived, including Sir Reginald Wingate, who was made commander in chief of operations. Aziz Ali arrived in Jedda in September and assumed command of the Arab forces, creating the nucleus of a trained army. But he did not hold his command for long due to friction with the sharif. He was succeeded by Ja’afer al­Askari. Meanwhile, the prisoner-of-war camps in Egypt and India produced a new unit whose men participated in the fighting, including Nuri al­Sa’id and Maulud Mukhlis, members of al-Ahd who served with outstanding distinction in the Arab campaign.

Three weeks after the outbreak of the revolt, the Arab forces numbered between thirty and forty thousand. By the time Wajh was captured, the number had risen to seventy thousand. Although equipment was scarce and discipline lax, these forces were able to accomplish remarkable results: taking six thousand prisoners, locking up a garrison of fourteen thousand Turks in Madina and another of five thousand in Tabuk, intercepting the communications between Damascus and Madina, ending communications between the three Turkish divisions stationed in Asir and Yaman, and denying the Turco-German forces access to the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean.

The Tribes Unite

On November 2, 1916, it was announced that the Sharif Husayn had been proclaimed king of the Hijaz. An assembly of religious and secular notabilities had gathered together and performed the ceremony of the bai’a, the traditional custom accompanied by formal declarations of allegiance. 118

At Wajh, Faysal had extreme difficulty in uniting the different tribes who were at war with each other. Through mediation, gold, and the message of Arab emancipation, Faysal was able to solve this problem. While he was busy with this task, he dispatched emissaries to the chieftains in southern Syria, calling them to join the revolt. Among those who responded to the call was Auda Abu Tayeh, the head of the Huwaitat confederation, a man of fifty-five who was considered the toughest fighter in the country. Auda promised to devote all his efforts to the cause of fighting the Turks. It was he who proposed capturing Aqaba as the first step toward the march on Damascus. Faysal heeded his suggestion. While Auda was preparing his tribe for war, he comissioned his cousin Sharif Naser, Nasib al-Bakri, and T. E. Lawrence 119 to contact the Arab leaders in Damascus, Jabal al-Druze, Palmyra, and Baalbak. Faysal also contacted Rida Pasha Rikabi, an Arab general in the Turkish army, and one of the leading members of al-Ahd, and several prominent figures such as the Druze leader Husayn al­Atrash and Nuri Sha’alan, the chief of the Ruala confederation. 120

Auda assembled five hundred of his tribesmen and started the campaign toward Aqaba. On June 30, 1917, they attacked the railway, blowing up bridges and damaging an entire kilometer of line. On July 2, they attacked the Turkish garrison stationed at Abul­Ithl, on the Ma’an­Aqaba Road, and four Turkish posts between Abul­Ithl and Aqaba. On July 6, the Arab forces captured Aqaba. More than six hundred Turks were killed, and over seven hundred taken prisoner. The capture of Aqaba was a turning point in Faysal’s Syrian campaign.

In August of 1917, Faysal arrived in Aqaba, which became his military base, replacing his previous one at Wajh. The nucleus of his regular army comprised the Arab units that had been formed in Wajh, to which were subsequently added some six hundred men of the Arab Legion recruited in Egypt from among volunteers in the prisoner-of-war camps. A number of British and French officers arrived to serve as advisers to the Arab command. By the beginning of 1917, the British forces under the command of Sir Edmund Allenby reached the confines of Palestine. Allenby, who was quick to grasp the importance of Aqaba, made it known to Faysal that he could count on him for help. 121

For the first six months after the capture of Aqaba, Faysal devoted great effort to making his coalition of tribesmen into a strong fighting army as well as extending the range of his tribal alliances. Faysal’s emissaries traveled into the interior of Syria and established communication with the seminomadic populations in the regions on either side of the Jordan. The largest enemy concentration was at Ma’an, which became his immediate target.

While Faysal was engaged in his military and political preparations, Sharif Naser, Auda, and T. E. Lawrence were carrying out several expeditions, raiding the railway and demolishing the tracks, bridges, and culverts. In one of these attacks, near Mudawwarah, about the end of September, they blew up a train, killing seventy Turkish soldiers. Three weeks later, they captured a convoy of supplies bound for Ibn Rashid. In the last days of December, Sharif Naser captured Jafr al­Darawish and Tafila.

The military campaign was supported by a political one aimed at winning the Arab population of Syria over to the Allied side. The principal weapon of propaganda was the agreement concluded between Sir McMahon and the Sharif Husayn. The Allied cause had become identified with the cause of Arab independence.

As the British forces advanced eastward from the Suez Canal in the summer of 1916, secret emissaries were dispatched to the chiefs of the tribes in southern Palestine. Chaikh Furaih Abu Meddian, the chief of the Beersheba tribe, received a signed letter from King Husayn calling upon all Arabs to aid the efforts of the British forces who were working for Arab liberation. Airplanes flew over the Turkish lines, raining copies of King Husayn’s letter onto the troops. Delegates headed by Husayn’s cousin, Sharif Abdullah Hamza, joined the British forces in contacting the chieftains in southern Syria to persuade them to give up serving the Turks and help facilitate the British advance toward Palestine. This campaign was successful enough to force the Turkish forces to evacuate al­Arish and Maghdaba. Throughout Allenby’s advance on Jerusalem in the autumn of 1917, Arabs deserted from the Turkish ranks in large numbers. Some crossed the British lines and gave themselves up, others went to Aqaba to join Faysal’s army, and the majority disappeared into the countryside.

The attack launched by General Allenby at the end of October led to the capture of Jerusalem on December 9, 1917. The cities of Gaza, Hebron, Jaffa, and Bethlehem had fallen earlier. In Jerusalem, the British forces were welcomed by a population shrunken to half its former size by hunger, exile, and deportation. Even so, when the British command established a recruiting office for volunteers to serve in Faysal’s army, many men enlisted. A young member of one of the leading Arab families, Amin al­Husayni, led the enlistment movement and took an active part in organizing the forces. 122

Arab pressure on Ma’an was tightening, and the attacks on the Hijaz railway were becoming so frequent that traffic on it was reduced to one train a week; the journey from Damascus to Madina now took five days instead of its usual eighteen hours. Retaining Madina for that long was very costly for the Ottoman army, and did not prove to be of great benefit to their military campaign in Arabia, so the Turks decided to evacuate the city.

The Arab revolt was costly for the Ottomans: Turco-Arab engagements killed 4,800 men and wounded another 1,600; beyond this, eight thousand were captured. These figures do not include Arab desertions from the Turkish ranks. In addition, there were garrisons of twelve thousand Turks at Madina, seven thousand at Ma’an and some three thousand at various points on the intervening sections of the railway; these all were immobilized by the action of the Arabs. In all, the number of Turks killed, captured, or contained by the Arab revolt amounted to some 35,000. 123

News of the Turks’ decision to evacuate Madina reached Faysal about the middle of March 1918. He realized that the Turco-German command intended to secure the safe withdrawal of the Madina garrison and the subsidiary garrisons on the Hijaz railway line and bring them to Ma’an. To counteract this plan, he decided to start an offensive immediately aimed at isolating Ma’an and severing its communication with Madina. He divided his available forces into three columns, and sent them to attack the railway simultaneously in three different sectors. The attacks began in the first week of April: the first column destroyed the northern line between Ma’an and Amman; the southern column destroyed the line in the south as far as Mudawwara; this left the line wrecked beyond repair. The central column occupied the outer defenses of Ma’an and demolished the line immediately to the north and south of the city. The Turks launched several attacks at Semna, which was held by the central column, but the Arab forces held ground. In ten days, Faysal’s three columns de­ stroyed over fifty bridges and culverts and three thousand rails and captured 450 prisoners and large supplies of ammunition. Faysal’s offensive attacks prevented the Turks from evacuating Madina. 124

Apart from the garrisons based in the Ma’an sector, which were known as the II Corps, there were three Turkish armies opposing the British and Arab forces on both sides of the Jordan. To the west, the British were face-to-face with the Eighth and the Seventh Turkish Armies under the command of Mustafa Kemal Pasha (the future president of the Kemalist Republic), which amounted to a rifle-equipped force of seventeen thousand men. To the east, the Arabs were opposed by the Fourth Army, which was headquartered in Amman. The Turkish forces opposing the Arabs in the area east of Jordan amounted to fourteen thousand, which included the Fourth Army and the Turkish II Corps based in Ma’an. In addition, there were twelve thousand troops contained in Madina and on the railway between Madina and Mudawwara. Thus, to reckon the military value of Faysal’s forces, they were engaging approxi­ mately the same number of Turkish forces as those confronting the British forces to the west of Jordan. In addition, the Arab forces were covering the right flank of the British army in Palestine and protecting its long line of communications from Turkish raids in the neighborhood of Hebron and Beersheba. Furthermore, Ali and Abdullah were containing and harassing a large enemy force. In 1917, there were more Turkish troops fighting the Arabs in the Ma’an area and the Hijaz than there were in Palestine to resist the British northward advance. 125

Liberation from Ottoman Rule

As the summer of 1918 advanced, Allenby was developing a master plan for the final offensive against the Turco-German forces in Syria. Allenby’s forces, which amounted to eight infantry and four cavalry divisions, were formed into the XX Corps and the XXI Corps, plus a corps of cavalry. Allenby’s plan was to sever the Turkish communications between Damascus and the south before launching his offensive. The vital point in the enemies’ communications was Dar’a, a station on the Hijaz railway, where the branch line to Haifa split off from the line to Madina. If it succeeded, the isolation of Dar’a would deny the Turks the option of sending reinforcements to Palestine, as well as the ability to pull back their forces safely if the British offensive succeeded. Allenby also predicted that the threat to the railway at Dar’a might cause the Turco-German commander to dispatch some of his reserves from Nazareth area to protect the junction of the railway, thus weakening the resistance to the British advance. 126

Early in September, Faysal moved his base to Azraq, some eighty kilometers east of Amman. The first attack was made on September 16, three days before the start of the British offensive. In accord with Allenby’s plan, the railway was cut between Dar’a and Amman, suspending all traffic between the two cities. On the following day, other Arab forces destroyed the railway at points to the north and the west of Dar’a; they were planning to storm the town, but the arrival of strong German reinforcements forced them to halt their attack. Thus the Germans walked into the trap. Meanwhile, the Arabs continued their attacks, hoping to draw off a further contingent from Nazareth area. On September 18, they carried out more demolitions on the railway; as a result, by that evening, Dar’a was isolated on every side. Early in the morn­ ing of September 19, 1918, the British offensive was launched on Palestinian front. The Turks expected the British attack would be directed on their left wing to the north, against their Seventh Army based in Nablus, and eastward against their Fourth Army based in Amman. Allenby began his operation by directing his XX Corps to make a sharp attack against the Seventh Army. This was only a deceptive attack, however. The real attack was delivered by the XXI Corps against the Eighth Army, which was holding the ground between the coast and the foothills of Samaria. It was such a forceful attack that the enemy commander was compelled to retreat in a disorderly fashion, leaving the coastal plain unprotected. This retreat gave Allenby the opportunity to advance his cavalry along the gap that became open. In less than twenty­four hours, a mounted brigade had reached the outskirts of Nazareth. A few hours later another brigade occupied Affuleh, a station on the Haifa­Dar’a­Damascus Railway, and in the afternoon of September 20, a division entered Baisan. Thus by sunset on the second day, Allenby’s forces were holding the three sides of a rectangle within which the entire Turkish Eighth and Seventh Armies were trapped. The Eighth Army was almost completely destroyed, except for small German unit. Of the Seventh Army, only a few scattered battalions were able to retreat toward Dar’a; the only way to escape was east across the Jordan, but the divisions of the XX Corps closed the escape path as they advanced northward toward Nablus and eastward in the direction of Amman. Meanwhile, in the hills beyond Jordan, the Arab forces, having surrounded Dar’a, were closing in on the II Corps in Ma’an. 127

On September 22, the Turkish Fourth Army stationed in Amman began its retreat on foot, as the railway line to Dar’a had been destroyed. As soon as the Turkish forces began their retreat, a British mounted brigade crossed the Jordan and advanced on Amman, occupying the city on September 25. The British commanding officer remained in Amman to secure the surrender of the Turkish II Corps retreating from Ma’an, which the Arab forces had occupied on September 23. Further north, the Arab forces were closing in on Dar’a, which they occupied on September 27, while other Arab units led by Auda Abu Tayeh and Nuri Sha’lan captured Edra and Ghazaleh. Meanwhile, the British cavalry crossed the Jordan to the south and north of the Sea of Galilee and started their advance toward Damascus. At the same time the Arab forces were marching toward Damascus and covering the right flank of the advancing British forces. Meanwhile the tribesmen were attacking the retreating Turkish Fourth Army.

The first to arrive the outskirts of Damascus were Sharif Naser and Nuri Sha’lan, who arrived with their forces on the evening of September 30, 1918, after a twenty­four­hour march that included fighting along parts of the seventy­ mile journey. A strong contingent was sent to the city the same night to carry the tidings to the population, along with a message to set up an Arab government.

Early, on the following day, October 1, a detachment of British cavalry entered the city, closely followed by the forces of Naser and Sha’lan. Two days later, Allenby who drove from Jerusalem, arrived in Damascus just as Faysal, accompanied by 1,200 of his men, entered the former capital of the Arab empire on horseback at full gallop. Damascus was in a frenzy of joy as the rebel army entered the city, ending four hundred years of Ottoman domination. 128

The notables of Damascus were committed to Ottomanism until the final days of the war; like their counterparts in Palestine, they opposed to the Hashemites. When the Ottoman rule collapsed, they had no choice but to adopt the new political ideology. The main concern of the prominent Damascene notables like Abd al­Rahman al­Yusef, Muhammad Fawzi al­Azm, Badi’ Mu’ayyad al­Azm and Muhammad Arif al­Quwatli, was the reestablishment of their aristocratic position in the new regime. When Emir Faysal’s army marched through Damascus on October 1, 1918, those notables gathered at the municipality hall to welcome Faysal.

In Damascus, the Arab nationalists thought that the dream of Arab nationalism was close to being fulfilled. They also thought that by supporting Faysal and his government, their struggle against Zionism would gain more strength. The younger Syrians, Palestinians, and Iraqis—many of them either officers in Faysal’s army during the war or members of the Arab nationalist societies—became the real masters of Syria during the twenty-two months of Faysal’s regime.

The rest of Syria was liberated from Ottoman rule before the end of October 1918. A British division began the advance northward from Acre on October 3, along the coastal highway. Tyre was liberated on the October 4; Sidon on October 6; Beirut on October 8; and Tripoli on October 13. No enemy resistance was encountered, and the troops were received everywhere with demonstrations of welcome.

The advance of the British and Arab forces from Damascus to Aleppo followed an inland course. As the British division was moving along the main road, an Arab brigade was covering its right flank, while the Sharif Naser at the head of force of irregulars went to liberate Homs from the east, reaching it on October 15, one day ahead of the British advance column, and found that the Turks had withdrawn. Two days later, Naser’s force took Hama without opposition.

Stiff resistance was encountered on the outskirts of Aleppo, in the form of two Turkish divisions under the command of Mustafa Kemal Pasha. A plan was drawn up for an attack by the British cavalry and the Arab regulars on October 26, but during the afternoon of October 25, Arab tribal forces entered the city and fell on the garrison so strongly that its commander was forced to withdraw and to order the retirement of the two divisions guarding Aleppo on the south. On the second day, the British cavalry and the Arab regulars entered the city. On October 29, a detachment of Naser’s force occupied the junction at Muslemian where the railway from Constantinople divides into Syrian and Iraqi branches. Its occupation marked the northernmost limit of the Allied advance, for, on the following day, Turkey signed the Madras armistice.

The liberation of Beirut and Aleppo and almost every other town in Syria gave rise to scenes of rejoicing similar to the ones that the inhabitants of Damascus had shown when Emir Faysal entered their city. The sufferings of the Arabs of Greater Syria during the war years and the horrors that they had to endure are indescribable, especially in Lebanon. More than 350,000 died of starvation; three thousand were sent into detention or exile. Taking into account losses due to military service, Syria’s contribution to the holocaust of the war was almost half a million lives out of a total population of under four million.

The Arab revolt was a boon to the Allied forces in their fight against the Ottomans. The revolt blocked the road to the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, and prevented Turco-German forces from expanding to the south. As the British prepared to advance into Palestine, they realized—as T. E. Lawrence pointed out—”that more Turkish troops were fighting the Arabs than were fighting [them].” 129 As shown by Husayn’s correspondence with McMahon, Britain pledged to to recognize and up- hold an independent Arab state in territories including Syria and Palestine in return for Arab support for Allied forces. These promises were betrayed by Britain, which ultimately turned its back on the Arabs in favor of France, Russia, and Zionism.

The Sykes-Picot Agreement

As soon as Henry McMahon clinched his bargain with Sharif Husayn in February 1916, the British Foreign Office in London opened a conversation with the French government in order to conclude the previous discussions between Great Britain, France, and Russia. The Foreign Office chose to withhold from the French the terms— and perhaps the fact—of the agreement made with the Sharif Husayn. The two governments each delegated a representative to confer and reach a final agreement. Monsieur F. Georges Picot, who had served as consul general in Beirut in the years preceding the war, and the British delegate Sir Mark Sykes, an Eastern affairs expert, drew up an agreement for the disposal of the Ottoman Empire. They were then instructed to proceed to Petrograd in order to discuss their proposal with the Russian government. Negotiations began about the middle of March 1916, and resulted in a draft agreement. Further discussions took place in April and May of 1916.

In these meetings, the three powers helped themselves to generous slices of the Ottoman Empire. Russia took Constantinople and a few kilometers of hinterland on either side of the Bosporus, as well as a large portion of eastern Anatolia along the Turco-Russian frontier. France claimed the greater part of Syria, a considerable portion of Southern Anatolia, and the Mosul district of Iraq. Great Britain took a band of territory running from the southernmost extremity of Syria across to Iraq, where it opened out to include Baghdad and Basra and all the territory between the Persian Gulf and the area assigned to France, as well as the ports of Haifa and Acre. The area comprising what is known as Palestine was reserved for a special international regime of its own. The special provisions made for Palestine were the outcome of a conflict of aims between the three powers. France had pressed for possession of all Syria, including Palestine. Great Britain demurred, insisting that Palestine had an important role in the protection of the Suez Canal and the British colonies in the East. Meanwhile, Russia had schools and convents in Nazareth, Nablus, and Hebron, and so also laid a claim to this territory. 130

The Sykes-Picot agreement was concluded in May 1916 without the knowledge of Sharif Husayn. It is clear that it was in direct conflict with the terms of Sir Henry McMahon’s compact with him.

In May 1917, Mr. Picot arrived in Cairo at the head of a French mission to meet the Arab leaders in Egypt with the aim of furthering French interests in Syria. The discussions between the French mission and the Arab leaders in Cairo aroused Husayn’s apprehensions and prompted him to contact Sir Reginald Wingate, who had succeeded McMahon as high commissioner, for assurances as related to the French mission’s intentions. At the suggestion of Wingate, Sykes arrived in Jedda early in May 1917, and met with Husayn to allay his anxieties and to pave the way for a visit by Picot for a special meeting with King Husayn. Lengthy meetings took place between the two delegates and Husayn on May 19 and 20 of 1917. What passed at the meetings has never been fully made public; however, subsequent events showed that the delegates did not even mention the existence of an Anglo-French agreement. King Husayn later stated that the purpose of the discussions in May 1917 was to get the Arabs to recognize a French sphere of influence in the coastal regions of northern Syria—that is to say, Lebanon. Husayn’s response was that the furthest he would go was to consult the leaders of the Arab National Movement and try to induce them to consent to a partnership between France and an Arab administration in Lebanon limited to a fixed period of years. During this period, France would aid the administration with a subsidy and promote her interests within the framework of Arab sovereignty.

In November 1917, the Bolshevik party seized power in Russia. One of their first acts was the publication of certain secret documents, among which were the agreement of 1916 with Britain and France. As soon as Jemal Pasha learned of this agreement in the last week of November 1917, he sent a secret emissary to Emir Faysal in Aqaba carrying a letter dated November 26. In his letter, Jemal Pasha re­ vealed the content of the Sykes­Picot agreement and pointed out that Faysal and his father had been misled by promises of Arab independence into rebelling against the supreme authority of Islam, and that the true intentions of the Allies were to partition the Arab countries and place them under foreign masters. He entreated the Arabs to return to the Ottoman side, guaranteeing full autonomy to all Arab prov­ inces of the empire and the fulfillment of their nationalist aspirations. He also invited Faysal to come to Damascus for negotiations aimed at reaching an agreement based on the principles mentioned in his letter. He ended his message by assuring Faysal that the terms of the agreement would be secured not only by the sultan’s ratification, but also by a collateral guarantee from the German government. The Turkish government and their German allies published Jemal’s offer to Emir Faysal in all newspapers in Syria; copies were sent to Madina and smuggled into Mecca. 131

Faysal forwarded Jemal’s letter to his father, who forwarded the whole correspondence to Sir Reginald Wingate in Cairo. Wingate then referred the matter to the Foreign Office in London. The British foreign secretary, Arthur Balfour, sent a telegram to King Husayn through Wingate, followed up by a formal note from the acting British agent at Jedda. The note, which is dated February 6, 1918, stated:

Documents found by Bolsheviki in Petrograd Foreign Ministry do not constitute an actually concluded agreement but consist of records of provisional exchanges and conversations between Great Britain, France, and Russia, which were held in the early days of the War, and before the Arab Revolt Jemal Pasha has distorted the original purpose of the understanding between the Powers He has also ignored the fact that the subsequent outbreak and the striking success of the Arab Revolt, as well as the withdrawal of Russia, had created an altogether different situation.

The message sent out in Mr. Balfour’s name was a dishonest communication. The note King Husayn received was designed to deceive him, for it not only evaded the issue of a secret Allied agreement, but also implied that no such agreement had been concluded. King Husayn accepted the note at face value and set his mind at rest. 132

The Balfour Declaration

The Balfour Declaration is a letter only sixty-seven words long, yet it had far-reaching consequences for all Jewish and Arab peoples, as well as for the entire region. Given its ramifications, it can be said to be among the most important documents of the past two centuries. By supporting the creation of a “Jewish national home,” in Palestine, the British set the stage for a Zionist takeover of the whole country of Palestine and the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, which is still ongoing.

The Intersection of British and Zionist Interests

Since the beginning of the war, Chaim Weizmann and Arthur James Balfour had participated in negotiations aimed at preparing a pro-Zionist document that would pledge Britain’s strong support for a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine. Both Lloyd George and Balfour were Christian Zionists—that is, devout Christians who believed that the establishment of a Jewish state was a prerequisite to the Second Coming of Christ. Christian Zionism emerged in Britain in the nineteenth century, well before the emergence of modern Zionism as a political force in the Jewish world. 133 Weizmann had met Balfour in 1905 and explained to him why Britain’s offer of East Africa as a Jewish homeland was unacceptable. They met again in 1915 when Balfour became the first lord of the admiralty. Balfour showed great interest and enthusiasm toward the Zionists’ goals. His motive was not wholly based on his religious beliefs, however. Britain’s main aim at the end of the war was the control of the prewar territories of the Ottoman Empire in the Middle East, as these territories represented the key supply routes to India, the crown jewel of the British Empire. The Zionist colonial project of Palestine definitely served Britain’s strategic in­ terests. If a million Jews were moved into Palestine within the next fifty or sixty years, it would constitute a barrier separating the Suez Canal from the Black Sea and any hostility which might come from that direction. 134

At the end of 1916, the strongly pro-Zionist Lloyd George became Britain’s prime minister. He brought to the government men who were known to be pro-Zionists. By 1917, The British appeared to be emerging as the victors in Palestine and were close to capturing it from the Ottomans. In the late summer of that year, Weizmann urged Balfour, who became Britain’s foreign minister, to make the British government’s commitment to Zionism public.

Zionist leaders in Germany tried to obtain an official declaration in support of Zionism. The news about the contacts between Weizmann and British statesmen were brought to the attention of the German government, but Berlin was not willing to exert greater pressure on its Turkish allies. The news about the talks between the Zionists and the German representatives was noted in London, and was used by Weizmann to persuade the British to hurry up and come out first with their declaration. Neither the German Zionists nor Weizmann revealed any news about their achievements or failures. The British government took the news seriously, and when the talks in the war cabinet dragged on, Balfour announced on October 4, 1917, that a decision had to be made soon, since the German government was making great efforts to gain the support of the Zionist movement. 135

Weizmann learned of the existence of the Sykes-Picot agreement a year after it was ratified through Sir Mark Sykes, who urged him to demand that the British government abandon the idea of internationalizing Palestine and adopt the concept of British protectorate. In February 1917, a conference took place, attended by Sykes and Samuel as well as the leading Zionists and two members of the Rothschild family. The meeting decided against the internationalization of Palestine in favor of a British protectorate. In March and April 1917, Weizmann met both Lloyd George and Balfour and gained their support for a British protectorate over Palestine. In June and July, the Zionist leaders drafted the text of a letter supporting their goals to be issued by the British government; according to the draft, Britain was to declare that the reconstitution of a Jewish state was one of its essential war aims. The British Foreign Office’s draft employed terms such as “asylum” and “refuge” and proposed the establishment of a “sanctuary” for Jewish victims of persecution; this draft was rejected by the Zionists. Eventually, on July 18, Rothschild submitted a compromise proposal mentioning a “National Home of the Jewish People,” instead of a Jewish state. The war cabinet debated Rothschild’s draft in early August 1917, and resolved to consult President Wilson on this matter; the latter responded with unequivocal support for the Zionist project. In addition, US Supreme Court justice Louis Brandeis pressured Britain to accept the Balfour Declaration in return for bringing American Jewish support for the war effort. Finally, the cabinet of war meeting of October 31, 1917, approved the text that became known as the Balfour Declaration. On November 2, 1917, Lord Balfour included this text in a letter addressed (at Weizmann’s suggestion) to Rothschild, president of the British Zionist Federation:

Dear Lord Rothschild,

I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet.

His Majesty’s Government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non­Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other countries.

I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.

Yours sincerely, Arthur James Balfour

The Arab Reaction to the Balfour Declaration

The British government ratified the Sykes-Picot agreement with the French in May 1916, concerning the postwar division of the Near East, and concluded lengthy negotiations with the Zionists in November 1917, which culminated in the Balfour Declaration promising them the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine. However, in July of 1915, it already had promised the Arabs its support for an independent Arab state, which would include the Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire. The Balfour Declaration was published two years after the issuance of Sir Henry McMahon’s note of October 24, 1915, and eighteen months after the outbreak of the Arab revolt. When the news of the declaration reached Egypt, it provoked a wave of protest among the Arab leaders residing in Cairo. The British authorities, aided by strict censorship and active propaganda aimed at allaying Arab apprehensions and preventing the collapse of the revolt, tried to conceal the news. When the news reached King Husayn, he was greatly disturbed by it and requested from the British a definition of the meaning and the scope of the declaration. Commander Hogarth, one of the heads of the Arab Bureau in Cairo, arrived in Jedda in the first week of January 1918 to meet with the king. Hogarth was in­ structed by his government to assure Husayn that Jewish settlement in Palestine would only be consistent with the political and economic freedom of the Arab population. Husayn’s reply was quite explicit: if the aim of the declaration was to provide a refuge for the Jews from persecution, he would use all his influence to further that aim. He would also agree to any arrangement that might be suitable for the safeguarding and control of the holy places by the adherents of each of the creeds who had sanctuaries in Palestine. But he made clear that there could be no question of surrendering the Arab claim to sovereignty. 136

In the months that followed, Husayn sent out messages to his followers in Egypt, as well as to the Arab forces of the revolt informing them that he was satisfied with the British assurances that the settlement of Jews in Palestine would not conflict with the British pledges of achieving the independence of all Arab territories, in­ cluding Palestine. He ordered his sons to do what they could to allay the apprehensions caused by the Balfour Declaration among their followers. He also published an article in his official newspaper, al-Qibla, calling the Arab population in Palestine to adhere to the holy books and their traditions that preach the duties of hospitality and tolerance, and urged them to welcome the Jews as brethren and to cooperate with them for the common welfare.

The Declaration to the Seven

In the spring of 1918, when Balfour Declaration was announced and the Sykes-Picot agreement was disclosed, seven Arab leaders stationed in Cairo, who had all been involved in the Arab National Movement and participated in the development of the terms of the Husayn-McMahon compact, drew up a statement in the form of a memorandum to the British government. They presented their views in regard to the two agreements and asked for a clear and comprehensive definition of Great Britain’s policy regarding the future of the Arab countries as a whole. The memorandum was handed to the Arab Bureau in Cairo for transmission to London. The authors asked that their identities not be disclosed until the answer might be made public simultaneously. Eventually the group was revealed to include Rafiq al­Azm; Shaikh Kamel al­Qassab; Mukhtar al­Sulh; Abdul Rahman Shahbander, Khaled Al­Hakim; Fawzi al­Bakri; and Hasan Himadeh. A British reply was returned by the Foreign Office on June 16, 1918. The Declaration to the Seven stated, in part:

His Majesty’s Government have considered the Memorial of the Seven with great care The territories mentioned in the memorial fall into four categories:

1. Territories which were free and independent before the outbreak of the war;
2. Territories liberated from Turkish rule by the action of the Arabs themselves;
3. Territories liberated from Turkish rule by the action of the Allied armies;
4. Territories still under Turkish rule.

With regard to the first two categories, His Majesty’s Government recognise the complete and sovereign independence of the Arabs inhabiting those territories, and support them in their struggle for their freedom.

With regard to the territories occupied by the Allied armies, His Majesty’s Government invite the attention of the memorialists to the proclamations issued by the commander in chief on the occasion of the capture of Baghdad (March 19, 1917) and of Jerusalem (December 9, 1917). These proclamations define the policy of His Majesty’s Government towards the inhabitants of these regions, which is that the future Government of these territories should be based upon the principle of the consent of the governed. This policy will always be that of the Majesty’s Government.

With regard to the territories in the fourth category, it is the desire of His Majesty’s government that the oppressed peoples in those ter­ ritories should obtain their freedom and independence. His Majesty’s Government will continue to work for the achievement of that object. 137

The Declaration to the Seven was by far the most important statement of policy publicly made by Great Britain in connection with the Arab revolt. Its significance lies in the fact that it confirms England’s previous pledges to the Arabs in plainer language than any previous public utterance, and provides an authoritative enunciation of the principles on which those pledges rested. 138

On October 3, 1918, the Arab flag was hoisted in Beirut by Shukri Pasha al-Ayyubi in the name of Emir Faysal. General Allenby, in response to a request from the French, ordered the flag to be removed. The removal of the flag resulted in a violent reaction in Damascus, and a wave of suspicion and apprehension swept the country. Faysal protested to Allenby, declaring that he could no longer keep the Arab forces in control unless an unequivocal definition of Allied intentions were immediately proclaimed. On November 7, a declaration was issued jointly by Great Britain and France. The Anglo­French Declaration defined the French and British war aims as the com­plete and final liberation of the populations living under the Turkish yoke, and the setting up of national governments chosen by the people themselves in the free exercise of the popular will. 139

The Postwar Settlement

On the eve of the capitulation, when the Ottomans acknowledged defeat and signed the Armistice of Mondrus, General Allenby reported to the War Office that he had divided Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine into three administrative areas called Occupied Enemy Territories: OET­North (Lebanon and the Syrian coast) from Acre to Alexandretta, to be administered by a French officer; OET­South (Palestine), to be administered by a British officer; and OET­East (Transjordan and the interior of Syria) administered by Emir Faysal. The chief administrators of these areas were directly responsible to the commander in chief, General Allenby. The commander in chief was responsible to the war cabinet, and his chief political officer received instructions from him and from the Foreign Office.

French troops landed in Beirut on October 7, 1918, and took up positions in Mount Lebanon. The French were given control over OET­North in December 1919. The French administrator of OET­North was cut off from his own govern­ ment and was subordinated to the British general. Mount Lebanon, the city of Beirut, and the coastal region all the way north to Alexandretta were controlled by the French. In the course of less than two years, the French forces on the Syrian coast expanded from two thousand men to 180,000 in the spring of 1920.

When Faysal’s Arab army entered Damascus in the early morning of October 1, 1918, T. E. Lawrence appointed Shukri Pasha al­Ayubi, an ex-Ottoman army officer, as acting military governor. On October 5, Faysal proclaimed an independent government in the interior of Syria with the knowledge and recognition of General Allenby. He appointed Ali Rida Pasha al­Rikabi, who was a general in the Ottoman army, to the head of his government in Syria. Both al­Rikabi and al­Ayubi were local Damascene notables who had shifted to the Sharifian camp toward the end of the war. Faysal’s administration passed through three stages; the first one extended between October 5, 1918, and August 4, 1919, during which authority was in the hands of the military governor under the supervision of Faysal, who was responsible to the British commander in chief. In the second phase, which lasted between August 4, 1919 and March 8, 1920, when Faysal’s government declared Syria independent, the general administrators acted as ministers. The third phase, known as the phase of formal independence, ended in July 25, 1920, when the French forces overthrew Faysal’s government. In this phase, the government was responsible to the General Syrian Congress, which acted as a constitutional assembly, having first convened on June 3, 1919. 140

In all three phases, the Arab administration in Syria was a continuation of the Ottoman government system. Faysal, who had been in Europe for lengthy intervals to plead the case for Arab independence, had left the day-to-day government opera- tions in the hands of his confidants, the young Syrian, Palestinian, and Iraqi officers and intellectuals who had taken part in Faysal’s war effort. Actual political control during Faysal’s short reign in Damascus lay in the hands of al­Fatat and al­Ahd, who formed a new party, the Arab Independence Party (Hizb al­Istiqlal al­Arabi). The older generation of Syrian notables who had switched to the new ideology to protect their position within the new regime were upset at having lost their position as the leaders of the country and the prospect of an alien group of young Palestinians and Iraqis, as well as local Syrian newcomers, exercise authority over them. 141

Of the three parties mentioned above, al-Fatat was the most influential. On December 17, 1918, the founding members of al-Fatat held a meeting in Damascus in coordination with the Beirut branch of the society, passed new bylaws, and resolved to establish a public political organization, Hizb al­Istiqlal al­Arabi. This group was established in early February 1919 to act as a front for al­Fatat and to provide the growing number of members who sought to join al­Fatat with an or­ ganization through which they could carry out their political activities in an open fashion. Besides being a member, Faysal provided al-Fatat with financial assistance, which enabled Hizb al-Istiqlal al-Arabi to establish branches in Syria, Palestine, and Lebanon. Unlike al-Fatat, Hizb al-Istiqlal maintained a policy of open registration, with membership around 75,000. Though the party was originally devoted to Arab independence and unity, after the war al-Fatat focused more attention on events in Syria, and adopted the principle of pan-Syrian unity.

The Arab nationalists from Palestine were enthusiastic about Faysal’s proclamation of his government in Syria. They believed that it represented a crucial step in the realization of the dream of Arab independence, which would help the Palestinians in their struggle against Zionism. Numerous Palestinians played an active role in Faysal’s administration: Sa’id al­Husayni served as foreign minister in the government of al-Rikabi; Awni Abd al­Hadi was a member of the Hijazi delegation at the Paris Peace Conference and later served as Faysal’s private secretary; Muhammad Ali al­Tamimi was adviser to Emir Zayd; Ahmad Hilmi Abd al­Baqi was director of the treasury; and Mu’in al­Madi was director of intelligence. Although the Palestinians in Damascus subscribed to Arabism their focus on Palestine overshadowed all other matters. 142

The Disposition of Arab Territories

Although World War I had begun in Europe in August 1914, Britain did not declare war on the Ottoman Empire until November 5, 1914. Before the formal declaration, Britain had recognized Kuwait as an independent state under British protection. On November 6, a British-Indian military force landed at the southern port of Fao and extended its rule to the area around Basra in order to protect the oilfields in nearby Iran. British-Indian laws, police, bureaucracy, and government were applied in this area straight away. In June 1915, the forces placed at Basra advanced toward Baghdad. The far larger Turkish forces drove them back and trapped an entire British division in the town of Kut, 160 kilometers south of Baghdad. For four months, the British tried to break the siege, but failed. After losing seven thousand soldiers, the British force of thirteen thousand surrendered. Conquering Iraq would cost nearly four more years and twenty thousand more casualties. It took more than a million British soldiers to protect the Suez Canal, which the Turks attacked in 1915, and to drive the Turks away from the southwestern Iranian oil pipeline, which they cut for three months in 1915. Finally, after occupying Baghdad in March 1917, they established an Arab state with a local government under a British protectorate. 143

In the Hijaz, King Husayn was recognized by the Allied powers as the ruler of what had formerly been a province of the Ottoman Empire and now became an independent Arab state. Ibn Saud was also recognized as the sultan of Najd, the undisputed master of central Arabia from the Hijaz border in the west to the Persian Gulf in the east, with his capital at Riyadh. To the north of Saud’s sultanate, stretching as far as the Iraq border, lay the territory of Shammar, still under the rule of Ibn Rashid, whose power and prestige had been weakened by the defeat of the Ottoman Empire. In the south, the Idrisi maintained his rule over the territory of Asir; and Imam Yahya also maintained his sovereignty over Yemen. The positions of the smaller rulers of Kuwait, Masqat, and the Hadhramaut remained unaffected.

While the Arab Peninsula was left to itself, the northern Arab territories wit­ nessed administrative arrangements described as provisional, subject to final settlement at the Paris Peace Conference. These measures, although described as being temporary, had contributed to the unrest which led to the issue of the Anglo­ French Declaration of November 7, 1918. And when Faysal protested the partition of Syria, General Allenby assured him that the future of Syria would be deter­ mined in accordance with the wishes of the population. The assurances given to Faysal by Allenby, and the ones contained in the Anglo-French Declaration, had persuaded Faysal’s followers to cease protesting the administrative partition of Syria. Two weeks later Faysal left for London to press for Arab unity and independence. He also had a mandate from his father, King Husayn, to represent him at the peace conference.

The Paris Peace Conference

The Paris Peace Conference was a set of formal and informal diplomatic meetings that took place from January 1919 and into 1920 after the end of the First World War in which the victorious Allies set the peace terms for the powers they had defeated. The conference involved diplomats from thirty-two countries; the main outcomes were the creation of the League of Nations and agreements with the defeated states. These included the transition of former Ottoman territories into “mandates” passing chiefly into the hands of Britain and France.

In the run-up to the conference, Emir Faysal arrived in Marseilles on November 26, 1918, and was met by two French officers of high rank who informed him that the government welcomed him in France as a visitor, but could not regard him as a representative. His visit to France lasted for about two weeks. On December 10, 1918, he arrived in London, where he was told that the Sykes-Picot agreement was a hard fact. He was informed that the French government had strong reservations about his appointment as the head of the OET-East administration, and they objected to placing him as the representative of the Hijaz at the peace conference.

At the end of the war, the Sykes-Picot agreement was a subject of intense debate between France and Great Britain. When Faysal arrived in England, French prime minister Georges Clemenceau had been in London negotiating with Lloyd George over the terms of the agreement. The British were introducing major changes to the agreement on the basis that Russia had denounced it, while the French were insisting that the agreement was still binding between the two other parties. Britain viewed the agreement, in its original text, as being in conflict with the British in­ terests on two important issues: the assignment of Vilayet Mosul, with its rich oilfields, to France; and placing Palestine under an international administration. Finding Clemenceau stubbornly resistant to any changes in the terms of the agreement, Lloyd George offered the assignment of a substantial share of Mosul’s oil to France. Clemenceau agreed to consider the offer, but returned to Paris without a firm commitment. Two months later, in a note dated February 15, 1919, the offer was formally accepted by the French government. 144

During his stay in London, Faysal was informed of the Anglo-French negotiations, and was subjected to very intense pressure by the British government to give his consent in principle to the objects of the Balfour Declaration. They instructed Lawrence to use his influence to induce Faysal to give formal recognition, on behalf of the Arabs, to the aspirations of the Zionists in Palestine. Faysal found himself in a difficult position: the proposals which the British were pressing him to endorse were in conflict with the general sentiments of the northern Arab countries. He tried to obtain specific directions from his father, but all he could elicit from the king was an order to accept nothing less than the fulfillment of the pledges made by Great Britain with regard to Arab independence.

The British pressure on Faysal was more than he could handle, especially as he was also facing the French hostility that he had first tasted when he arrived in Marseilles. He allowed himself to be persuaded that his chances to neutralize the hostility of the French would be greater if he met Britain’s demands. The British wanted him to commit himself to an agreement with the Zionists in anticipation of the decisions of the peace conference. Lawrence convinced him that there was no harm in con­ cluding the proposed agreement with the Zionists as long as the Arab claims of independence were fully recognized. 145

In Faysal’s mind, Jewish settlement and colonization would be welcomed on humanitarian grounds if they adhered to the limitations imposed by a regard for the welfare and the political and economic rights of the existing population. King Husayn had accepted such assurances from Hogarth in the spring of 1918, and his acceptance had been conveyed to Faysal in a message he received in confidence at his camp in Aqaba. Later, in the first week of June 1918, Faysal had met Weizmann in Aqaba, and in the course of that meeting Weizmann had given him assurances that the Zionists had no intention of working for the establishment of a Jewish government in Palestine, but that all they wished to do was to help in the development of the country without harming the Arab interests. In that frame of mind, Faysal consented to sign the agreement, but made his consent conditional upon the fulfillment by Great Britain of her pledges respecting Arab independence. 146

In mid-January 1919, Faysal returned to France. The French government originally denied him the status of delegate at the peace conference on the basis that the Hijaz was not officially recognized as one of the Allied states. But with intervention from Britain, the Hijaz delegation was granted two seats at the conference. On January 29, 1919, Faysal submitted a statement in which he defined the Arab claim to independence. On February 6, 1919, he addressed the meeting. In his speech, he stressed the claims of the Arabic-speaking peoples of Asia to independence and unity, laying special emphasis on the cultural, geographical, and economic factors that made them a cohesive people. He mentioned the part played by the Arabs in the war and the sacrifices they had made. He concluded his address by thanking Great Britain and France for the help they had given the Arabs in their struggle for freedom. In his statement of January 26 and his address of February 6, he emphasized the principle of the consent of the governed as stated in the Anglo­French Declaration, rather than the McMahon pledges. In the discussion which followed his address, he proposed the appointment of a commission of inquiry by the peace conference to visit Syria and Palestine to investigate the wishes of the population. 147

The King–Crane Commission

Faysal’s proposal for the appointment of a commission of inquiry appealed to President Woodrow Wilson and received his immediate support. Clemenceau received it with hostility, and insisted that the French would not accept a commission of inquiry unless French forces replaced British troops in Syria. The British refused to accept this demand. It was not until March 20 that the proposal was formally debated. Wilson suggested that a commission of inquiry consisting of French, British, Italian, and American members in equal numbers should be appointed to go to Syria and, if needed, to the neighboring territories in order to investigate the facts and report to the peace conference. The suggestion was carried through at that sitting. On March 25, the proposal was formally adopted and the instructions drawn up by Wilson for the guidance of the commission were approved. Wilson appointed Dr. Henry C. King, a well-respected theologian, educator, and author who was president of Oberlin College, and Mr. Charles R. Crane, a prominent Democrat who was known for his experience and independence of judgment, as the US members of the commission. 148

The arguments between the British and the French over the commission’s value and how to carry out its mission wrecked the original scheme; President Wilson alone held his ground. Certain members of the United States delegations were opposed to the inquiry, as they believed that the peace conference had already enough information. They also believed that the arrival of the commission in Syria might arouse greater hopes than could ultimately be fulfilled.

The two commissioners whom Wilson had selected arrived in Jaffa on June 10, 1919, and spent six weeks visiting Palestine and Syria. They carried out an extensive inquiry, interviewed a large number of delegations in some forty towns and rural centers, and received a total of over 1,800 petitions. They were back in Paris in the last week of August. On August 28, 1919, they deposited a copy of their report with the secretariat of the United States delegation.

The King-Crane Report is an outstanding document. It is the only attempt made on behalf of the peace conference to establish the facts relating to Arab aspirations. It was conducted by two men recognized for their open minds and independence of judgment. The commissioners expressed themselves in favor of the mandatory system for Syria­Palestine and Iraq, but on condition that the mandate be for a limited term and that it should aim at bringing the mandated countries to in­ dependent status as rapidly as conditions would allow. They recommended that Iraq be treated as one country and that the unity of Syria (including Palestine) be similarly preserved, subject to the maintenance of Lebanon’s autonomy within the framework of Syrian unity. They found that the Syrians overwhelmingly were in favor of the United States as mandatories, but if the Syrian mandate could not be assumed by the United States it should be assigned to Great Britain—not France. In addition, they admitted that they had started out with a favorable mindset toward the Zionist project, but after examining the situation in Palestine they recommended that Zionist ambitions be limited. The statements made to them by the Jewish representatives had convinced them that the Zionists were seeking complete disposition of the non­Jewish inhabitants of Palestine, and they expressed their opinion that if the Zionist were able to achieve their goals, it would be a gross violation of the rights of the people and of the principles proclaimed by the Allies and by President Wilson. They felt bound to recommend that the Zionist program be greatly reduced, that Jewish immigration be definitely limited, and that the idea of making Palestine into a Jewish commonwealth be abandoned. The report was ignored, and was not acted upon even in Washington, as it reached Wilson while he was on the speaking tour that ended with him having a debilitating stroke. It was not even published until 1922. 149 This was by the New York Times, which published the entire report on December 3–4, 1922. It introduced the report by saying, in part:

The world is askew today because facts have been concealed or per­ verted. If, in 1918–1919, the world had seen the international situa­ tion, stripped of all camouflage, with every secret treaty opened and every national condition made clear, it would have insisted on a totally different outcome of events. 150

Faysal returned to Damascus in the early part of May 1919 after being away for four months. Now he faced a very difficult mission: reporting to his people his findings at the peace conference in Paris. The Arab leaders in Damascus were restless and anxious, seeking answers regarding the fulfillment of the Arab national aspirations. Faysal adopted a cautious attitude, confiding his concerns and fears only to a small circle of followers. In his public address he attempted to ease public fears by focusing on the inter-Allied commission of inquiry.

Faysal and the Zionists

The opposition of the Arabs to Zionism started in the later part of the nineteenth century with the arrival of Jews to Palestine from Eastern Europe. This opposition developed into a widespread phenomenon over the following two decades, and reached its peak during the first part of the twentieth century between 1908 and 1914. After the establishment of Faysal’s administration in Damascus on October 1, 1918, the Palestinian members of the Arab National Movement established the Arab Club, al­Nadi al­Arabi, whose mission was organizing active opposition to the Zionist project, in Damascus.

When the Palestinian Arab nationalists learned about the agreement Faysal had signed with Weizman, they started an intensive campaign aimed at preventing Faysal’s administration from cooperating with the Zionists. In an attempt to rally public support and to dissuade Faysal from dealing with the Zionists, Muhammad Izzat Darwaza, a key member of al-Fatat, wrote articles in the local press calling for action against Zionism. In his articles he ridiculed the idea of the potential for Jewish contributions to Palestine, and pointed out the catastrophic impact of Jewish immigration on the country and the threat that Zionism posed to Syria and the Arab world. The Syrian Arab nationalist Nabih al­Azma wrote: “The Arab nation never granted Faysal or any other person such a mandate that runs counter to the aspi­ rations it had expressed on many occasions. Matters that are decisively essential to the life of a nation cannot be dealt with simply on the basis of a document signed by one person or a group of persons.” 151

The Arab nationalists in Damascus realized the extent of the pressure Faysal had been subjected to by the imperial powers that forced him to consent to such an agreement with Weizmann. However, they were not willing to appreciate his position of weakness. Some of them, especially members of al-Ahd, believed that they could confront both France and England. Others became extreme opponents of the Hashemite family, accusing them of betraying the national cause.

The Syrian Congress and the French-Anglo Response

The strong resistance to Faysal’s agreement with the Zionists escalated rapidly, prompting a group of responsible leaders of the recently formed Hizb al-Istiqlal al-Arabi organization to propose the formation of an assembly. Faysal gave support to the movement. Elections were held in the portion of Syria which was under Arab administration (OET-East), but the representatives of Lebanon and Palestine were appointed by the national societies of these two regions. The opening session was convened in Damascus on June 3, attended by sixty-nine out of a total of eighty-five members representing Syria, Palestine, and Iraq. The French authorities prevented the Lebanese representatives from traveling to Damascus.152

On July 2, 1919, the First General Syrian Congress passed the following resolutions:

1. Recognition of the independence of Syria, including Palestine, as a sovereign state with Emir Faysal as king; and recognition of the in- dependence of Iraq.
2. Repudiation of the Sykes-Picot agreement and the Balfour Declaration, and of any plan for the partition of Syria or the creation of a Jewish commonwealth in Palestine.
3. Rejection of the proposed mandatory systems, but acceptance of for- eign assistance for a limited period provided it did not conflict with national independence and unity.
4. Rejection of French assistance in any form. 153

In August 1919, Faysal was invited by Lloyd George to visit London again. The tensions in Anglo-French relations over the Arab question were escalating. At the same time, the cost of British garrisons in Syria and Cilicia was mounting. Lloyd George proposed the withdrawal of the British forces from Cilicia and eastern Syria, to be replaced by French troops in Cilicia and Arab troops in eastern Syria. This proposal gave the Arabs exclusive garrisoning of the towns and districts of Aqaba, Amman, Damascus, Homs, and Aleppo. The withdrawal was to begin on November 1, 1919. The proposal reserved the control of the railway and a pipeline between Iraq and the Mediterranean to the British. At the meeting of the peace conference on September 15, Clemenceau accepted the proposal as a temporary measure and reiterated that the French government desired to obtain a mandate for eastern Syria.

Faysal arrived London on September 19, and was informed of what had happened in Paris. After a series of meetings with Lloyd George and other ministers, Faysal submitted his response in a note dated October 10, stating that the Arabs could not consent to such measures. He reminded the British of the assurances con­ tained in the Declaration to the Seven of June 16, 1918, and the Anglo­French Declaration of November 7, 1918. The British were embarrassed, as they were aware that their agreement with the French set the grounds for France to occupy eastern Syria in the near future. Lloyd George hoped that a Franco-Arab agreement , if one could be concluded, would relieve them of their embarrassing obligations. Lloyd George asked Faysal to enter into direct negotiations with Clemenceau.

On October 20, 1919, Faysal arrived in Paris, began lengthy negotiations with the French, and after two and a half months, at the beginning of January 1920, the two parties reached a provisional agreement under which France recognized the right of the Syrian nation to independence and unity, but insisted that the Syrian state was to be defended, advised, and represented abroad by France. The agreement with the French stipulated that the occupation by France of Lebanon and the rest of the coastal regions of Syria as far as Alexandretta by France would be respected by the Arab government in the interior. It also stipulated that the Arab state should turn to France for any assistance it might require. Faysal postponed signing the agreement until he could obtain the consent of his people in Damascus. 154

When Faysal returned to Syria on January 14, 1920, he found its leaders in a state of dismay. Mass demonstrations paraded the streets, calling for unity and independence and expressing disapproval of the agreement between Faysal and Clemenceau. Minor clashes led to hostilities between the French and Arab forces in Tripoli, Baalbek, and other locations. Faysal made several attempts to persuade his supporters to accept his agreement with Clemenceau, but to no avail. Al-Fatat and al-Ahd were now not only anti-French but also anti-British. They told Faysal that they were ready to declare war against both France and England: England planned to hand Palestine over to the Jews; France had already endorsed the formation of a Jewish state in Palestine and wanted to take over Syria.

In the early months of 1920, Faysal managed to convince older Syrian notables who were strong opponents of his family to form a new political party that suited his policy of compromise and moderation. In answer to Faysal’s call, Abd al­Rahman Pasha al­Yusef and other conservative Damascene notables formed al­Hizb al­Watani al­Suri (the National Party), which sought compromise with the French on the basis of the unsigned Faysal-Clemenceau agreement. Two prominent members of al-Fatat, Ali Rida Pasha al-Rikabi and Nasib Bey al-Bakri, both born to notable landowning Damascene families and both known to be disdainful toward the Palestinian and Iraqi members of al-Fatat, were among the founders of the new party. 155

On March 8, 1920, the General Syrian Congress in Damascus demanded the complete independence of geographic Syria, refused to recognize the mandate of any power, rejected the Jewish national home policy in Palestine, called for the withdrawal of all foreign armies, and proclaimed Faysal king of Syria. The French and British governments announced that they would not recognize the proceedings in Damascus as valid, and took steps to convene an early conference of the Supreme Council, inviting Faysal to return to Europe.

San Remo: French Betrayal, Arab Resistance

The Supreme Council of the League of Nations met at San Remo and took its decisions on April 25, 1920. The whole of the Arab rectangle lying between the Mediterranean and the Persian frontier was to be placed under mandatory rule. Syria and Lebanon were to be placed under a single mandate to be entrusted to France; Great Britain was to hold a mandate for Iraq and another for Palestine. A rider was added to the effect that the mandate for Palestine would carry with it an obligation to apply the Balfour Declaration. The San Remo decisions were made public on May 5, 1920. 156

The decisions taken at San Remo were nothing short of betrayal of the spe­ cific promises and pledges given to the Arabs, as well as a violation of the general principles proclaimed by the Allies. It was on the strength of those promises and principles that the Arabs had come into the war and made their contributions, leaving the Allies in their debt.

As soon as the San Remo conference announced its decision, the Arab nationalists began to put pressure on Faysal to declare war upon the French. Faysal refused their request. Although his confidence had been shaken by the San Remo decisions,

still he had some hope for a fair hearing before the conference. In the early part of July 1920, he wrote to the French commissioner general Henri Gouraud to announce his decision to sail to Europe. Gouraud wrote him back informing him that he was about to send him an important communication from his government. On July 14, 1920, Faysal received an ultimatum on five points that he had to comply with in four days: the handing over of the Rayyaq-Aleppo Railway to French military control, which amounted to the occupation of Aleppo, Rayyaq, Baalbek, Homs, and Hama; the abolition of conscription and the reduction of the Arab army; an unqualified acceptance of the French mandate; the adoption of the currency imposed by the French administration; and the punishment of persons implicated in acts of antiFrench hostility. To the surprise and then the anger of the Arab nationalists, Faysal accepted all the conditions. 157

Even though the ultimatum had been accepted by Faysal, the French army advanced on Damascus. As the French were nearing the Maisalun Pass, two thousand patriots rushed out in defiance of Faysal’s orders and joined the small regular force guarding the pass. The heroic stand of the Arab forces against the airplanes and the superior numbers and equipment of the French forces was the greatest pride of the entire Arab nation. The young minister of war, Yusef al­Azmeh, was killed leading a handful of the regular Arab forces against the French machine guns. The bulk of the army garrison of Damascus had already been demobilized by Faysal. The road to Damascus was wide open, and there was no further resistance. When Gouraud reached Damascus, he asked Faysal to leave the country. On July 28, Faysal left Damascus, taking a train to Dar’a and then to Haifa, then sailing to Italy. He remained in a retreat on the shores of Lake Magiore until December, when he traveled to London in response to an invitation from the British government.

The months that followed the decisions of the San Remo Conference witnessed armed uprisings in Syria, Palestine, and Iraq. The first of those outbreaks occurred in Palestine at Easter, when the Arab population in Jerusalem, alarmed by activities of the Zionists and the announcements made by the Zionist leaders, attacked the Jews of the city. In Syria, after the entry of the French into Damascus, a series of organized attacks occurred in different parts of the country. In the region between Aleppo and Antioch, a group of leaders succeeded in raising a considerable body of volunteers to fight against the French columns sent out against them. The large reinforcements the French had brought into the country managed to put an end to the armed resistance by the end of 1920.

By far the most serious uprising occurred in Iraq. It was an armed rebellion against the denial of independence and the imposition of the mandatory system. The little town of al­Qaim was the main center of resistance. The British government

in London ordered the British forces in Iraq to pull back from the area. The nationalists thought that they had achieved victory. Finally a small group of nationalists, members of the al-Ahd secret society, formed the Northern Iraq Army and tried to capture Mosul in May 1920. Their military campaign did not last for long. The British forces succeeded in putting an end to this operation. Several members of the Northern Iraq Army were arrested, and few managed to escape. 158

The most serious armed resistance by the Iraqis began in July 1920, as a social revolution and evolved into a national revolt. British military commander General Arnold Wilson and his staff, who were known among the English as the “Indian School,” since all had come to Iraq from service in Britain’s Indian empire, assumed that the Iraqi tribes functioned like the Pathan tribes of India. Wilson and his staff identified local notables who were promoted to be “chiefs,” and gave them authority over their kinsmen. Those new chiefs were given various advantages, including “large doles, subsidies, and no taxation,” along with confirmation of their private ownership of lands that had previously been regarded as communal to tribes. The British assumed that this would give the chiefs a stake in British rule, which would motivate them to control their fellow tribesmen. But what happened was the opposite. Their conduct excited the anger of their fellows. The anger was intensified when the British used force to suppress their agitation. The social unrest then turned into a national revolt. During the holy month of Ramadan, joint Sunni–Shia meetings were held in which the two creeds decided to revolt against British rule. The leaders of the Shia community issued instructions to their followers, particularly among the tribes of the south, to rise up against the British. On June 30, 1920, Iraq blew up in a vast insurrection against the British. 159

By the end of July, when news had come of the French occupation of Damascus, the leaders of the insurgence called for jihad, which was first proclaimed in early August in Najaf and Karbala and later through the whole countryside of the middle and lower Euphrates. In August and September, the rebels were masters everywhere except for the three cities of Baghdad, Basra, and Mosul. In the countryside, the administration had lost its authority, and control of affairs was assumed by provisional governments proclaimed in various centers by the local leaders. 160

The British had 133,000 troops in Iraq, widely scattered and relatively immobile. The Iraqis began using guerrilla warfare, characterized by hit-and-run tactics. For the next six months, as the British battled against virtually the entire population, they lost 1,654 men and spent more than six times as much as they had spent on the whole of their wartime campaign in the Middle East. The British government was horrified. This was no tribal revolt, but a national war of independence led by respected men of religion—both Sunnis and Shiites—doctors, teachers, merchants, and journalists. In October, Sir Percy Cox replaced Wilson as civil commissioner. The British decided to declare Iraq as an independent state under guarantee of the League of Nations and subject to the mandate of Great Britain. Cox appointed an elderly Iraqi to be “leader” of the “Descendants of the Prophet” (Naqib al-Ashraf). A provincial Arab government, known as the Council of State, was formed, consisting of Iraqi personalities serving as ministers with British advisers attached to each department. Ultimate control was vested in the hands of Sir Percy Cox. 161

On the initiative of Mr. Winston Churchill, then secretary of state for the colo­nies, a conference was called in Cairo in March 1921, to examine Britain’s position in the Arab countries and devise measures for remedying it. Decisions were taken at that conference that led to a radical change of policy in Iraq, and to changes of major importance in the part of southern Syria lying to the east of Jordan. The conference, assembled on March 12, was attended by the high commissioner for Iraq, Sir Percy Cox, and the high commissioner for Palestine, Sir Herbert Samuel, along with other British officials. The conference recommended that Emir Faysal, based on the earliest understanding arrived at in London between Faysal and Churchill, should proceed to Iraq as a candidate for the throne. The hope was that establishing a government in Iraq would enable the British to reduce their garrison considerably. 162 However, the people of Iraq had already expressed their desire to have Emir Abdullah as their king; furthermore, neither Husayn nor Abdullah had been told that Britain in­ tended to install Faysal as king of Iraq. This caused a rift between the two brothers. Moreover, the fact that his sons were allowing British priorities to take precedence over Arab ones caused King Husayn great disappointment.

The regions east of the Jordan River had formed part of the Arab administration set up under Emir Faysal, but had not come under French occupation. Great Britain persuaded France to agree to their inclusion in the area of the British mandate. This area, which became known as Transjordan, was granted to Great Britain in July 1920. The British were busy setting up a civil administration in Palestine proper, and had no intention at that stage of making the territory east of the Jordan into an independent Arab state. A small number of Arabic-speaking British officers were therefore sent to the various centers east of the Jordan with the task of setting up local autonomous administrations and running the country with these as best they might. They were told that it would be a waste of time to request assistance in the form of money or troops, but that any expert advice available would be placed at their disposal. The British officer Alec Seath Kirkbride was assigned to Kerak, the most southern of these centers. Kirkbride described this area as being inhabited by the wildest tribesmen in the country, who had never been subdued completely by the Ottoman government.

He invited the tribal elders to form a council of elders to govern themselves, and called the new administration the “National Government of Moab.” The northern administration was sited at Amman; its British adviser was Kirkbride’s younger brother.

In January, 1921, news came to Kirkbride of the arrival of Emir Abdullah at Ma’an, which was still part of the Hijaz, at the head of a force of nearly two thou­sand men. When his hopes of becoming king of Iraq faded, Abdullah had resigned from the post of minister for foreign affairs of the Hijaz. He then proceeded to recruit a private army and had announced, on arrival at Ma’an, that he intended to expel the French forces from Syria and to take over that kingdom on his own account. Having told the world of his plans, which involved the armed invasion of a territory under British mandate, he sat back and waited to see what Britain would do. Britain took no action, so he decided to advance northward. Kirkbride consulted the high commissioner in Jerusalem, asking for instructions. The reply was not helpful; it said only that it was most unlikely that the emir would advance into territory which was under British control. Kirkbride rode off with the other members of the Council and met Abdullah at the nearest station on the Hijaz railway. Kirkbride introduced himself and welcomed “His Highness” officially to the territory under British control. The emir replied: “Thank you, thank you, I come here with the friendliest sentiments towards the people of this country, whom I regard as my brothers, and towards Great Britain, by whose side we fought to liberate the beloved homeland from its oppres- sors.” Abdullah then turned to Kirkbride and said, “Am I correct in assuming that you are here to welcome me on behalf of the government of Great Britain?” Kirkbride replied, “I came with my colleagues here to meet your highness as the Council of Moab; I expect that His Majesty’s Government will send a representative, in due course, who is more senior than myself.” 163

Kirkbride summarized the situation as follows: “The National Government of Moab passed away quite painlessly, as did the other autonomous administration in the north. Emir Abdullah set up a central administration at Amman with which to govern the Emirate of Transjordan.” 164

On March 24, 1921, Churchill arrived in Jerusalem. Besides discussing the situation in Palestine and the British policy in regard to the mandate and the obligations toward the Zionists, he was interested in the status of Transjordan. Emir Abdullah was invited to Jerusalem to confer with him. A series of conversations took place, attended by Lawrence. A provisional arrangement was made with Abdullah by which he should remain in Transjordan and receive financial assistance from the British government to enable him to maintain an Arab force to be recruited locally for the preservation of order in Transjordan. In regard to his ambitions of ruling over Syria, Churchill agreed that Great Britain should use its good offices to secure the restoration of an Arab administration in Syria with Emir Abdullah at its head. Unfortunately, Churchill’s views of Arabs, and Palestinians in particular, were quite prejudiced. He viewed the Jews as a “higher­grade race” compared to the “great hordes of Islam,” 165 and called Palestinians “barbaric hordes who [eat] little but camel dung.” 166