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The Emergence of the Modern Middle East

Week 1 - Intro

1.1 What and Where is the Middle East?

The term Middle East was created in 1902 by American naval historian Alfred Thayer Mahan.

Non-Arab countries that can be considered part of the Middle East: Turkey, Iran and Israel.

We can consider the Middle East to be comprised of state-nations rather than nation-states,
because of their arbitrary creation.

People in the Middle East traditionally identied themselves by their religious beliefs, not by
territory or language.

The impact of the west can be seen in the 19th century changes in the region, namely the
Ottoman reform of modernising and centralising (called the Tanzimat), and the Islamic reform of
synthesising western science and philosophy with religion.

Nationalism was one of the most important ideas to arrive in the Middle East in the 19th century
(the sovereignty of man, not the sovereignty of god).

The Ottoman Empire was not seen by the Arabs as an imperial foreign conquerer but as a
legitimate Islamic authority until the emergence of Arab nationalism.

The new states established in the Middle East after WWI served Western imperial interests
(mostly Britain and France).

Arab nationalism originally fought against the imperial state creation.

Arab nationalism was a compromise between secularism and Islamic identity.

Arab nationalism was very popular throughout much of the 20th century but was a failure in
political practice, most notably in the conict with Israel and the 1948 and 1967 defeats.

Politics in the Middle East after 1967 was governed by two trends: acquiescence in the colonial
state order, which Arabs felt had become more legitimate, and radical Islamic revival.

The radical Islamic revival is an alternative route to modernity, not something opposed to
modernity.

1.2 What is the Modern Era?

It is customary to start the modern era in the Middle East in 1798, when Napoleon invaded Egypt
and ushered in an era of change.

It is problematic because it assumes that the region was not already in the process of changing
and that the modern era was created entirely by European inuence.

The thesis of decline argues that the Ottoman Empire was in a 350-year linear decline from the
mid-16th century onwards, that the Middle East was a stagnant society and it was resurrected by
the Western enlightenment.

While it is true that the Empire did not expand after 1683 and did weaken in comparison to part of
Europe, this was a relative retreat compared with the Empires former greatness and the
Ottomans still enjoyed various victories after 1683.

On the one hand the Ottoman Empire was the sick man of Europe but on the other hand it
continued to enjoy unquestioned Islamic legitimacy until the late 19th century.

Difculties faced by the Ottomans in the 19th century: territorial losses (e.g. Egypt), nationalist
uprisings in the Balkans, Western advance and advantage.

There has not been an alternative date suggested for the start of the modern era.

1.3.1 The Middle East in the 19th Century - The Structure of Society

Society in the Middle East was composed of groups rather than individuals.

These groups were based on family, extended family, tribe and religion.

There was a 2:1 Christian majority in the European parts of the Ottoman Empire.

Compact minorities: located in one single particular territory (e.g. Maronite Christians in Mount
Lebanon, Alawis in northwestern Syria, Druze in southern Syria and Lebanon).
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Compact minorities had a tendency to develop a very strong communal identity, as opposed to
non-compact minorities (such as the Orthodox Christians in Europe).

The millet system was the organisation of minorities into well-dened categories. The millets
were allowed to rule themselves as autonomous peoples governed by a law of their own.

Not all peoples of the Ottoman Empire were under the same legal authority.

Non-Muslims paid a tax, called the jizya in Arabic and Cizye in Ottoman Turkish, although only
about 1/3 of non-Muslims paid it.

Non-Muslim communities provided courts and education for their community.

The Alawis and the Druze are breakaway Shii sects (10th and 11th centuries).

The Sheik al-Islam was the chief of the ofcial establishment Islam.

Social hierarchy: government (military, bureaucracy, mostly Muslims), religious establishment,

remainder of those outside government.

There was a great deal of tension between landowners and the peasantry.

A new European-style education system gave rise to a new group of educated secular people,
which weakened the status of the religious establishment.

1.3.2 The Middle East in the 19th Century - The Economy

Total population of the Middle East estimated at 30 million at the start of the 19th century
(including 24 million in the Ottoman Empire and six million in Iran).

Egyptian population rose from 3.5 million at that time to 25 times that now.

The Middle East was relatively underpopulated in the early 19th century, because of wars,
famine, disease and birth control (abortion).

There was a demographic revolution in the 19th century, due to Western medicine, public health
measures, better communications and transportation and increased security.

The Ottoman losses of European provinces in the 19th century made the Empire more Muslim
and less Christian.

In the early 20th century there was a demographic disaster in the Middle East, with 20% of the
population of Anatolia dying and 10% emigrating from 1912-23.

There was also a trend of the territorialisation of identity, which led to bloody clashes between
different religious national groups - the most well-known of all being the Armenian genocide (Prof
Susser does not refer to it as a genocide).

On the eve of WWI, the Middle East was no longer self-sufcient in food.

In the 19th century, Britain surpassed France as the leading commercial power in the Middle
East.

Middle East exports of raw materials and food items went to Europe, with nished goods coming
back due to the Industrial Revolution.

These changes were much slower in Iran than in the Ottoman Empire and Egypt.

1.3.3 The Middle East in the 19th Century - The Politics

Government was diverse and minimal.

Capitulations: rights and privileges conferred by the Ottomans to Europeans, who were governed
by the laws of their own country.

Ottoman power began to shift from the Sultan to the Grand Vizier, the chief minister.

Education was controlled by the communities and Muslims and non-Muslims followed different
laws. This gave the impression of a decentralised and ineffective government.

Notable families tended to send their children to attend religious education and then to work in
religious establishments.

Mathematics and astronomy were among the secular subjects taught at religious schools.

1.4 The Changing Balance of Power with Europe

Until the mid-18th century the Ottomans could feel on an even keel with Europe (and superior to
Europe prior to this).
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The Russian-Ottoman War (1768-1774) was a critical turning point as the Russians took over the
Crimea and the Black Sea was no longer an Ottoman lake.

This also represented the Ottoman Empires rst serious loss of control of Muslim subjects,
which was symbolically important.

The belief in the historic supremacy of Islam over Christianity was in need of rethinking and in the
1790s the Ottomans began to reform the military.

The military was the vanguard of Western military reform. Revolutionary change often began in
the military.

The French stayed in Egypt for three years (1798-1801) until forced out by the British and
Ottomans.

Britains exports to the eastern Mediterranean increased by 800% from 1815-50. Among the
imports were olive oil from Tunisia, silk from Lebanon and cotton from Egypt.

The Russians and French interfered regularly in the affairs of Christians in the Ottoman Empire.

1.5 The Eastern Question

The Eastern Question refers to the fate of the Ottoman Empire and its effect on the European
balance of power.

The European powers feared that an Ottoman collapse would lead to a European war over the
pieces.

The Europeans generally had the collective interest to preserve the integrity of the Ottoman
Empire.

In the early 19th century, Russia posed the greatest challenge to the Ottomans. The two main
components of this was Russias support of Orthodox Christians and Russias desire to advance
to the Black Sea and eventually the Mediterranean.

Napoleon occupied Cairo in July 1798, but a month later his eet was destroyed which severed
his communication with France. Britain, Russia and the Ottomans formed an alliance against
him. Napoleon headed north to Syria but was stopped at Acre in 1799.

In the aftermath of the French occupation in Egypt, an Ottoman ofcer of Albanian origin,
Muhammad Ali, gradually assumed control of Egypt.

He became the creator of modern Egypt, essentially separating it from the Ottoman Empire and
instituting reforms (beginning with the military).

A core component of the Eastern Question was the conict between the Ottoman Empire and its
Balkan subjects, which were adopting European ideas like nationalism. Greece gained
independence in the 1820s, followed by the Serbs, Romanians and Bulgarians.

Muhammad Ali was called in by the Ottomans to suppress the Greek uprising, but they were
defeated in 1827 by a combined French-British force. Ali had been promised Syria for his
assistance but the Ottomans didnt keep their promise, so he invaded Syria in 1831 and defeated
the Ottomans in Konya in 1832.

In 1833, Russia and the Ottomans made a defence pact. The Russians wanted to preserve the
Ottoman Empire but it gave the impression to the other European powers that Russia had
acquired a de facto protectorate over the Ottoman Empire.

Britain therefore wanted to remove Mohammad Ali from Syria.

Ali defeated the Ottomans again in 1839 and Britain and Russia forced him out of Syria and back
to Egypt. He was given the hereditary rights to rule Egypt in exchange for his withdrawal.

1854 - the Crimean War saw Britain and France back the Ottomans against the Russians.

Two years later, the peace of Paris guaranteed the territorial integrity of the Ottoman Empire.

The Sultan promised reforms and better treatment of Christians as part of the peace.

The result was a growing European inuence and interference in the Ottoman Empire, nationalist
movements threatening the empire and the need for reforms within the Ottoman Empire.

Week 2 - Modernity, Tradition and the Age of Reform

The impact of Europe in the early 19th century led to a period of reform, characterised by a
continuing struggle between modernity and tradition.

Reforms began in the military but then spread to all spheres of life.
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Centres of reform: the Ottoman Empire and Egypt, which had emerged as separate political
entities with geo-strategic differences.

Egypt is centralised as a political entity because of its connection with the Nile; while the
Ottoman Empire was decentralised with many centres of power and peoples, which made reform
more difcult to implement.

The Ottomans were preoccupied by military needs, while Egypt was not. Reforms moved faster
and further in Egypt than in the Ottoman Empire.

2.1 The Ottoman Empire

The period of accelerated reform in the Empire was under Selim III from 1789-1807.

By this time, the Ottoman Empires decline was becoming more obvious while events like the
French revolution and the rise of Napoleon showed the rising power of Europe.

By this time, the idea of the inherent superiority of Islam was beginning to wane.

1783: the Ottomans lost Crimea to the Russians, the rst signicant loss of Muslim lands to a
Christian power. This eroded the legitimacy of the Ottoman Empire as an Islamic Empire.

2.1.1 Traditional World View and Opposition to Reform

The traditional Islamic view included a considerable opposition to reform, there was nothing to
learn from the outside world.

Two main opponents of reform in the Ottoman Empire: the ulema, Muslim scholars educated in
Islamic disciplines (religious establishment); and the Janissary Corps, the elite infantry units of
the army.

The opposition of the ulema was the opposition in principle to innovation. The Janissary Corps
opposition was due to their corruption.

Selim III employed many foreign advisors (including the French) and established embassies in
Europe. The people who served in these embassies became architects of reform later on.

Military ofcers were at the centre of reform and became the standard-bearers of modernisation
and secularism. This is a repeated theme in the modern Middle East.

Selim IIIs most important military reform was the establishment of the Nizam-i-Jedid in 1791, a
new conscripted army unit. In 1805 the janissaries revolted and defeated the new troops.

In 1807 an army revolt came because the army was forced to wear European-style uniforms,
which touched on the issue of collective identity and meant abandoning the external appearance
that showed the soldiers to be Muslims. This mutiny was supported by the janissaries and the
ulema and Selim III was deposed in 1807.

At this time, the opponents of reform outnumbered those who supported it. It was easy to
discredit reforms as indel innovations.

To continue the pace of reform, the janissaries had to be removed. In 1826, Mahmud II (the 30th
sultan) did just that. He is described as the Ottoman version of Peter the Great.

The janissaries had earlier revealed their incompetence during the Greek revolt of the 1820s.

Mahmud II began reforms within an Islamic framework to appease opponents. The janissaries
revolted again, so he crushed and abolished them. This incident is referred to as the auspicious
event, as the road to a European-style army and comprehensive reforms was now open.

In the advent of reform, state power was strengthened which weakened the power of the ulema.

Among the reforms: new schools were established (including medical schools and a school of
military science, with instruction in French), clerks were now ministers with European titles,
students were dispatched abroad from 1827, a translation bureau was opened in 1833 which
helped spread foreign ideas, and the overseas embassies were reopened.

This was not a revolution of the masses; it was top-down reform. The masses were largely
indifferent or even hostile to the reforms and their impact on the masses was minimal.

Mahmud IIs reforms regularised and legitimised change, which now became an acceptable
practice. The driving force behind the reforms was the need to preserve the empire.

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2.1.2 The Tanzimat

1839: Abdulmecid I succeeded Mahmud II and the Tanzimat began.

The goals of the Tanzimat were set out in two reforming edicts: the Hatt-i-Sherif of Gulhane
(1839), the imperial edict, and the Hatt-i-Humayun (1856), the imperial reform edict.

The Ottoman constitution of 1876 was also an important reforming document.

The reforms did not create a more liberal form of government. But they strengthened the central
government and prolonged the life of the empire.

Between 1/2 and 2/3 of the expenditure on these reforms went to the army.

Taxation was modernised, with tax farming eliminated (whereby nobles were charged with
collecting tax and pocketed much of it).

Administrative reform was also necessary. The Vilayet Law of 1864 established a more
centralised government for a more effective administration and collection of taxation.

The vilayets (provinces) were placed under a governor appointed in Istanbul, while local councils
were also created with some appointed and elected members.

1847: the ministry of education was established. This removed education from the control of the
religious establishment and further weakened the ulema. Education wasnt entirely
revolutionised, though.

This all eventually led to legal reforms, which were the most revolutionary of all, because this
undermined religious law (the sharia). It changed collective identity, which weakened the hold of
Islam on society more than anything else.

The heart of this reform was the decision to grant all subjects of the empire equality before the
law in 1839. Previously religious minorities were not equal before the law.

This led to the secularisation of the law and was a great step towards territorial nationalism.

However, it was explained as a need to correct the sharias corrosion over the last 150 years.

Equality for the Christian minorities was intended to offer them equal participation within the
empire as Ottoman subjects. But this accelerated the Christian desire to break away.

For Muslims, this was a cause for opposition and frustration. In 1860 in Damascus there was a
massacre of thousands of Christians in a protest against the Tanzimat. The Jews of Damascus
were unaffected; the complaint was against the increase of Christian inuence.

Christians broke away from the empire in the areas in which it was territorially feasible and
European pressure meant that it was impractical to suppress these rebellions.

The reforms therefore created a situation where the state had more theoretical power but was
limited in how it could use it because of external factors and inuence.

The edicts of reform were issued at various times when the need to leave an impressive of
liberalism on Europe was important for the empire - 1839, the empire needed help against
Muhammad Ali; 1856, the end of the Crimean War; 1876, avoiding European intervention as the
empire was going bankrupt.

In the mid-1870s, the nancial problems of the empire were confounded with the intervention of
Europeans over the struggle in the Balkans.

The Young Ottomans: a movement led by Namik Kemal of young Turkish intellectuals dissatised
with the Tanzimat. They argued that the forces that previously restrained the Sultan were no
longer there; so the state required a constitution and parliament.

Russo-Turkish war in 1877-88 led to Ottoman defeat. Other losses in the Balkans resulted in a
loss of Ottoman territory.

Abdulhamid II dissolved the reform parliament in 1878 and emphasised pan-Islamism. Muslim
solidarity was more heartfelt than nationalism at this time.

For all its problems, the Tanzimat laid the foundations of modern Turkey as a new educated elite
emerged out of the new schools.

2.2 Muhammad Ali in Egypt

At the end of the 18th century Egypt was in a state of anarchy as a result of the conicts between
the various Mamluk groups (who had begun as slave soldiers). They controlled Egypt before the
invasion of Napoleon.
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Muhammad Ali arrived in Egypt in 1801 and gradually came to power. He destroyed the power of
the Mamluks from 1809-12, in a similar way to the removal of the janissaries.

In Egypt the reform process was continual, in contrast to the Ottoman experience.

Ali rebuilt the Egyptian army based on European models. He brought 20,000 Sudanese to join
his army but this was a failure. He then took the revolutionary step of recruiting Egyptian Arab
peasants, which later gave rise to Egyptians coming through the military to political power.

Egypt was not under the same military pressure as the Ottoman Empire.

Economic development in Egypt was an important step to help Muhammad Ali maintain his
power. Reforms included vocational schools, industrial monopolies, establishment of factory
industries and an increase in trade (especially the export of cotton). The direction of trade was
more with Europe than with the Ottoman Empire.

Mahmudiyya Canal in 1819 linked Cairo with Alexandria. The population of Alexandria soared.

Muhammad Alis military adventures included campaigns in Arabia (Hijaz, Najd), the Sudan,
Syria and Greece.

In 1840 he settled for Egypt and its hereditary government in his family.

Theories on these undertakings: Arabism, Egyptian nationalism, Muslim/Ottoman context,

military adventurer. Most likely it was a combination of the third and the fourth.

After Muhammad Ali there was a slowdown in reform but it picked up again under his grandson
Khedive Ismail (the impatient Europeaniser) from 1863-79.

He bankrupted the country through his reforms which led to increasing foreign control of Egypts
nances and ultimately to the British occupation.

His most important legacy was the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869.

In 1875 Britain bought his shares in the canal and became the major shareholder.

Advances during Ismails reign: agriculture (expanding the cotton and sugar industries), the
construction of canals, bridges, railway lines etc, the immigration of Europeans to Egypt,
education for girls and encouragement of Western dress and habits.

The British invasion came in 1882 to ensure the payment of debt, and they stayed for 70 years.

An Egyptian nationalist movement developed rather quickly after the invasion, well before the
development of an Arab nationalist movement.

2.3 Islamic Reform or Nationalism?

This long period of reform gave rise to an important debate as to how Islam should respond to
this crisis of modernity.

In Western Europe, religious thought was superseded by nationalism and rationalist secularism.
In the Middle East, that was not so, and the two continued to compete against one another.

Dar-al-Islam: the House of Islam (Muslim territories). Dar-al-Harb: the House of War (non-Muslim
territories).

2.3.1 Islamic Reform or Modernism?

The movement of Islamic reform or Islamic modernism was an effort by Muslim thinkers to nd a
compromise between faith and reason by attempting to show the compatibility of Islam with
modern ideas.

There was a need to answer the European attack on Islam, that Islam was the cause of the
stagnation of the Muslim world.

French philosopher Ernest Renan said Islam was incompatible with modern civilisation.

Rifaa al-Tahtawi went to Europe and noted that even the common people there know how to
read and write.

Jamal al-Din al-Afghani (1838-97) was the rst in line of Muslim reformers. He was a supporter of
modern science and he portrayed Islam as a religion of progress and change.

In the Sunni tradition, the gates of itjihad were closed in the 10th century. Now Muslims could
reclaim the knowledge what was originally theirs.

Afghani supported pan-Islamic ideas, arguing that being a Muslim was a form of national
solidarity. He also argued that Islam followed the rules of nature.
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Afghani laid the idealogical foundations for secular, nationalist ideas, even though he wasnt a
secular nationalist himself.

Muhammad Abduh (1849-1905) was Afghanis disciple. His constant emphasis was that there
was no inherent conict between religion and reason.

Change and innovation were legitimate in Abduhs view. He was trying to control - not to curb -
the process of modernisation without losing Islamic identities.

Abduh was not an Arab nationalist, but the ideas that he raised provided the foundations for it
because he emphasised human wisdom and the importance of returning to the original Arab
Islamic ideal.

Rashid Rida (1865-1935) was born in Syria but active in Egypt, and was a disciple of Abduh, but
he went in a more Islamic fundamentalist direction.

He was disturbed by the Westernisation and secularisation of Muslim society and created a
movement to return to Islams roots, called the salayya.

His emphasis on the Arab nature of early Islam comes close to Arab nationalism, but isnt there
yet. He doesnt want to undermine the Ottoman Empire and is still ultimately talking about an
Islamic context rather than an Arab context.

After Rida, the next reformer is Abd al-Rahman al-Kawakibi (1849-1902). He was more radical on
the centrality of the Arabs and called for a return to the Arab caliphate. He wanted to separate
religion and state.

All these reformers contributed to the spread of the idea that politics is more about mans will
than Gods will and introduced self-determination.

Elie Kedourie has argued that Afghani and Abduh were subverting religion.

Two competing ideas: If Islam was reason, why take the western road to modernity? If Islam was
reason, why not westernise completely?

Week 3: The Rise of Nationalism; The Demise of Empire

Muslims did not traditionally connect collective identity with territoriality, but with Islamic belief.
But European inuence began to change this.

Three forms of nationalism in this period: Turkish, Arab and Egyptian.

Nationalism was, for the most part, the property of an intellectual, elitist, westernising minority.

New schools produced new social classes and professions.

Most of the population was still deeply embedded in Islamic tradition, but just what that tradition
was was also changing.

3.1 Turkish Nationalism

Issues that led to Turkish nationalism: European pressure, Christian secession, the failure of
Ottomanism to keep the Christian territories inside the empire. The idea of a shared Ottoman
identity did not eventuate.

The new Turkish elite believed in Turkish nationalism based on a common language, rather than
a grouping based solely on religion.

Young Turks came to power in 1908, but they were reluctant to push Turkish nationalism too far
so as not to cause tension with the large Arab population of the empire. They sought the
salvation of the empire.

The Young Turks were young military ofcers and bureaucrats, the graduates of the Tanzimat,
and not the usual opposition to the Sultan.

They called for reform and restoration of the Constitution.

They staged a rebellion in July 1908 and deposed the Sultan (Abulhamid II) in April 1909.

They later formed an ofcial party: The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP). They
consolidated their power with a coup in 1913, which gave the CUP complete control.

The young Turks modernised the empire by improving infrastructure and further centralising the
government.

The idea of a constitutional government gained ground with Japans defeat of Russia in 1905.

Constitutionalism also meant, for the young Turks, the shift of power from the Sultan and the
bureaucracy to the army.
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1911: Italy took Tripoli and Libya from the Ottomans.

Since the second half of the 19th century, there had been an increased interest in Turkish history,
culture and language. Ziya Gokalp (1876-1924) was the most prominent ideologue of Turkish
nationalism. He rejected Ottomanism.

But as long as the empire existed, Turkish nationalism could not be adopted by the empires
rulers.

Since the empire was losing territory, what was left faced increasing nationalist challenges by
other groups that served to reinforce Turkish nationalism.

With the loss of the European provinces, Anatolia was established as the heartland of the
Turkish-speaking people. The Armenians were therefore seen as a threat to this heartland.

Armenians and Sunni Muslim Kurds were concentrated in eastern Anatolia. An Armenian national
identity had begun to rise in the 19th century (inuenced by American protestant missionaries)
with Haik Nahapet as the legendary patriarch of the Armenian nation.

The Armenians provoked the Turks in the hope of attracting European attention to their plight.

Hamidian Massacres 1894-96: killing of Armenians carried out mainly by Kurdish irregulars of the
Ottoman army.

Armenians in eastern Anatolia had fought with Russia against the Ottomans in WWI. In spring
1915, with British and Russian forces advancing against the Ottomans on three fronts, they
decided on a mass deportation of Armenians from eastern Anatolia. Probably more than a million
people perished or were murdered during this process.

The Armenian tragedy showed the general transition of the empire from communal identity
(Ottoman-style) to territorial self-determination (European-style).

3.2 Arab Nationalism

What were the intellectual origins of Arab nationalism? There were two sources: Christian
scholars who produced new scholarship on Arab language and culture, and Islamic reform, which
emphasised the primacy of the Arabs.

The original Arab demand was for decentralisation, not secession from the Ottoman Empire.

The Christian intellectual roots of Arab nationalism can be traced to missionary schools and
programs; there were 500 French schools in Syria in 1914.

The American University of Beirut was established in 1866.

This brought Arab Christians into close contact with the west and resulted in a revival of Arab
literature and culture, with Christian Arabs largely emphasised.

Some Christian ideologues of Arab nationalism converted to Islam, like Faris Shidyaq.

The Arab Christians were very different from the Christians of the Balkans.

The Orthodox Arab Christians were spread all over the empire and had an interest in common
ground with their Muslim neighbours, as opposed to the Maronite Christians.

Najib Azuri was one Christian Arab operating in Paris who advocated an Arab nation, including
Syria, Iraq and Arabia.

For other Arab Christians, Arab nationalism was a dangerous concept because it could
marginalise these Christians.

Muslims were more inuenced by the Islamic reformers than the Christian intellectuals
(obviously).

The revival of Arabic studies led to the revival of Islam which in turn led to the glorication of
Arabs.

Arab nationalism only became popular after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.

The role of Islam was emphasised in Arab nationalism.

Before WWI, there were secret societies that promoted Arab nationalism but these carried very
little weight before 1914.

Typical Arab demands before WWI were for autonomy, the recognition of Arabic as an ofcial
language of the Ottoman Empire, and the appointment of more Arab ofcials.

There was even less interest in Arab nationalism in Iraq than in Syria. There had been less
change and development in Iraq. Plus, the large Shia population in Iraq thought that Arab
nationalism, with its majority Sunni element, would compromise them.

The Jews of Iraq were generally loyal Ottoman subjects.

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3.3 Egyptian Nationalism

Egyptian nationalism is the only country nationalism among Arabs that we speak of in this period.
It differed from the other cases because of the British occupation.

There was a specic Egyptianness to the nationalist movement as opposed to Ottoman or Arab.

Egypt was bankrupt in the 1870s, and there was increasing international intervention in Egypts
nances.

In 1879, the European powers removed Khedive Ismail from power in favour of his son.

There was increasing tension between the Arabic-speaking Egyptians and the military ofcers
and landowning elite of Turkish or Mamluk (Circassian?) origin.

Archaeological discoveries from ancient Egypt also fed Egyptian nationalism. Typically in Muslim
countries, the pre-Islamic past is not celebrated and is called the jahiliyya, which means
ignorance. Valuing the pre-Islamic past of Egypt therefore eroded the role of Islam in the
Egyptian collective identity.

Rifaa al-Tahtawi (1801-73) spoke frequently of nations and countries because of his inuence
from Europe. He called for Egyptian nationalism.

1881-82: the Urabi Rebellion was led by an Arab Egyptian ofcer against foreign dominance.

Egypt became increasingly rebellious and disorderly. In July 1882, the British navy shelled
Alexandria and from September of that year the British occupation began.

More freedom of speech was allowed in Egypt by the British than was customary in the Ottoman
Empire, which helped the Egyptian national sentiment grow.

1906: the Dinshaway Incident took place. It was an altercation between British ofcers and
Egyptians, in which a British ofcer died. The subsequent trial resulted in executions and
oggings of Egyptians, which inamed Egyptian nationalism.

1907: modern-style political parties were established, including the Nationalist Party led by
Mustafa Kamil, an exciting writer and orator. But he was inconsistent in who he supported.

Another political party established in 1907 (Hizb al-Umma) was also a nationalist party, led by
Ahmad Lufti al-Sayyid, a journalist and lawyer and disciple of Abduh. He rmly rejected religion
as the cohesive element of society and promoted territorially-dened nationalism instead. But he
underestimated the role of Islam.

Lufti thought the British occupation was benecial, because it would further secular nationalist
ideas in Egypt.

1906: the Taba Issue was the denition of the boundary between Egypt and the Ottoman Empire
(now the border between Egypt and Israel). The Egyptian public supported the Ottomans against
the British in this claim, which showed that nationalism was not widespread.

There were also tensions between Egyptian Muslims and Copts. Secular nationalism was
attractive for the Copts because it would bring equality.

1910: the assassination of Butrus Ghali, the Coptic prime minister of Egypt, by a Muslim.

The Arab element in Egyptian nationalism was minimal, except in opposition to the Turko-
Circassion elite.

3.4 WWI

The modern Middle Eastern state system was built on the ruins of the Ottoman Empire.

The Ottoman decision to side with Germany in WWI meant that France and England had every
reason to seek its destruction.

The Sykes-Picot agreement of 1916, a theoretical division of the Arab parts of the Ottoman
Empire, ceded Cilicia, coastal Syria and Lebanon and a sphere of inuence stretching east to
Mosul to France, while Britain got Iraq, a sphere of inuence west to the Mediterranean and the
ports of Haifa and Acre in Palestine, with much of the rest of Palestine given over to international
control. Russia was granted the Armenian provinces, but the 1917 revolution led to Russia opting
out of the colonial spoils of the Ottoman Empire.

There was also correspondance with the British high commissioner in Egypt, Henry McMahon,
and the leader of the Hashemites in Mecca, starting in 1915. Britain was deeply concerned that
the Muslims of India would revolt and was in search of a Muslim ally.
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The Hashemites were a prestigious Muslim family (descendants of Muhammad) who ruled
Mecca on behalf of the Ottomans. Sharif Hussein Ibn Ali was their leader at this time.

The Hashemites had aspirations for Islamic leadership independent of the Turks.

In their negotiations with the British, the Hashemites demanded a Hashemite caliphate including
all Arab areas east of Egypt (excluding Egypt and North Africa).

The British agreed to this for three reasons: a guarantee of an Arab contribution to the war effort;
to put themselves in a better post-war position against the French later on; and to secure their
imperial communication routes.

British reservations: exclusion of certain areas that were not purely Arab - portions of Syria lying
to the West of the districts of Damascus, Homs, Hama and Aleppo; and that British promises
related only to those portions of territories wherein Great Britain is free to act without detriment
to her ally France.

Zionists later used the rst of these reservations to show that Palestine was excluded from the
Arab state, but in fact it was the second reservation that was more relevant.

The Vilayet controversy over the rst reservation was related to whether the districts meant the
Ottoman provinces or just the city environs. The vilayet of Damascus stretched south of the city,
and thus west of it was Palestine. But the reference to districts could not have meant vilayet,
because Homs and Hama did not have a vilayet but were included in Damascus while there was
no land west of the vilayet of Aleppo, so the exclusion of Palestine from the Arab state was not
based on this reservation. This reservation was meant to exclude Mt Lebanon and the Maronites,
not Palestine, from the Arab state.

But the second reservation, saying that there could be no detriment to France, comes into play
because France shared responsibility with Britain of Palestine.

It is often claimed that Palestine is the twice-promised land, but there is no real substantial
discrepancy from the British side between Sykes-Picot, the Hashemite correspondence (which
was just that, and not an agreement) and the Balfour Declaration.

The Arab Revolt of 1916 launched by the Hashemites against the Ottomans did not gain
popularity. The British had given far more weight to Arab nationalism than actually existed.

The 1st Zionist Congress in Basel in 1897 declared its aim to establish a home for the Jewish
people.

Palestine was not promised to the Arabs, but it wasnt promised to the Jews either. The Balfour
Declaration supported a Jewish state in Palestine, but it wasnt a promise of all of Palestine.

British Prime Minister Lloyd George was quite religious and associated Jews with Christians
because of his biblical studies.

Britain wanted more support from the USA and Russia in the war effort and believed that support
for Zionism would help them in this way. But they overestimated the inuence of Jews in both
countries.

The British Foreign Secretary Balfour wrote to the leader of the Zionist movement in Britain,
declaring sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations and that the British view with favour the
establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people. It was an extremely
cautious and noncommittal approach.

The declaration also says that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious
rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine.

As WWI ended, Britain occupied most of the Ottoman Empire. France was completely
preoccupied in France and could not spare forces for the Middle East except for a small force in
Lebanon.

King Faisal was in control of an Arab state in Syria with Hasemite support from the end of the war
until July 1920, when he was evicted by the French with British support.

Important French concessions were made to Britain in Palestine and Iraq. France agreed to give
up their share of Palestine and control of Mosul, which now fell under British Iraq. In exchange,
the British allowed the French to take over Syria from Faisal.

The allocation of mandates took place in San Remo in 1920. The mandate was a colonial
compromise with the principle of self-determination whereby the mandate power committed itself
to guide the territory to independence.
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The Turks signed the treaty of Sevrs in August 1920, which called for an international regime for
the straits, an Armenian state in the east, the possibility of a Kurdish state in the east and Italian,
Greek and French spheres of inuence.

This was the conversion of Turkey into a European semi-colonial dependency.

The Greeks had landed in Izmir in May 1919 and taken it over.

Week 4: The Creation of the Middle East

Middle East state system created in the aftermath of WWI in the ascendence of the European
powers Britain and France.

What inuenced the decisions of these powers? The British and French perceptions of the
Middle East; Britains interests against those of France; and the achievements of the Arab Revolt.

The French saw the Middle East as a heterogenous mosaic of various minorities while the British
saw it as a homogenous Arab region.

London sought compromise with France, but the British view in Cairo was different; that France
was a nuisance and that the British should side with Arab nationalism without deferring to
France. But the London view won out.

The mandate compromise was invented because creating colonial states was no longer viable.

Britain saw the Middle East as a strategic area because of its location vis-a-vis India; France saw
its Middle Eastern territories as important unto themselves.

France didnt want Arab nationalism to erupt in the Middle East because they didnt want this to
spread to its holdings in North Africa.

The Arab Revolt had achieved some sort of international recognition.

4.1 Egypt

Egypt was the exception to the rule in the Middle East because it had existed as a separate
entity previously.

At the beginning of WWI Egypt became a British protectorate governed by a high commissioner,
nally ofcially detaching itself from the Ottoman Empire.

The Wafd Party became the most inuential in the rst half of the 20th century. It was headed by
Saad Zaghlul and sought independence.

Zaghlul was one of the disciples of Afghani and Abduh. In March 1919 he was arrested and
deported, which resulted in the 1919 revolution or thawra which encompassed virtually the entire
population.

Students and organised workers joined in the struggle, while the peasants used the rebellion to
revolt against landlords as well as the government.

The British eventually agreed to talk with Zaghlul, but an agreement wasnt reached.

On Feb 28 1922 the British declared Egypts independence, with four areas remaining under
British control: defence and foreign affairs; the Suez Canal, capitulations (rights given to
foreigners) and the Sudan.

Egypt then established a constitutional monarchy under King Fuad 1, who descended from
Mohammad Ali. The parliamentary system became corrupt and was discredited.

The 1920s were the golden age of Egyptian-ness and secular liberal politics. The two go together
because Egyptian-ness is by denition a secular movement, unlike pan-Islamism or even Arab
nationalism to a certain extent.

Islam was considered only one phase in Egypts long history of thousands of years.

The establishment of the constitutional monarchy formalised and legitimised man-made

legislation at the expense of Sharia law and religion.

Ali Abd-Al Raziq argued that there was no need for a caliphate and that the Sharia was unrelated
to the earthly governing of men. Others also made similar arguments as part of the attack on
tradition.

The response to this came in the late 1920s and 1930s. The Muslim Brethren was established in
1928 in a town near the Suez Canal. They argued for the development of a modern society
governed by the Sharia.

The leading modernists retreated and began to produce works on early Islam instead.
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This nationalism that included religion was more appealing to the society at large.

4.2 The Fertile Crescent

The Fertile Crescent stretches from the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf in an upside down U
shape.

The population of the Fertile Crescent was very heterogenous, especially in Lebanon, Syria and
Iraq - unlike Egypt. This makes the formation of a cohesive state a lot more difcult.

4.3.1 The French Mandate: Lebanon

The Maronites in Lebanon had a very distinct sense of identity - they were Catholic Christians
rather than Muslims or Orthodox Christians like the rest of the minorities of the Middle East.

They were a compact minority, living in a well-dened territory around Mt Lebanon.

They had a formal link with the Catholic church and a historic link with France.

In the 1840s tensions mounted between the Druze and the Maronites, the two main communities
of the area. This deteriorated into a civil war in which the Druze won. There was also the 1860
massacre of the Maronites in Damascus, both of which led to the military intervention of France.

An international accord between all relevant parties resulted in the formation of an autonomous
province of Mt Lebanon within the Ottoman Empire, run by a Christian governor appointed from
Istanbul. This sectarian government would form the basis of the government established in
Lebanon after independence.

The state of Lebanon was much larger than the cohesive territory of Mt Lebanon, because the
Maronites wanted more territory and lobbied for it. It was also benecial for France to have the
new state control the coastal cities like Beirut.

This changed the population distribution dramatically. In autonomous Mt Lebanon, 80% were
Christians and 60% were Maronites. In the new greater Lebanon, Christians were just over 50%
with Maronites at 1/3 of the population.

Population then grew in favour of the Muslims and in time it was the Shiites who became the
largest community in Lebanon.

The Sunnis, who had been the majority in the Ottoman Empire, were now a minority and
resented their position within the new greater Lebanon.

4.3.2 The French Mandate: Syria

Syria was a mosaic of minorities as well, but without a distinct territorial core like the Maronites in
Mt Lebanon. Sunni Muslims made up about 70%, though this was split between Arabs (60%) and
Kurds (8%).

Syria was not a consolidated unit historically and had many rivalries within it. There was also an
overlap between sect and social class, e.g. the Sunni landowners and the Alawi peasants.

The Sunnis were the only group that really identied with the Ottoman Empire.

There was hostility and suspicion towards Christians because of their afuence & ties to Europe.

At rst, Damascus and Aleppo were divided into two different states until 1924. The Druze and
Alawaites were given autonomy until being incorporated into Syria in 1936.

1925-27: the Great Syrian Revolt, which began among the Druze who demanded greater
autonomy and less French presence. Arab nationalists joined in but it was dominated by Druze
and Bedouin tribes. The Christians for the most part opposed the rebellion.

The French suppressed the rebellion and exiled Syrian leaders to Saudi Arabia.

The French had a minority preference and preferred to have Christians in key administrative and
military positions.

The difculty of consolidating the state made Syria the most unstable of the early Arab states,
with more coups than any other.

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4.4.1 The British Mandates: The Palestine Question

Palestine had to be clearly dened as a separate territory from Transjordan because of the
Balfour Declaration and its unique circumstances.

Transjordan then became part of the Hashemite arrangement.

Originally, Transjordan and Palestine were part of the same mandate with Iraq as a separate
mandate.

Part of the French mandates in Lebanon and Syria involved them stepping away from Palestine.

You could not speak of a Palestinian identity in 1920 when Palestine was established. The Arabs
there were identied as Christians and Muslims, with perhaps a bit of Arab nationalism involved.

4.4.2 Trans-Jordan

Trans-Jordan was established as a separate identity primarily not to include it within the Zionist
program.

At the end of 1920, Prince Abdullah, one of the sons of Sharif Hussein Ibn Ali, came to Jordan.
He wanted to take revenge against the French who had expelled his brother from Syria.

The British didnt know what they wanted to do with Trans-Jordan. In 1921, they made an
agreement with Abdullah in which he would become the Emir of Jordan.

Abdullah had to make a commitment to the British that he would not attack Syria.

Trans-Jordan was often looked at as the most articial Arab state.

It had no urban centres when it was established, with Amman having only 2000 people.

On the other hand, Jordan was a country of Sunni Arab Muslims (more than 90%), so the
problem of ethnicities and minorities in other countries were not present in Jordan.

In the long run, Jordan proved to be the most stable of the Arab states that were created at this
time.

Jordan had been closely associated with Palestine because of the topographical structure of
Jordan. The rivers create an easier east-west movement than north-south, while the towns on
both sides of the River Jordan had a long association with one another.

Abdullahs real dream was to rule a greater Syria from Damascus.

Jordan established a ruling Hashemite elite and a sense of Jordanian-ness.

4.4.3 Iraq

The Euphrates and Tigris dont serve the same purpose as the Nile does in Egypt - as a
centralised artery.

The Shiites in Iraq had not been regarded as loyal Ottoman subjects and were instead loyal to
Persia.

Iraq was the birthplace of Shia and the holiest places are there such as the Shrine of Imam Ali in
Najaf, the Shrine of Imam Hussein in Karbala and the Al-Kadhimiya Mosque in Baghdad.

The Hashemite arrangement in Iraq seemed promising but ultimately failed.

From the beginning in Iraq, the existing reality made it difcult to build a state. The Hashemites
were overthrown in 1958.

Iraq was made up of three Ottoman vilayets (provinces): Basra, Baghdad and Mosul. Mosul was
supposed to be part of Syria but the French gave it up.

Iraq was made up of over 90% of Muslims, but these were divided between Sunnis and Shiites
and Arabs and Kurds (who each made up 50% of the Sunni Muslims). Shiites were a slight
majority.

Baghdad had a population of 200,000, with 40% of these being Jews.

People didnt identify themselves as Iraqis in the early 1920s, but rather by sect/ethnicity/tribe.

The British created Arab Iraq in the name of Arabism which wasnt a shared value by all of the
population. The Shiites saw Arab nationalism as a Sunni way to obtain supremacy.

1920 revolt: a reaction of the Shii tribes to the new reality in Iraq, against the British. The British
saw this as an Arab nationalist revolt and sought to accelerate the independence of Iraq.

The Kurds had been among the Sunni Muslim majority in the Ottoman Empire but were now a
minority in Iraq in both religion and ethnicity.
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Iraq was ruled under Sunni Arab dominance for decades. King Faisal I was installed in 1921.

1921-1936: 71% of ministerial posts were held by Sunnis.

1922: Britain devolved more responsibilities. 1930: Independence obtained. 1932: Iraq becomes
rst Arab state admitted to the League of Nations.

King Faisal died in 1933.

4.5 The Saudis and the Hashemites in the Arabian Peninsula

In Arabia there had been a powerful alliance between the family of Saud and the Wahhabis, a
radical puritanical movement. This alliance produced the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

The Wahhabis were against modernisation and change.

In the early 20th century, the Hashemites controlled western Arabia including the two holy cities
but the Wahhabis controlled most of the region.

Arabia was hardly affected by the 19th century Ottoman and Egyptian reforms.

The Hijaz railway reached as far as Medina by 1908.

Britain had formed alliances with both the Saudis and the Hashemites.

In 1917, Hussein Ibn Ali of the Hashemites declared himself King of the Arabs but no one
recognised him as such.

The Saudis defeated the Hashemites in a number of battles after WWI.

Hussein Ibn Ali didnt want to corporate with the British over the mandates so they abandoned
him and allowed him to be defeated by the Saudis.

Hussein declared himself caliph in 1924 but the Hijaz was annexed by the Saudis in 1925 and
the Hasemites went into exile.

1932: Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was established.

The Persian gulf principalities were under British inuence.

4.6.1 The non-Arab States - Turkey

The allied powers wanted to teach the Ottomans a lesson for trying to rally the Arabs under pan-
Islamism. They wanted to dismantle the empire and weaken the Turks.

The Treaty of Svres (1920) took the Arab provinces from the Empire.

There had been partition plans for Anatolia.

July 1923, the Treaty of Lausanne replaced the former treaty and enabled an independent
Turkey to emerge.

The Greeks had landed in Izmir in May 1919 and made claims over western Anatolia. They
performed a variety of atrocities.

The Turks rose up under Mustafa Kemal and fought a war of independence. They recaptured
Izmir in September 1922.

The Ottoman sultanate was abolished in November 1922 and replaced by a Turkish government
in Ankara which negotiated the Treaty of Lausanne.

Kurdish and Armenian claims for independence disappeared.

Turkish nationalism only took root during the war with the Greeks.

Kemal was given the title gaze in 1921, which means an Islamic conquerer.

Turkey and Greek population exchange was part of the Treaty of Lausanne, with 1 million Greeks
going back to Greece and a lesser number of Turks going back to Turkey.

Religion, not language, dened which nation these people belonged to. Turkish-speaking
Christians were considered Greeks.

1927 census of Turkey showed a population of 13.6 million, 98% Muslim. The population was
10% Kurdish.

Ziya Gokalps ideas of a more narrowly-based Turkishness was now more accepted than it had
been prior to WWI.

Religion was separated from the state and replaced with secular nationalism.

Sultan Mehmed VI ed, replaced by Abdulmecid II as caliph who had no political power.

October 1923: Turkey formally became a republic and the caliphate was abolished in March
1924.

In 1926, the Sharia was abolished and replaced by a version of the Swiss civil code.
15

The 1925 hat law required hats to have brims.

1928: Latin alphabet introduced.

No other country in the Middle East went this far in its formal secularisation.

4.6.1 The non-Arab States - Iran

Iran was not a new state created by European powers.

The Safavid Empire ruled Iran from 1501-1736. The Qajar Dynasty ruled from 1785-1925.

Iran was characterised by a weakness of central government, of which it had a long tradition. The
geography of high mountain ranges and huge deserts contributed to this.

Iran was territorially isolated and far from Europe, so there was a slow pace of reform in the 19th
century.

Iran was a country historically troubled by external inuence.

Iran was populated by a series of minorities who lived along the borders, with part of their
populations in neighbouring countries (eg Azeris, Kurds, Arabs, Baluchis).

In 1900, Irans population was about 10 million.

The men of religion in the Shiite branch of Islam had extraordinary inuence. Typically the
religious establishment in Shiite societies is stronger than in Sunni ones.

Two schools of Shiite thought emerged in the 18th century: the Akhbari school, which saw all
answers as being in the Quran and the sunna; and the Usuli school, which believed that
answers should be given by a living mujtahid (interpretor).

The principle of taqlid held that the believers would imitate the interpreter.

1906: constitutional revolution forced a constitution on the shah of Iran.

In the years preceding WWI, foreign powers had some inuence in Iran (Britain and Russia).

1921: coup dtat staged by army ofcer Riza Khan. He crowned himself as the shah in April
1926 to begin the Pahlavi dynasty.

Differences between Turkey and Iran: length of exposure to the west and modernisation; greater
strength of religious institution in Iran; prestige and legitimacy of Ataturk compared with the
Pahlavis; demographic composition of the two countries.

True speakers of Persian made up only just over half of the population of Iran.

Week 5: The Arab-Israeli conict

5.1 Introduction to Contexts and Discourse

The European context: the European Jewish predicament that gave rise to the idea of the
creation of a Jewish state in Palestine.

Zionism was born out of a profound Jewish disappointment with modernity in Europe, which gave
rise to a modern anti-semitism.

Theodor Herzl rst called for a state for the Jews. He was a Hungarian-born Jewish journalist
who worked for a newspaper in Vienna.

Dreyfus Affair (1895): the case of a Jewish ofcer in the French army who was accused of
espionage just because he was Jewish. This exposed anti-semitism in Europe.

1896: After covering the Dreyfus Affair, Herzl published a pamphlet called the State of the Jews.

He sought to bring the idea of Jewish statehood into the public domain.

He hoped for an international charter to award Palestine to the Jews. When this didnt work, he
thought Palestine could be purchased from the Ottoman Empire.

He met and negotiated with the Ottoman Sultan Abdulhamid II in 1901, gaining momentum for
the idea even though the Ottomans did not give him what he wanted.

The three ideas seemingly available to the Jews were: leave Europe for the New World; engage
in socialist revolutions in Europe; or create their own state.

The Middle Eastern context: the relationship between the Jews and the Arabs in the Middle East
and how it is dened (Arab or Palestinian).

5.2 Early Zionism

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Secular Jewish nationalism was based on the cultural identity of the Jews that was fostered at
the end of the 19th century through the Jewish languages, Yiddish and Hebrew.

This nationalism was not fostered in the Russian or Polish languages that Jews also spoke.

Nationalism is a secular idea - about salvation of men by men, not by god.

Herzl thought Europeans would support Zionism because it would allow them to rid themselves
of the Jews.

1897: First Zionist Conference, Basel. Herzls emphasis was on self-help rather than protected
Jewry.

The Jews were not just a religious community anymore but a national people with rights.

Ahad Haam was among those who didnt believe in the creation of a Jewish state. He thought
Judaism itself should be reformed, and emigration to the USA was the answer. He thought that a
state could not be created without force, and that to use force was not Jewish.

1903: Pogrom of Kishinev, scores of Jews were raped and massacred in Moldova.

A land without a people for a people without a land - but the land was not empty; the Arabs
were already there.

The historic sense of Muslim superiority was being challenged by European modernism. The
Zionist project was seen as an extension of this Western expansion into the Muslim heartland.

The Zionists believed they would quickly establish a majority population in Palestine. There were
fewer than 700,000 Arabs in Palestine at the beginning of the 20th century.

The immigration was not as quick as expected. By 1930, there were 170,000 Jews in Palestine
(about 15-20% of the population).

5.3 Initial Arab Resistance

January 1919: Prince Faisal came to an agreement with Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann, but
Faisal was not representative of the Arab sentiment.

The Balfour Declaration was incorporated into the British Mandate of Palestine in 1920, which
was an upgrading of the British commitment to the Zionist enterprise as an international
obligation.

After WWI, a much more organised Arab opposition began. Muslim-Christian Associations were
formed against Zionism (showing how religious afliation trumped national identity at this stage).

Some Arabs argued for Palestine to be part of Syria under Prince Faisal, but he was expelled in
1920 by the French.

1920-1921: riots in Jerusalem and Jaffa.

The Zionists tended to deny Arab opposition. It was important in the Zionist project to believe that
the Arabs werent that opposed to Zionism.

Seeing the problems in Palestine, the British made the decision to separate Palestine and Jordan
in their mandate.

The 1929 riots were the worst so far. The Jews wished to expand their rights of prayer at the
wailing wall, but the Muslims saw this as the rst stage in an attempt to undermine and perhaps
destroy the Muslim holy places on the Temple Mount.

Over 100 people were killed on both sides in the 1929 riots. A British commission of enquiry
found that the root cause was the Arab animosity to Zionism.

The British issued a white paper in 1930 (the Passeld White Paper), restricting Jewish
immigration and land purchases. The Jews protested and the British backed down.

In the late 1920s the Zionist project was facing failure. More Jews were emigrating from
Palestine than immigrating to it.

1931: An international Islamic conference was convened in Jerusalem.

The rise of fascism changed everything. Jews in Palestine numbered 185,000 in 1932, then
375,000 in 1935, then close to 500,000 in 1939.

5.4 The Arab Rebellion and the Jewish Response

1936: outbreak of the Arab Rebellion against the Zionists/British (until 1939).

British dilemma: how could they reconcile creating a Jewish state in Palestine without disrupting
non-Jewish people in Palestine (as laid out in the Balfour Declaration)?
17

Izz ad-Din al-Qassam was the founding father of the armed uprising against the Zionists. He is
an iconic gure among both secular and Islamist Palestinians today.

He was killed by the British in a clash in November 1935, leading to the outbreak of the rebellion,
beginning with riots and then a general strike, which lasted for a few months.

Arab resistance was based on Islamic opposition and nationalist motivation.

The general strike hurt the Arab population more than it did the Jews. The Jews became more
economically independent (e.g. they built a port in Tel Aviv).

There was internal dissension in Palestine between various groups - the great families, the cities,
the urban-rural dichotomy and Muslims-Christians.

The rebellion took place for the most part in the rural inland of Palestine, where there were no
Jews. It was part of a class struggle among Palestinians. In the Arab rebellion, more Arabs were
killed by other Arabs than Jews and British combined.

In 1936 the Arabs in Palestine formed the Arab Higher Committee, but it was outlawed with its
leadership exiled in 1937. For decades thereafter, the leadership of the nationalist movement
was based outside the country.

The rebellion allowed for the formation of a national identity, but the Palestinians were divided
and leaderless.

The Palestinians had to rely on outsiders after the rebellion, vacillating thereafter between self-
reliance and dependence on external Arabs.

The rebellion led to the expansion of the Haganah, the Jewish self defence force, with the
approval of the British.

No Jewish settlements were abandoned during the rebellion, and in fact more were built. They
were built with partition in mind.

Jews and Arabs became more physically separate after the rebellion.

After the rebellion broke out, the British commission of enquiry (the Peel Commission) published
a report in July 1937 recognising that the rebellion proved that there were two national
movements in Palestine, a departure from the Balfour Declaration.

This drove the British to the logic of partition, which was recommended in the Peel Commission.
The Jews were granted a state containing 20% of Palestine on the coast and the Galilee, while
the rest would be annexed to the state of Trans-Jordan. Jerusalem would remain under British
control.

There was a large Arab population within the boundaries of the Jewish state (especially in the
Galilee). The British wanted to transfer these Arabs to the Arab state, however the Arabs
opposed the report except for the emir of Trans-Jordan.

The Jews grudgingly accepted the partition, but the British withdrew the idea in 1938. There was
a need to placate the Arabs in the coming war with Germany.

The St. James Conference in London in 1939 lasted for weeks with no agreement between Jews
and Arabs. The British issued a white paper at the end of the conference, in May 1939, which
was the nal British abandonment for the support of Zionism.

The white paper contained three main points: restrictions on Jewish immigration to Palestine to
15K a year for ve years with no more immigration without Arab approval thereafter, restrictions
on land sales to Jews, and independence for an Arab-majority Palestine within 10 years.

The White Paper was rejected by the League of Nations as a lack of British fullment of the
Palestine mandate.

With the predicament of the Jews in Europe getting worse and British support having come to an
end, time was running out for the Zionist project. The Jews realised war with the Arabs was
possibly inevitable, but they would only resort to it as a last resort.

5.5 The Impact of WWII

There was considerable Arab support for the German war effort. Cooperation between the
Palestinian leadership and the Germans delegitimised the Palestinians after the war.

About 36,000 Palestinian Jews served in the British army, which served as experience for the
future wars that would come to Palestine.

May 1942: Biltmore Conference in New York declared its acceptance of a partition of Palestine.

There were 560,000 Jews in Palestine by 1945.

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For the Arabs there was a great need to detach the question of Palestine from the issue of the
holocaust and the Jewish plight in Europe. But this did not work.

Britain supported the creation of the Arab League in 1944 and was unwilling to confront the Arabs
on any issue including Palestine because it wanted to preserve its inuence over the Middle East
and its oil.

Given the plight of holocaust survivors in post-war Europe and its own inability to prevent the
Holocaust in real-time, the U.S. pushed for Jewish statehood under President Truman.

The balance of power was changing in Palestine too. The Mufti was still in exile, there was a lack
of functioning institutions, and increasing external Arab interference.

5.6 The Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry

In 1946, the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry came to Palestine to study the situation. It
showed that the Americans were at least as inuential as the British in Palestine now.

The British and the Americans did not agree on the question of Palestine.

The Arab Testimony to the committee was as usual: rejection of the Balfour Declaration,
demands for an end to Jewish immigration, and the establishment of an Arab majority state.

The Zionist demand was for statehood and nothing less.

The committees report emphasised the Jewish plight in Europe and said the refugees must go to
Palestine. The U.S. endorsed the ndings, infuriating the British.

The Jews bombed British bridges crossing into Palestine in June 1946. The right-wing
underground carried out a policy of revenge and retaliation against the British including the
bombing of the HQ of the British administration in Palestine, the King David hotel, in July 1946,
causing dozens of deaths.

The British tried to take illegal immigrants and send them back to Europe, even Germany.

February 1947: the British gave up in Palestine and turned it over to the UN - at the same time
that the British decided to leave India.

5.7 Partition and War

May 1947: UN special committee on Palestine established, with the majority suggesting partition.

The Jews were elated that they would have their state but the Arabs threatened war.

The Soviet Union came out in support of partition which helped the Jewish position, even though
the Soviets were motivated mostly by the possibility of the removal of the British.

The Czechs supplied critical arms to the Jews that helped them in the 1948 war.

Two-thirds of the UN general assembly voted for partition.

The Jews received 55% of Palestine despite being only 1/3 of the population, while the Arabs got
45%, with Jerusalem designated as a UN-controlled zone.

The logic of this division was related to the European context and the settlement of Jewish
refugees in Palestine. It is clear that the majority of the UN thought it just and required that a
majority of the territory be accorded to the Jews because of the expected immigration which
indeed did follow.

The Negev, the large part of southern Palestine, was given to the Jews when it hadnt been in the
earlier version of partition.

First phase of the War in Palestine: Dec 1947 - May 1948, civil war between the Jews and Arabs,
which included minor foreign Arab involvement.

Second phase: May 1948 onwards, between the State of Israel and its Arab neighbours.

March 1948: it looked like the Jews were on the verge of defeat and the U.S. suggested that
partition be abandoned in favour of a UN trusteeship.

Plan D, April 1948: effort by the Jewish forces to control all the territory of the Jewish state, which
meant the conquest of Arab towns inside that state, something the Jews had never done before.

This population was to remain in place unless they resisted the Jewish occupation, in which case
they could be removed.

This allowed for the conquest of territory that allowed the Jews to prepare for the invasion of the
other Arab armies which came two months later. It was the turning point of the war.
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Deir Yassin Massacre, April 1948: Jewish forces massacred about 100 Arabs. Arabs took
revenge at least twice.

The reports in the Arab media of Deir Yassin exaggerated the massacre to mobilise the Arabs.
But in fact it encouraged more Arab ight and further exacerbated the refugee problem.

Under the pressure of war, Arab society was on the verge of collapse.

Israel declared its independence on May 14, 1948 as the last British soldiers left Palestine.

5.8 The Second Phase of the War

Initially the Arab states were hesitant to intervene, and hoped that just the threat of intervening
would lead to international pressure to abolish partition.

Even when they did invade, it was not a full-edged invasion because the Arab countries could
not spare their entire armies.

As the war progressed, the Jewish war aims changed. First it was defence at all costs, but
eventually they sought expansion and to push out some of the Arab population.

The Arab states were united in theory but all had their own interests and there was very little
cooperation.

The Jordanians operated under British constraints and were the most moderate towards Israel.
They restricted themselves to taking over as much of the Arab state of Palestine as they could.

The Iraqis wanted to take Haifa and take control of an oil pipeline.

The Egyptians wanted to stop the other states doing too well in Palestine at the expense of the
Palestinians.

The two military forces were more or less equal in numbers when the war began.

Israel had organised and prepared for the war while the Arabs had not. Israel was unied and the
Arabs were not. And as the war progressed, Israel gained the advantage in numbers and arms.

There were three phases of war with two periods of truce in 1948.

The Israelis eventually elded a force of over 100,000 men when the war nished.

The Israelis lost control of the Jewish quarter and wailing wall in Jerusalem. It is clear that the
Israeli leadership valued the strategic factors rather than the religious factors. The holy sites
were not the most important objective.

Israel could have taken Jerusalem but chose not to. They thought it was preferable to have the
city partitioned with Jordan. The Israelis feared that if they took the whole city, they would end up
with nothing in favour of internationalisation.

5.9 The Narratives of the 1948 War

The 1948 war was the formative historical experience for the Palestinian nation.

There were no Jews in any of the Arab areas of Palestine after the war.

New Israeli historians like Benny Morris are reexamining Israels role in 1948 in a more negative
light.

Did the refugee issue develop on its own or was it part of Israels grand design? Morris says it
wasnt a grand design but that Israel still played its role in exacerbating the problem.

The Israeli government prevented the return of refugees after the war. They did make an offer to
return 100,000 Palestinian refugees in exchange for full peace. The Arabs refused.

Palestinians call the 1948 defeat Al-Nakba, a catastrophe, and that Israel is responsible for it.

The collective memory of the defeat of 1948 and its consequences separate the Palestinians
from the other Arab people.

After 1948, the major players against Israel are the Arab states and not the Palestinians
themselves; the 1949 armistice was signed between Israel and Arab states, not Palestine.

After 1948, Palestine ceased to exist on the map - the Gaza Strip was controlled by Egypt and
the West Bank by Jordan.

700,000 Palestinian refugees and 700,000 Jewish refugees from the Arab countries.

Israel lost 6000 lives in 1948, 1% of the population. There were 8,000 Palestinian and 4,000
other Arab lives lost.

The Arab states did not want to accept and integrate Palestinian refugees into their countries
because it would mean acceptance of the state of Israel and the results of 1948.
20

On the other hand, Israels acceptance of Jewish refugees from the Arab countries was the
fullment of the Zionist ideology.

December 1948, the General Assembly dealt in part with the refugee question in resolution 194.
The Palestinians believe this resolution calls for the unconditional right of return of Palestinian
refugees to Israel proper.

The resolution actually says that refugees wishing to return and live at peace with their
neighbours should be permitted to return at the earliest practicable date. So it does not endorse
the unconditional right of return of Palestinian refugees to Israel. In fact, the Arab states who
were part of the general assembly all voted against it.

Week 6 - Arab independence and revolution

Independence was often followed by revolutionary activity.

Some reasons why Arab countries underwent revolution in the 1950s and 1960s: sense of failure
in the process of modernisation; social and economic crises; the land-owning elites did not create
policies that were benecial to the masses; the corruption of the parliamentary systems; and the
defeat in the war of 1948.

6.1 Egypt: Crisis and Revolution

1936: treaty of alliance between Egypt and Great Britain granted Egypt its independence but
allowed Britain to maintain a military presence in the canal zone for 20 years and to use Egyptian
bases in the event of war.

1938: two important books were published: The Politics of Tomorrow and On the Margins of
Politics. Both dealt with Egypts socio-economic difculties and were pessimistic on population
growth and consequences of insufcient economic development.

Egypts population: 10 million in 1900, 16 million in 1937, 20 million in 1957, currently 85 million
and growing by one million per year.

The Muslim Brotherhood called for modernisation in accordance with the sharia and this became
an inuential view. The secular modernists retreated somewhat.

In the 1940s, the brotherhood had hundreds of thousands of members and a following of
millions. It was organised in a nationwide network of branches and had its own economic
ventures and networks of social services.

December 1948: prime minister Mahmoud al-Nuqrashi ordered the dissolution of the brotherhood
but he was assassinated the next month. Brotherhood founder and leader Hasan al-Banna was
assassinated in early 1949, likely inspired or ordered by the government.

1952: a series of riots against the British took place in Cairo.

The government called in the army to restore order and they staged a coup on 23 July 1952.

King Faruk abdicated and the monarchy was abolished.

1954: nal agreement signed with Britain, which withdrew completely in 1955.

The coup signalled a dramatic change in Egyptian politics with a new ruling elite composed of
military ofcers of middle or lower class backgrounds now in place.

Some of them had formed the Free Ofcers Movement in 1949 and from then on, they readied
themselves to take over the army.

Gamal Abd al-Nasser was the leading gure of these ofcers (in his early 30s). He was the son
of a postal clerk and now became the countrys leader.

The new regime removed the land-owning elite; abolished the constitution; dissolved the political
parties of the ruling elite and undertook agrarian reform. Nasser was in complete control by 1954.

Before the agrarian reform, 70% of the arable land in Egypt was controlled by 1% of the
population.

Nasser forced the Muslim brotherhood underground from late 1954.

The structure of the regime was based on a powerful president, a powerless parliament and a
state-controlled ruling party.

The partys name changed from the Liberation Rally (1953) to the National Union (1956) to the
Arab Socialist Union (1962).
21

The Aswan Dam, completed in 1970, was the symbol of Egypts modernisation but it did not meet
expectations.

The Suez Canal was nationalised in 1956, along with British and French banks.

Ideological expression was a legitimiser and an afterthought, not the real reason behind these
changes.

Education was a high priority but achievements in this eld were modest. Illiteracy: 75% in 1950,
53% in 1982, 28% now (160th in the world).

The universities were a base of building and maintaining a massive bureaucracy (graduates were
promised government jobs).

The sharia courts were shut down in 1956; the su orders were formally abolished in 1961.

After defeat in the 1967 war with Israel, Egypt gradually moved from the Soviet to the American
camp and eventually made peace with Israel.

6.2 Iraq from the Overthrow of the Hashemites to the rise of Saddam Hussein

Iraq gained independence in 1930, the rst of the British mandate countries to achieve
independence.

The Iraqi monarchy could not consolidate a cohesive state. The Kurds and the Shiites were
relatively weak and could not compete with the Sunni Arab minority that controlled power.

1934: conscription began to build up the national army. The Kurds in the north could not be
completely subdued, however.

There was an early interference by the army in politics, already taking place in the mid-1930s.

A pro-German government came to power in 1941 and forced the Hashemites out. They were
later restored to power by the British but they were living on borrowed time.

Iraq post WWII: rising levels of education; increased politicisation of society; rapid urbanisation;
the inuence of radical parties over poor urban masses; the defeat of 1948 and the model of the
Free Ofcers Movement in Egypt for Iraqi ofcers.

These radical parties were the Bath party on one hand and the Communists on the other.

The early 1950s were good for Iraq as it began to enjoy its oil wealth, but the foundations were
shaky.

July 1958: a military coup overthrew the Hashemites with ease, to popular acclaim.

The leader of the coup was And al-Karim Qasim, who ruled for ve years.

As in Egypt, this coup was followed by the demise of the land-owning elite and its replacement
by a civil and military bureaucracy, with Sunni ofcers at the top.

But the coup did not build strong institutions and was built around the personality of Qasim. But
he didnt have the charisma of Nasser and did not capture the imagination of the people.

Agrarian reform did not change much in rural areas and the focus was on the urban areas.

1957-77: Iraqs population doubled from 6m to 12m, and then to 22m in 1997 (now 30m).

The Bath party was established in Syria in the early 1940s as a secular, Arab-nationalist party. It
emphasised Arab unity and socialism as the avenue to Arab revival (bath).

Qasim was overthrown and executed in 1963 by new rulers, many of whom came from the Bath.
But they were not united and there was another coup later in 1963, with the ejection of the Bath
supporters.

But this regime only lasted for ve years and the Bath party rose to power in 1968. It was much
better organised than before and it created a regime of institutions, with effective centralised
government and party control over the army.

The two key gures were provincial Sunni Arabs from Tikrit of lower middle class backgrounds:
Ahmad Hassan al-Bakr and Saddam Hussein. Hussein became president in 1979.

Under Saddam, men from Tikrit dominated the government. By 1987, 1/3 of the senior Bath
party leadership was composed of men from Tikrit.

Under the Bath, the state was socialist and secular, with a state-controlled economy and the
nationalisation of oil in the early 1970s. The state bureaucracy was a major employer, thus
maintaining the status quo was important for state employees.

The Sunni-Arab minority wanted to maintain a secular state because a religious state would
favour the more numerous Shiites. But criticism from the Shiites resulted in the Bath becoming
more religious.
22

The 1979 revolution in Iran created a fear among the Bath that the Iraqi Shiites would rise up.

The Iran-Iraq war (1980-88) was started by Saddam and resulted in hundreds of thousands of
casualties on both sides.

Iraq never found a solution to the Kurdish minority and its opposition to the central government.
The Kurds fought the regime from 1961-75 through the Barzani Rebellion, supported by Iran. It
began anew during the Iran-Iraq war, and in 1988 the Kurds were ruthlessly crushed in the Anfal
Campaign, in which thousands of Kurds were executed.

The attempt to promote a particular Iraqi identity based on the glories of ancient Babylon was
articial and didnt work.

6.3 Syrias Prolonged Instability

The French and Syrians failed to agree on a treaty which would lead to Syrian independence.

The Sunni urban notables had become fervent Arab nationalists.

By the 1930s, threats to the Sunni urban elite in Syria and the rise of a left wing government in
France led to an agreement in 1936, which promised independence for Syria in exchange for a
25-year treaty of alliance with France.

The treaty was never ratied as the Blum government fell. The new government refused to ratify
the agreement.

In WWII, the French mandates were now controlled by the Vichy French. The British feared that
Syria and Lebanon would become German bases, so Britain occupied both countries in June
1941. Britain pushed France for independence in Syria and Lebanon.

In 1946, the French and British forces withdrew and Syria gained its independence, with Shuqri
al-Quwwatli as the rst president.

The continuation of the mandate had allowed for the Sunni elite to maintain power. But once
independence came, it brought with it military intervention. The ofcers shortly overtook the
notables in power.

The Sunni notables were reluctant to serve in the military and the military was made up of
minorities. Its numbers were forcible reduced from 7500 to 2000 just before the 1948 war.

In 1949, there were three military coups in less than a year. The last coup was led by Adib
Shishakil, who remained in power for ve years.

The army increased in size consistently, reaching as many as 500,000 in the 1980s.

After Shishaklis overthrow in 1954, the urban notables returned to power briey but the Baths,
the communists and the army were to challenge them.

In 1958, the Bath appealed to Nasser to form the United Arab Republic because of fears of a
communist takeover and possible subsequent intervention by Turkey or Iraq.

The union didnt work, mainly because of Egypts domineering attitude. It was ended by a military
coup in Syria in September 1961.

In March 1963, the Bath ascended to power with revolutionary social and political implications.

Features of the Bath regime were: the army as a driving force of revolution; the displacement of
the ruling land-owning class; and the rise of the Alawis (12% of the population).

Alawi control became even more secure with the rise of the Neo-Bath (more radical) in 1966.

The Sunni military leadership was exhausted from previous struggles.

The Alawis needed a secular government to maintain their control because of the minority
religious status.

November 1970 - 2000: Haz al-Assad was a strong president using an Arab socialism model.

1973 constitution called for all power to be held by the president.

Alawis were not really Muslims in the true sense of the word; they were a breakaway Shia sect.

The Sunnis were naturally opposed to the secular, Alawi-dominated government and this
opposition was expressed mostly through the Muslim Brotherhood, which was banned in 1963.

In 1969, the regime removed a clause from the constitution saying that the president had to be a
Muslim; four years later it was reinstated.

At the same time the leader of the Shia community in Lebanon made an agreement with the
Syrians to accept the Alawis as Shia.

This did not satisfy the Sunnis and they waged jihad from 1976 until they were crushed in 1982,
with the massacre of the Muslim Brotherhood in Hama.
23

Syria was transformed into a regional power with a dominant position over Lebanon and a
leading role in the conict with Israel. Population: 3m in the 1940s, 9m in the 1980s, 14m in the
1990s to 23m today.

After agrarian reform came rapid urbanisation and industrialisation. By 1971, industry had
surpassed agriculture in its contribution to the Syrian economy.

6.4 Lebanons Civil Wars

The 1926 constitution was based on the confessional system whereby power was divided
between the religious communities based on their population share.

1932 census: 51% Christians, after which no more ofcial accounts taken as the Christians had
lost the majority.

The Maronites had to decide how to safeguard their status, with two schools of thought: one led
by Emile Edde, which was a smaller Lebanon protected by France; and the other led by Bishara
al-Khuri, which believed in an alliance with the Sunni Muslims of Lebanon and Arab neighbours.

The school that rested on French protection was defeated after France fell to the Nazis.

Under British occupation, Lebanon was more inclined towards the Arab solution.

The national pact of 1943 between the Maronites and the Sunnis gave the presidency to the
Maronites, the premiership to the Sunnis and the speakership of parliament to the Shiis.

In parliament, a 6-5 ratio in favour of the Christians was set for parliamentary representation.

The political umbilical cord to France was severed.

Lebanons nal independence came in 1946.

In 1958, civil war broke out, fuelled by the challenge of Pan-Arabism and its appeal to the Sunni
Muslim population in the wake of the creation of the United Arab Republic.

The changing demographics with no change in political representation also played a part.

The Maronite president appealed to the U.S., which landed marines in Beirut in July 1958 which
restored calm and maintained the status quo.

Stability in Lebanon always hinged on the acceptance of the power-sharing agreement.

The second civil war lasted from 1975-89 and was based upon the dissatisfaction of the political
system on the part of the Muslims communities and the Palestinian refugee problem, which
further destabilised the situation.

In the late 1960s, Palestinian armed groups established bases of operations against Israel in
southern Lebanon. After the 1970-71 civil war in Jordan, Lebanon became the PLOs sole
semiautonomous base.

There was internal Lebanese tension between the Sunnis, who saw Lebanon as an Arab state
committed to the conict against Israel, and the Maronites, who saw Lebanon as a western state
with no interest in war with Israel.

April 1975, clashes erupted between Palestinian forces and the Maronite militia, which
degenerated into a general Christian-Muslim conict. The general Lebanese army collapsed.

Syrian intervention brought the rst phase of the war to its inclusion. Syria intervened in May
1976 on behalf of the Christians. Syria sought to enhance its regional clout and didnt want to be
dragged into a war with Israel at a time not of its choosing (i.e. if a radical or Palestinian-
dominated faction emerged victorious in Lebanon).

The Maronites sought to reassert their supremacy in an alliance with Israel.

Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 with the objective of removing Palestinian strongholds in the
south and restoring Maronite supremacy.

The Maronite Bashir al-Jumayyil was elected president in Aug 1982 while Israel occupied Beirut.

The bulk of the Palestinian ghting forces were compelled to withdraw and were dispersed in
various Arab states. But Syria would not let that be, and its operatives assassinated al-Jumayyil
in September 1982.

The Maronite massacre of revenge came against Palestinians in refugee camps in Beirut (Sabra
and Shatila).

Accusations against Israel claimed that they didnt do enough to prevent the massacre.

al-Jumayyil was replaced by his brother as president but they had opposite outlooks: Amin
believed in the security of the Maronites by agreement with the Arabs, which meant subservience
to Syria rather than Israel.
24

Israel didnt want anything else to do with Lebanon and withdrew in 1985 except for a narrow
security zone in the south, which it withdrew from in 2000.

As the Maronites were in decline, the Shiites shifted from the periphery to the centre of
Lebanese politics, and they replaced the Maronites as the most populous community.

Syria was the hegemonic power in Lebanon until it withdrew in 2005.

The civil war further enhanced Shiite political objectives and they formed their own militias, rst
Amal and then Hizballah.

April 1985: the Shiites took over west Beirut.

The 1989 Taif accords brought an end to the war. Christians and Muslims would have an equal
representation in parliament and the the three sects would have equal footing. But the Shiites
had the most people and Hizbollah, as well as Syrias inuence, and were thus the most powerful
group.

6.5 The Surprising Stability of the Arab Monarchies

The monarchies have for the most part been the most stable states in the region. This is
sometimes due to wealth, but not in other cases (e.g. Jordan).

In the stable monarchies, the royal family played/plays a signicant role in the national-building
process.

Explanations for this stability: authority of the royal families; deep-rootedness of the dynastic
principle; the Hashemites legitimacy comes from their descent from the Prophet.

The failures of post-monarchy governments elsewhere perhaps showed the monarchy

populations that rebelling was not always wise.

6.5.1 Jordan

Jordan was the only Arab state to come out well from the 1948 war. It was not defeated by Israel
and more or less obtained what it hoped for - to obtain the bulk of Arab Palestine and annexe it.

After 1948, the Palestinians outnumbered the original Jordanians by about 2-to-1
(900,000-450,000), and Jordan sought to incorporate them into the country.

However, the Palestinians did not share the basic interests of the regime, which wanted to
maintain the status quo with Israel.

1951: King Abdullah was assassinated by Palestinians.

King Hussein reigned from 1953-99.

The Palestinians were great believers in Abd al-Nasser and became his allies in the effort to
transform Jordan from a pro-Western monarchy into the main Arab platform for the liberation of
Palestine.

Palestinians did not seek to break away from Jordan and create a separate state, because that
state might then be under attack from Israel. They wanted to overthrow the monarchy and align
with Egypt and the Soviet Union against Israel and the West.

It seemed like the Hashemites days were numbered, but they survived for three reasons: the
loyalty of the Jordanian elite; the loyalty of the army and security services; and the support of
outside powers.

The regime survived but failed to Jordanise the Palestinians.

Late 1950s: two movements in the Arab world for the revival of Palestinian identity: autonomous
Palestinian effort with clandestine groups; and a public pan-Arab effort.

This eventually led to the formation of the PLO in 1964 by the Arab League, but also the
formation of other Palestinian organisations outside the auspices of the PLO (e.g. Fatah).

Jordan would not allow the PLO to operate freely in the West Bank against Jordanian interests.

Jordan saw itself as the inheritor of Palestine and did not want to cede the West Bank to the
PLO. But Jordan lost control of the West Bank in 1967 and therefore lost its hold over the
Palestinian question.

After 1967, Jordan was compelled to allow the Palestinian ghting organisations to wage war
against Israel from Jordanian territory.

In 1968-69, the ghting organisations took over the PLO. Yasser Arafat, who was the leader of
Fatah, became the chairman of the PLO.
25

Israel fought back against the Palestinian groups and forced them further away from the border
into the interior of Jordan.

The Palestinian organisations established a state within a state, centred around the Palestinian
refugee camps, and threatened the stability of the Jordanian monarchy.

This led to a major clash, called Black September (1970), which ended with the expulsion of the
PLO from Jordan by the summer of 1971.

In the aftermath of Black September, Jordan underwent a process of Jordanisation which

excluded the Palestinians from positions of inuence in the government. Palestinians
subsequently became predominant in the private sector.

Some of the Jordanian elite saw Palestine as an unnecessary distraction.

Jordan stayed out of a direct confrontation with Israel in the 1973 war.

October 1974: the PLO was declared by the Arab League to be the sole legitimate representative
of the Palestinian people. Jordan could no longer claim to represent Palestinians.

King Hussein was reluctant to concede Palestine, but by the mid-1980s he had conceded that
the two were separate entities.

In the rst intifada in 1987, there were anti-Jordanian protests, and King Hussein declared
Jordans ofcial disengagement from the West Bank in July 1988.

Jordan went through an economic crisis in the late 1980s and was forced to cut government
spending and privatise many public enterprises. This was damaging to the original Jordanians,
who were dependent on government jobs.

King Hussein made peace with Israel in 1994. He thought it would boost Jordans economy but
this did not happen.

His successor, King Abdullah, is seen as an outsider because he has a British mother and spent
time abroad during his childhood.

6.5.2 Saudi Arabia

The same regime has been in power in Saudi Arabia since the foundation of the state in 1932.

The monarchy is structured to bet the tribal formations that underpin Saudi society.

The royal family has married into the main tribal groups, urban elite and the religious
establishment.

The Saudi king is the religious leader of the country and is subordinate only to the Sharia.

Reasons for stability: tribal-religious alliance; oil wealth; leaders of major tribes are conciliated by
the state; the ulema support for the regime in exchange for control of the law.

Saudi Arabia is a rentier state whose revenues come almost entirely from the sale of natural
resources and not taxation.

The royal family runs a lifetime welfare system in exchange for loyalty.

No taxation: no representation.

The government is the largest employer in the country.

Population growth: 7m to 26.5m from the mid-1970s to 2012.

November 1979: the grand mosque in Mecca was seized by fundamentalists who thought the
regime was not radical enough.

The rebels were eventually subdued and many were executed (beheaded in public).

The younger ulema have been more likely than the older ulema to oppose the government.

There is a 12% Shiite minority, but they have been suppressed and arent a serious threat.

After the Arab Spring, the Saudis dished out $130b in social spending to keep everyone happy.

6.6 The Arab Cold War

The 1950s and 1960s were characterised by the struggle between the progressive states (those
ofcer regimes aligned with the USSR) and the pro-western reactionaries aligned with the west.

The struggle, as always, was on the avenue to modernity.

The 1967 defeat against Israel portrayed the progressives as being full of empty promises.

Pan-Arabism was a defeated force and the vacuum was lled by Islamic radicalism.

Week 7 - Escalation and De-Escalation of the Arab-Israeli Conict (Part 1)

26

7.1 From 1949 to the Suez War

The 1949 armistice agreements were signed between Israel and its Arab neighbours (not
Palestine). The Gaza Strip was under Egyptian military control and the West Bank was annexed
by Jordan.

The Arabs called for a second round of war.

Israel developed a security doctrine for how to secure itself as a small nation with a small
population (fewer than 2 million in 1949) surrounded by hostile neighbours.

The security doctrine had two parts: basic security (the existence of Israel as the nation-state of
the Jewish people); and current security (dealing with day-to-day security affairs).

A small population meant Israel could not have a large standing army. Instead its security
doctrine called for a reserve army, war outside Israels territory, deterrence, preemption, wars of
short duration, and a rapid decisive conclusion.

Israel had a variety of border problems in the early years after 1948. This was mostly due to
hundreds of thousands of people crossing the border every year for peaceful (in most cases) or
aggressive purposes. The border was insecure.

May 1950: USA, Britain and France issued the Tripartite Declaration, which recognised and
guaranteed the borders of the Middle East as they existed at that time. This was an indirect
guarantee of the borders that had been established in the 1948 war.

The three Western powers also guaranteed that the arms race in the region would be maintained
in equilibrium.

The Western powers sought a NATO-style defence pact against the Soviet Union and saw Egypt-
Israeli peace as a key to this.

But they misunderstood two things: that the Arabs were not interested in an anti-Soviet pact; and
the extent of Arab hostility towards Israel.

The Western powers later suggested (1955) Israel could cede parts of the Negev which would
allow Egypt and Jordan to share a border and could lead to Egyptian peace with Israel.

Israel would not allow territorial concessions in the Negev and would not allow the return of
Palestinian refugees to Israel, two things Nasser sought.

Israels two main guiding principles after 1948 were to maintain the demographic and geographic
status quo that had been established by the 1948 war.

The tension between Israel and the neighbouring Arab states led to the Czech Arms Deal in 1955
signed between Czechoslovakia, via the Soviet Union, and Egypt.

Israel turned to the USA for arms to balance the Egypt deal with Czechoslovakia. But the USA
was not interested, and didnt want to push the Arabs further into the Soviet camp.

Israel eventually found an ally in France; both saw Nasser as an enemy (the French because
they were ghting the war of liberation in nearby Algeria). In 1956 there were serious French-
Israeli discussions about a combined attack against Egypt.

In July 1956, the USA refused to supply Egypt with aid for the Aswan Dam. Nasser responded by
nationalising the Suez Canal.

Britain then joined the Israeli-French alliance to restore control of the Canal zone.

The result was the Sinai campaign in October 1956. Israel launched a land campaign in the Sinai
and the French and British launched an attack in the Canal zone. The Israeli attack came rst
and within four days they had occupied the Sinai.

The Anglo-French campaign was a asco. The USA and USSR condemned the attacks, and the
British and French had to stop their attack without achieving their objective.

Israel withdrew from the Sinai in exchange for a guarantee from the USA for the freedom of
navigation in the Straits of Tiran in the naval area leading to the port of Eilat.

Results of the war: Israeli freedom of movement in the Straits of Tiran; the establishment of a UN
emergency force along the Egyptian-Israeli border; the end of an era for Britain and France as
powers in the region; Egypt defeated military by Israel but victorious politically.

Nasser emerged from the Suez campaign as the unquestioned leader of the Arab world.

The Nasserist formula: Pan-Arabism, Arab Socialism, Reliance on the USSR.

Israels border problems were now at an end.

27

The Arab countries now rethought the second round idea and realised that this was a conict
that would last generations and required a new strategic approach (reviving the Palestinian
claim).

From 1957-67, Israel enjoyed relative border peace and this was known as Ten Good Years.

7.2 The Revival of the Palestinian Identity

The revival of the Palestinian identity was necessary for the long-term conict with Israel.

Jordan had sought to incorporate the Palestinians (now the majority) into the Jordanian state
after 1948. Using the term West Bank instead of Palestine is one example of how Jordan was
trying to eliminate the Palestinian identity.

It would have been preferable for both Jordan and Israel for the Palestinians to be absorbed into
the Arab countries.

The Palestinians were great believers in Nasser, but after the Suez War they began to realise
that Nasser might not be able to deliver.

After this it became clear that there was a need for an independent Palestinian organisation.

It also became necessary to show the Palestinian issue not as just a refugee problem for certain
individuals but as a national struggle for self-determination.

Late 1950s: two movements in the Arab world for the revival of Palestinian identity: autonomous
Palestinian effort with clandestine groups; and a public pan-Arab effort (Arab League).

May 1964: Palestine Liberation Organisation established under the leadership of Ahmad al-
Shuqayri.

Nasser sought to continue to control the Palestinian cause through the PLO.

Why did Jordan agree to the founding of the PLO? They believed, like Nasser, that they could
control the PLO. They also wanted to accept the Arab consensus.

The rst PLO meeting was in Jerusalem in Jordanian territory. The PLO needed to operate in
Jordan where the majority of Palestinians lived.

PLO demands of Jordan: direct taxation of Palestinians living in Jordan; conscription for the
Palestinian Liberation Army; political mobilisation of the Palestinians in the West Bank and
arming the villages on the front line with Israel.

This was unacceptable for Jordan because it would mean the creating of a virtual Palestinian
state within the Jordanian state.

The independent Palestinian organisations included Fatah and others. They began as student
groups in Cairo in the early 1950s.

Fatah was established in 1958-59 by Yasser Arafat and others.

The breakup of the United Arab Republic was a disappointment in general for Palestinians and
was another indication that the Palestinians needed to create their own self-reliance and not
depend on the Arab states for their liberation.

Groups like Fatah were encouraged by the successful armed struggle waged by the Algerians
against the French at the time.

The Bath regime in Syria supported Fatah and allowed Fatah to attack Israel from Syria and
from Jordan.

January 1965: Fatahs rst operation was against the Israeli National Water Carrier. It failed but it
showed that the armed struggle had begun.

By late 1965, relations between Jordan and the PLO had broken down. In 1966 Jordan began
arresting PLO supporters.

In 1966, King Hussein disconnected all relations with the PLO. His argument was that Jordan
was Palestine and Palestine was Jordan.

November 1966: the Samu Incident was an Israeli retaliation against Fatah in the West Bank.
Israeli forces took control of the village of Samu, demolished 41 buildings and showed the
incapacity of Jordan to defend Palestinians in the West Bank.

This resulted in a mini-uprising of the Palestinians in the West Bank against Jordan.

Hussein believed Samu was a precursor to an Israeli attempt to take over the West Bank.

Apart from Syrias support of Fatah, the other point of tension between Syria and Israel at this
time was Syrias attempts to divert the sources of the Jordan river to defeat Israels irrigation
program.
28
7.3 The Deterioration to War

The Arab League Summit of January 1964 not only established the PLO, but also established a
United Arab Command that would conduct future wars against Israel, and agreed to divert the
sources of the Jordan river.

These actions make it look like the Arabs were seeking war with Israel, but they were actually
intended to postpone war. The idea was to keep the conict going on a low controllable ame
until the Arabs were ready.

May 1967: Israels chief of staff Yitzhak Rabin warned Syria that if the situation continued to
deteriorate, Israel would take action against Syria.

Shortly thereafter, the Soviet Union passed on false intelligence to Egypt that the Israelis were
concentrating forces along the border with Syria.

Nasser followed up by sending his army into the Sinai in a demonstrative show of force, even
though part of his army had been tied up ghting in the civil war in Yemen since 1962.

Nasser checked the Soviet information and discovered it was false, but he had already moved
his forces into Sinai and it was too late to turn back.

Israel mobilised its reserve forces in response.

The Jordanians and Saudis waged a propaganda campaign against Egypt and claimed that
Nassers forces in Sinai were all for show.

Nasser ordered the UN forces to leave on May 17, and they did. On the same day, Egyptian
MIGs ew over Israelis nuclear facility.

Levi Eshkol was Israels prime minister at the time and the public didnt have condence in his
military ability.

On May 22, after Jordanian and Saudi pressure, Nasser closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli
shipping, which Israel had stated would be a cause for war.

Israel turned to the U.S., who had committed to Israels presence in the Straits when Israel
withdrew from Sinai in 1956. But the U.S. didnt respond with a naval force to open the straits.

Public pressure forces Eshkol to bring Moshe Dayan and Menachem Begin into the government,
which legitimised the political right and created a hawkish government.

War was initiated by Israel with a surprise air attack on June 5, 1967.

The Jordanians were ghting under Egyptian command as part of the United Arab Command,
and they opened a second front against Israel.

The Israelis were reluctant to open a war on two fronts and told the Jordanians that Israel would
not attack them if the Jordanians ceased their attack. But Hussein was convinced that Israel
would attack Jordan anyway so he decided to continue the attack.

Within a few days the Israelis had defeated both the Egyptian and Jordanian armies. Exploiting
the momentum of success, Israel opened the front with Syria and occupied the Golan Heights.

In six days, Israel had achieved a complete victory and occupied Gaza, the Sinai, the West Bank
and the Golan Heights.

November 1967: UN resolution 242 was very understanding of Israeli needs. The resolution did
not call for Israel to unconditionally withdrew from the territories it had acquired, but that it should
withdraw if the Arab states make peace with Israel.

This gave birth to the land for peace formula. The Arab states accepted 242 so this represented
the very beginning of their willingness to eventually make peace with Israel.

The Palestinians were not mentioned in resolution 242 so for them it was a very insufcient
resolution.

The war had a large psychological effect on Israel because they had feared defeat as it began.

It also had a religious and spiritual impact because the new territory conquered in the West Bank
(Judea and Samaria) was the heart of biblical Israel.

The post-1967 Israeli Domestic Debate was now divided between rational security arguments
and religious belief in God-given rights. This was the domestic ght over Israels soul and it has
still not been resolved.

Settlements soon began in the West Bank, some with government approval and some without
(though these were eventually tolerated).

Key consequences of the 1967 war: Pan-Arabism was deated; the division between the
revolutionaries (the ofcer regimes) and the reactionaries (Jordan) was no longer necessary as
29
both had been defeated by Israel; the Jordanisation of the Palestinians was now over as Jordan
had lost the West Bank; the Palestinians emerged as autonomous players; while the Israelis now
had a sense of invincibility that would come back to haunt them; Israels indecision which led to
them neither annexing nor withdrawing from the West Bank (except Jerusalem, which they
annexed) or Gaza.

7.4 The Palestinian Struggle from Jordan

The Palestinians continued their armed struggle against Israel from Jordan, but from the east
bank now of the Jordan river with the West Bank now lost.

Why did Jordan allow this? King Hussein still wanted to represent the Palestinians so he could
hardly ght them.

Fatah and other organisations tried to ght against Israel from bases in the occupied West Bank
but Israel pushed them out to the Jordanian side of the river.

March 1968: the Karameh Operation was a major operation conducted by the Israelis on the
village of Karameh where Fatah had established a base.

It became a great symbol of the armed struggle for the Palestinians even though it was the
Jordanian army who was responsible for most of the damage inicted against Israel.

This created the idea among Palestinians that the popular armed struggle could defeat the
Israelis in a way in which the regular Arab armies could not.

This paved the way for many young Palestinians in Jordan to join the ghting organisations and
for the takeover of the PLO by these organisations, led by Fatah, in 1968-69.

The PLO was thus transformed from a bureaucratic organisation into an umbrella organisation of
Palestinian armed groups. Yasser Arafat became the chairman of the PLO.

After Karameh, the Israelis continued to ght against the Palestinians in the Jordan valley, forcing
the Palestinians further into the interior of Jordan. The PLO took over Palestinian refugee camps
in cities like Amman which contributed to the erosion of the Jordanian state.

July 1970: the Rogers Initiative was a U.S. initiative for peace between Israel and the Arab states
based on UN resolution 242. But this meant an Israeli-Jordanian negotiation over the West Bank
and an Israeli-Egyptian negotiation over Gaza with no PLO involvement.

7.5 Black September

The Palestinians therefore had to prevent Jordan from joining this initiative which would exclude
and marginalise the Palestinians, and decided on a military challenge.

The PLO underestimated Jordanian military capacity, overestimated their own popular support
and expected to receive support from Iraq (who had forces in Jordan at the time) and Syria in a
military confrontation with Jordan.

Black September was instead a crushing defeat of the PLO by the Jordanians, even with Syrian
support for the PLO.

Jordan turned to the U.S. which was an indirect approach to Israel. Israel mobilised soldiers
publicly and ew over the Syrian forces, denying Syria use of its airforce.

Black September resulted in the expulsion of the PLO from Jordan.

The consequences of Black September were: for Jordan, the securing of the Jordanian state and
regime with no Palestinian state-within-a-state anymore; for the Palestinians, the defeat of their
strategy of peoples war and the loss of their base in Jordan which was the best place for them to
be in their struggle against Israel.

Liberation solely by means of an armed struggle was no longer an attainable goal.

The PLO expanded their base in Lebanon which became its new headquarters but it was
nowhere near as good as the Jordanian base.

By mid-1973, the PLO had established a new state-within-a-state in Lebanon.

Summer 1974: the PLO developed the strategy of phases, which spoke of the PLO using all
means (military and diplomatic) in the struggle against Israel, liberation in phases, and a required
change in the balance of power.

1974 Arab League Summit: the PLO was declared as the sole legitimate representative of the
Palestinian people. This disqualied Jordan as a negotiator on the Palestinians behalf.
30

7.6 The War of Attrition, 1968-70

A war of attrition was fought between Israel and Egypt near the Suez Canal after the 1967 war.

The Israelis were at a disadvantage because Egypt had more artillery. Israel responded with air
power and attacked targets in the Nile Valley and in the interior of Egypt.

This led to direct Soviet intervention on behalf of Egypt.

This war had a deep impact on Egypt. It was the rst time the war with Israel had been fought in
the heart of Egypt and led to a willingness to move toward peace with Israel.

The Egyptians suggested a partial settlement in 1971 but it was not well received in Israel.

Anwar Sadat was the new president of Egypt following Nassers death. He described 1971 as his
year of decision about whether it would be peace or war with Israel.

Israel did not take the threat of war from Egypt seriously.

In July 1972, Egypt expelled all Soviet advisors from Egypt. This was an effort to pave the way
for war with Israel (by removing constraints on Egypts decision-making process), but it was seen
by Israel and the U.S. as a peaceful move.

In early 1973, Egypt made moves towards the U.S. which reinforced the belief that Egypt would
not go to war with Israel.

There was pressure in Egypt to change the status quo - either war or peace was needed.

In 1973 there was joint Egyptian-Syrian planning for war against Israel. Egypts objective was to
shake up the political situation in the region to allow for the unfreezing of the diplomatic front,
while Syria wanted to retrieve territory from Israel in the Golan Heights.

Jordan was not involved in the planning and stayed out of the eventual battle in October 1973
except for a limited support of Syria.

Week 8 - Escalation and De-Escalation of the Arab-Israeli Conict (Part 2)

8.1 The October Surprise

On 6 October 1973, Egypt and Syria began a surprise war against Israel on Yom Kippur, the
holiest day on the Jewish calendar.

The Israelis had been operating under the preconception, which was that the Arab states would
not attack Israel unless they had an answer to Israels air supremacy.

The Arabs had deceived Israel into believing that war was not imminent.

Israel only discovered that the Arabs were going to war a few hours before it began. Israel chose
not to strike rst, for several reasons: to not be condemned internationally as the aggressor,
because of their self-condence following 1967, and because they had the buffer of the Sinai.

The rst few days resulted in unprecedented Arab success on both fronts.

On the Egyptian front, two entire armies, the 2nd and the 3rd, crossed the Suez Canal and
established themselves on the other side.

On the Syrian front, the Syrians broke through the lines in the southern Golan and almost
reached the Sea of Galilee.

Israel turned the tables, rst on the Syrian front, where they pushed the Syrians completely out of
the Golan Heights. On the Egyptian front, Israel crossed the canal after 10 days and encircled
the Egyptian 3rd army and came within 101km of Cairo.

At this time, both superpowers intervened to bring about a ceasere and essentially end the war
with Security Council resolution 338.

A new equilibrium was now established. All three parties were much more aware of their
respective limitations and were willing to make agreements to lessen the possibility of war - the
two separation of forces agreements.

Egypt-Israel - January 1974: Israeli withdrawal from the Egyptian side of the Suez Canal; an
exchange of POWs; the allowing of the reopening of the canal.

Syria-Israel - May 1974: Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 boundary line; POW exchange. This
agreement has essentially governed the relations between Israel and Syria for 40 years.

Jordan also sought a separation of forces agreement even though they were not involved in the
war and there were no forces to disentangle as there were on the other two fronts.
31

Jordan sought to have Israel withdraw from the West Bank as part of an agreement with Jordan
that would isolate the PLO and eventually give the West Bank back to Jordan.

Israel was unwilling to begin a process to eventually withdraw from the West Bank.

This non-agreement paved the way for the Arab League to recognise the PLO - not Jordan - as
the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.

September 1975: An interim agreement between Egypt and Israel resulted in further withdrawal
by Israel in the Sinai - not yet a peace treaty but an important stepping stone to it.

8.2 The Egyptian-Israeli Peace

Henry Kissengers step-by-step diplomacy had helped create the three separation of forces
agreements, but the Carter administration took a different approach. The Carter administration
sought to achieve a comprehensive settlement.

The Americans wanted to reconvene the Geneva conference as a forum for peace. Israel and
Sadat had reservations. Sadat didnt want to negotiate with Israel along with other Arab states.

The U.S. position was closer to the radical Syrian position. The Syrians supported the peace
conference - not to make peace but to block a separate Egyptian-Israeli peace deal. The PLO
also supported the conference too to bolster their position.

May 1977: Menachem Begin and the Likud party won the election to form the rst right wing
Israeli government. Begin sought a separate deal with Egypt because he was a believer in
Heretz Israel and wanted a peace that didnt affect the West Bank.

Sadat wanted Egypt to gain back all the territory Egypt had lost in 1967. His sense of urgency
became more acute after food riots took place in January 1977.

Mid-September 1977: top Israeli and Egyptian ofcials held secret talks in Morocco.

In October 1977, the U.S. and Soviet foreign ministers issued a statement on an international
conference - in opposition to what both the Israelis and Egyptians wanted.

In November 1977, Sadat went to Jerusalem, recognised Israel and addressed the Israeli
parliament. He said he wanted to make peace but also said that Israel had to make concessions
to the Palestinians. He demanded an independent Palestinian state, the complete Israeli
withdrawal from the West Bank and the division of Jerusalem.

The Israeli cabinet was divided on withdrawing from the Sinai.

September 1978: Sadat, Begin and Carter met at Camp David and an agreement was reached,
with U.S. involvement seen as critical.

Israel agreed to withdraw fully from settlements and airelds in the Sinai (the U.S. agreed to
rebuild these airelds in Israel). The U.S. supplied an aid package to Egypt and Egypt agreed to
provide oil to Israel.

The nal peace agreement was signed in March 1979.

There was also a Palestinian section in the Camp David agreement, which included autonomy
for Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. However, there was no binding linkage between the
Palestinian section of the agreement and the Israeli-Egyptian section.

Begin had essentially succeeded in trading the Sinai for Israeli control over Heretz Israel.

The agreement altered the regional balance of power in Israels favour. Egypts departure from
the order of battle meant that there were no more Arab-Israeli wars.

8.3 The 1982 War in Lebanon: The Impact on Palestinian Politics

Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 to try to put an end to the PLOs military presence there.

The PLO needed to preserve its Lebanese base at all costs after losing the Jordanian base so it
had bolstered its military force there.

Israels objectives were to expel the PLO from Lebanon and to install Bashir al-Jumayyil as the
president of Lebanon (reestablishing Maronite supremacy).

Israel didnt succeed in meddling in Lebanese domestic politics but did succeed in evicting the
PLO forces from the country.

The consequences for the PLO were: the loss of its political independence to some degree;
increased limitations on the armed struggle; the centre of Palestinian politics shifting from the
diaspora to Palestine itself.
32

The Reagan Initiative (Sep 1982) was a plan for Palestinian autonomy linked to Jordan. The plan
opposed a Palestinian state and opposed Israeli control or annexation of the West Bank.

Israel was not interested in Palestinian control of any kind in the West Bank and Gaza. Its aims in
Lebanon had been to give it a free hand in these areas, not to concede them.

The PLO and Jordan held discussions about the Reagan Initiative to see whether they could nd
common ground and jointly enter negotiations with Israel. But they failed to come to an
agreement.

The mid-1980s were the twilight zone for the PLO. It had become a weaker player without the
autonomous base in Lebanon, had declined regionally and internationally, and Palestinian
politics had shifted inwards to the West Bank and Gaza.

8.4 The First Palestinian Intifada

By the mid-1980s, Israel was strengthening its hold on the Palestinian territories and the younger
generation of Palestinians were agitating for change.

This agitation came from both those who were secular nationalists (typically supporters of the
PLO) and Islamists.

At the end of 1987, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza spontaneously rose in an unarmed
civilian uprising against the Israeli occupation. It had greater force and inuence than the armed
struggle the PLO had waged for decades.

The armed struggle had put the Palestinian issue on the international agenda but was also seen
as terrorism and therefore illegitimate by many.

With the intifada, it was suddenly the Israelis who seemed like the armed aggressors and faced
delegitimisation.

The uprising created new political realities for the Palestinians: the people in the West Bank and
Gaza were now leading the struggle; the PLO was now a bystander; pressure came onto the
PLO to change its political priorities to remain relevant and transform the great effort into
meaningful political gain.

The uprising was not against the PLO, but what it meant was that the PLO needed to listen to
those inside Palestine.

The protestors wanted a partnership of equals with the PLO.

There was an increased inuence of West Bank civil societies (press, universities, NGOs).

November 1988: the PLO accepted two UN resolutions they had never previously accepted:
resolution 242 and the partition resolution of 1947 (both with reservations).

This paved the way for greater political recognition for the PLO including the willingness of the
U.S. to engage with the PLO. But that did not last very long, as Yasser Arafat supported Iraq
against Kuwait.

The Madrid Peace Conference of 1991 did not have direct PLO representation. Palestine was
represented by a joint delegation from Jordan and from the Palestinian territories.

It was the Oslo accords that allowed the PLO to eclipse the internal Palestinian leadership and
reassert its control over the Palestinian national endeavour.

During the intifada, Hamas emerged as the leading Islamist organisation in Palestine and
became a contender against the PLO for leadership of the Palestinians.

In mid-1988, Jordan declared its disengagement from the West Bank. There had been anti-
Jordanian feeling during the intifada. This was a challenge to Israel and the PLO to deliver peace
by themselves.

8.5 The Oslo Accords

Other causes that brought the PLO to the negotiating table: perception of time (things were
changing, there was a sense of urgency); the collapse of the USSR, which had been a great
supporter of the PLO; the immigration of Soviet Jews to Israel (1 million in the 1990s).

The PLO realised that the numbers game might not be in their favour for much longer, and the
possibility of these Soviet Jews being settled in the West Bank created a sense of urgency.

Other factors: the change in the balance of power with Iraqs defeat in the rst Gulf War; the need
to translate the intifada into meaningful gains; the nancial bankruptcy of the PLO because of
33
Arafats backing of Saddam and the subsequent loss of funding; even radicals in the PLO fearing
that the Palestinians would nd themselves on the trash heap of history if they did not initiate
talks with Israel; the fear of the insider leadership alternative.

The Rise of Hamas was one example of political events inside the Palestinian territories that
wasnt in the PLOs best interest.

Israel under Yitzak Rabin saw its place in the region as needing to create an inner circle of peace
surrounding it to offset the more radical states further aeld (e.g. Iraq, Iran).

Rabins analysis of the intifada was that it was a drain on Israels resources and damaged its
international standing.

The limitations of the Madrid conference showed that Israel needed to negotiate with the PLO
and not other representatives.

Mid-1993: secret Israel-PLO negotiations in Oslo.

In the Oslo Accords, the two parties recognised each other; Israel was to withdraw from Gaza
and Jericho as part of a phased approach to test the goodwill of both sides; at the end of the ve-
year transition phase the two parties would come to a nal agreement on the issues that had
been left for nal status negotiations.

The Oslo Accords established the Palestinian Authority (PA), a state in the making, that would
take control of the areas that Israel withdrew from. The Oslo Accords did not specically mention
the creation of a Palestinian state but it was clearly intended to create one.

The PA had two elective institutions: a president (Arafat) and a legislative assembly, elected only
by the Palestinians who lived in the West Bank and Gaza. This narrowed the Palestinian
question to the Palestinian territories (as the Israelis chose to see it).

Hamas did not participate in the 1996 elections because it rejected the Oslo Accords.

The nal status negotiations were territory, Jerusalem, security and refugees.

Palestinian critics of the Oslo Accords said it was not peace but capitulation, and that the PLO
had put statehood above liberation and return.

Israeli critics ercely opposed the idea of withdrawal, especially from Heretz Israel and especially
in giving territory to the PLO.

Terrorism on the Palestinian side and settlements on the Israeli side continued, undermining the
Oslo Accords. Neither side was able or willing to reign in their more radical sides.

November 1995: Yitzak Rabin was assassinated by a religious opponent of his policy. The
succeeding government was less enthusiastic about Oslo.

8.6 The Jordanian-Israeli Peace

Oslo paved the way for a peace agreement between Israel and Jordan.

Israel and Jordan had agreed on the framework for a peace treaty at Madrid in 1992, but the
Jordanians couldnt sign a separate peace with Israel until the PLO had made their move.

Another reason for peace was Jordans post-Gulf War strategic needs (to get back in the U.S.
orbit after being neutral in the war and not cooperating with the U.S.).

The Jordan-Israel peace treaty was signed in 1994 and was different from Israels other treaties.
It contains no bilateral security arrangements. The treaty was more about arranging the
relationships between them and a variety of third parties - especially Iraq.

The treaty said no potentially hostile foreign forces could be stationed in Jordan. This made
Jordan a stable buffer against Iraq.

From the Jordanian point of view, the treaty was important because of concerns that Israelis or
others would try to transform Jordan into the Palestinian state.

To guard against that, a clause in the treaty banned involuntary population movement, which
meant that Israel could not send Palestinians from the West Bank into Jordan.

The Jordanians thought the peace treaty would lead to the stabilisation of the region (and an
Israeli-Palestinian peace) and would rapidly improve Jordans economy, but neither of these
happened to Jordans disappointment.

8.7 Camp David, 2000

Israel was led by Ehud Barak of the Labour government (the same party as Rabin).
34

Shortly after his election, Barak tried to negotiate rst with Syria but this led nowhere.

The Israelis felt that they needed to nally conclude the agreement with the PLO while President
Clinton was still in ofce.

Baraks offer was more generous than any previous offer Israel had made.

The Israeli offer at Camp David in mid-2000 was: the Palestinians would receive 80% of the West
Bank; the Palestinians would receive East Jerusalem (which was a concession that the Israelis
had not made before since 1967), but there was no agreement on what to do about the Temple
Mount; no Palestinian refugees would be accepted in Israel proper (in later peace talks Israel
offered to accept a very small number).

Israel was negotiating from a 1967-centric worldview, while the Palestinian negotiations started
from a 1948 worldview. This made an agreement very difcult.

The West Bank and Gaza make up only 22% of historical Palestine.

The division of Jerusalem was agreed upon.

The PLO wanted the Palestinian refugees to have a free choice about whether to return to Israel
or not, but the Israelis could not accept this.

There is a difference between the inter-state conict between Israel and the Arab states (with a
1967 departure point) and the Israeli-Palestinian conict with its 1948 issues. Israel can concede
on 1967 issues in principle without eroding the nature of the Jewish state. This is not true for the
1948 issues.

There are two 1948 issues: the right of return of Palestinian refugees to Israel proper, and the
rights of the Palestinians who are citizens of Israel.

Clash of the narratives: self-defence vs aggression in Israels actions from 1948 onwards, justice
vs injustice in the creation of Israel to begin with, and Palestinian-ness, which is difcult for Israel
to come to terms with in the way that the Palestinians see it (as a nation born out of being
dispossessed, displaced and stateless).

Camp Davids failure gave way to the second intifada, which was very different from the rst.

The suicide bombings in the second intifada took over 1000 Israeli lives and hardened the
Israelis signicantly. The Israelis concluded that Palestinian targeting of Israeli civilians in Israeli
cities showed that the Palestinians werent interested in just a state in the West Bank and Gaza
but in challenging the state of Israel.

8.8 Unilateral Disengagement and Further Negotiations

Ariel Sharon was strongly right-wing in his original political makeup but he had a change of
thought as prime minister. He came to the conclusion that the long-term occupation was so
damaging to Israel in the long run that it was preferable to withdraw.

Sharon withdrew from the Gaza Strip and dismantled all settlements in mid-2005.

In terms of current security, this withdrawal did not improve Israels situation and in fact
worsened it. But in terms of basic security (the long-term preservation of Israel as the nation-
state of the Jewish people), withdrawing from Gaza and ruling over fewer Palestinians improved
Israels situation.

Gaza was taken over in 2007 by Hamas. The increasing power of Hamas gave rise to the
question of who really represented the Palestinians.

Reasons for the failure of Oslo: the gap and tensions between the 1948/67 viewpoints; the
inherent deciencies of Resolution 242; the Palestinians broadened back out to the 1948
questions (the right of return), whereas in Oslo they had seemed to be narrowing to 1967.

During the Abbas-Olmert talks in 2008, there was a narrowing of the gap on the 1967 issues but
not on the 1948 ones.

Israel offered to take 5000 refugees (1000 every year for ve years) of the 5,000,000 that there
now are.

Privately the Palestinians have spoken about the possibility of accepting Israel taking
100,000-150,000 refugees but they have denied this in public.

Both sides had intrusive perceptions of the two-state solution. The Palestinian idea of the refugee
solution intruded on Israels territory, while Israels security demands would intrude on Palestine.

Week 9 - Middle Eastern Stateness, Islamic Revival and the Arab Spring
35

9.1 The Post-1967 Middle East: the Victory of the State Interest

The 1967 defeat was a failure of Pan-Arabism to bring the prosperity it had promised.

The vacuum was lled by two simultaneous but contradictory trends: the entrenchment of the
territorial state and the rise of political Islam.

After 1967, the dichotomy between the progressives and the reactionaries became irrelevant -
the national state interest was now the most important thing.

Egypt: after the war of attrition with Israel following 1967, it now became in Egypts state interest
to make peace with Israel without reference to the wishes of the Arab collective.

Egypt was the most self-evident territorial state as the most natural Arab state.

Iraq: the Kurds and the Shiis were crushed into submission by the institutions of violence of the
ruling Sunni Bath party. Cohesion through Arabism was not possible, and Iraqiness with its
emphasis on Babylon (supported by Saddam) did not work either.

The occupation of Kuwait was intended to serve the Iraqi states narrow strategic needs (even
though the justications were based on pan-Arabism). Almost all Arab states favoured
maintaining the state order by supporting the U.S.

After 2003, the Kurdish Regional Government in Iraq became a quasi-independent state.

The overthrow of Saddam signalled an end to the domination of the Sunnis, which had been in
effect for 1000 years. Sunnis have refused to acquiesce to the new reality, resulting in clashes
and civil wars since.

Some sense of Iraqiness has coalesced despite the sectarian violence as the Shiis have not
moved to join the Shiite state of Iran.

Syria: there was a sour taste of Arab union after the failed union with Egypt, leading to a strong
desire to protect Syrian independence.

Haz al-Assad searched for a formula that would bridge the gap between party ideals of Arab
unity and political reality. The old motif of Greater Syria was given a new lease of life because it
would serve Syrias strategic interests and strengthen it against Israel.

Roman-era archeological nds in Syria were presented as part of Syrian heritage.

Despite Syrias dominant position in Lebanon, Syria did not move to change the borders even
though Bathi ideology dictated that the borders were articial.

Palestinian-ness was unique in that it was the loss of territory - not great deeds of the past - that
served as the backbone of the cohesive collective memory.

Jordanian-ness was dened against the Palestinian other, especially after 1970.

An attempt was also made to dene Jordanian-ness as something that existed during the
Ottoman period, even though this was not true. This story allows for the foundation of the
monarchy to have been based on self-determination, not colonial desires.

Jordanian-ness was also founded on the uniqueness of the tribal-monarchical compact as the
core of Jordanian national identity.

Since 1948, Jordan has become increasingly Palestinian. The Palestinians have a majority in
Jordan (not even including the West Bank), but both Jordanians and Palestinians are still mostly
Sunni Muslim Arabs.

The distinctions between Palestinians and Jordanians are only skin-deep compared with the
division between Sunnis and Shiis which date back centuries, or between Kurds and Arabs etc.

In Jordan, the tribes actively adopted the Jordanian identity, thus the nation was created in a
bottom-up as well as top-down fashion, unlike Iraq.

9.2 The Islamic Revival

The revival of Islamic politics came about because of the disappointment of secular nationalism
in the wake of Nassers defeat in 1967.

The economic problems, population growth and massive urbanisation were also all reasons for
the rise of Islam.

The idealogical underpinnings of the Islamic trend: opposition to secular modernisation,

nationalism and territorialism; modernity and nationalism without their secularist thrust; the need
to base society on Islamic law.
36

Since the late 19th century there were three main theories to explain the relative weakness of
Muslim societies compared with the west: that they had deviated from true Islam (Afghani and
Abduh); that it was the fault of Islam itself (Ataturk); the intoxication of the West [Hasan Al-Banna
(Muslim brotherhood), revolutionaries in Iran].

Sayyid Qutb (1906-66) was the key ideologue of the Muslim brethren in Egypt. He expanded on
the theme of the new Jahiliyya (pre-Islamic societies that were not governed by the sharia)
developed by Pakistani scholar Abu al-Ala Mawdudi (1903-79). Under this idea, there could be
no compromise with Western thought, which should be rejected.

Qutb was imprisoned and then executed by the Nasserist regime in 1966.

The specic complaints of the Islamists: against the marginalisation of religion in politics, law and
society; they dismissed the cult of the nation-state as a form of heresy; education and media
spread un-Islamic values; openness to western economies and globalisation which led to
corruption and a consumer society; the real enemy was the indel regime itself which had to be
removed even before the struggle against Israel.

9.2.1 The Islamic Revival in Egypt, Syria and Iraq

Egypt: While Sadat encouraged Egypts territorial identity, in the process of de-Nasserisation he
allowed greater freedom for the Islamists, especially in the universities. He later suppressed
them which led to his assassination in October 1981.

His successor, Hosni Mubarak, allowed more freedom for the Islamists. The sharia, abolished
under Nasser, could be used by the Islamists in secular courts.

Egyptian society from the late 1980s showed more signs of increasing religiosity, with mosques
being built, more people attending Friday prayers and more veils for women (over 80%). Reading
religious literature was favoured over Western pursuits like watching movies or attending bars.

Education and media became inuenced by the Islamists, even state-run press.

The Copts were exposed to increasing levels of intolerance and violence.

Syria: the religious factor in politics was related to the sectarian nature of society. The
marginalisation of religion by the state was a blessing for the Alawi minority in power.

Under Haz al-Assad, the Bath party changed course from a secular nationalist movement to
one that sought to enhance the religious legitimacy of the Alawis, who were declared orthodox
Shiis by the Lebanese Shiite authorities, and therefore eligible for the Syrian presidency under
Assads reinstated clause in 1973 which stated that the president had to be a Muslim.

Assad crushed the Sunni Muslim brethren in 1982 but was more conciliatory in later years.

Basher al-Assad has developed a more sustained process of Shiisation with Iranian help to
legitimise the Alawis and thus the regime.

Syrian society has also become more Islamised, evidenced by dress and mosque attendance.

Iraq: Saddams regime also went through an Islamising phase. Saddam cracked down on the
Shiis but he also claimed direct descent from the caliph Ali.

Irans effective use of religion as a mobilising force in the Iran-Iraq war encouraged Saddam to
use Islamisation himself on the eve on the rst Gulf War.

9.2.2 The Examples of Jordan, Algeria and the Palestinians

Jordan: The Muslim Brethren and the Jordanian regime were allies in the confrontation with the
secular Arab socialist movements (Nasserism and Bathism) and the Brethren supported the
regime against the PLO in 1970.

There was no bad blood between the regime and the Islamists in Jordan as there was in other
countries like Egypt, Algeria and Syria.

The Hashemites are seen as legitimate rulers, owing to being descendants of the Prophet.

The Muslim Brethrens political party, the Islamic Action Front (IAF), won 40% of the seats in
1989 parliamentary elections but have not been as successful since.

Algeria: in December 1991 the rst multi-party elections since independence were held. The
Islamists strong showing in the rst round caused the cancellation of the elections by the military.

Civil war broke out from 1991-2002 and in the end, the Islamists were subdued.
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Palestine: this is an extraordinary case owing to the structural weakness of the PA and the fact
that it is not a real state with strong state institutions to counter the Islamist trend.

2006: Hamas was victorious in both the West Bank and Gaza in parliamentary elections but how
to implement these results couldnt be agreed upon. Hamas took Gaza by force in 2007.

Islamists have done well in elections in Egypt, Tunisia and Turkey.

Secular nationalists sought to nationalise Islam and make it only one component of the national
identity, while Islamists sought to install religion as the cohesive element of society.

The charter of Hamas accepts nationalism as part of religious ideology but it proclaims Palestine
to be an Islamic trust and not a secular state as the PLO would have it be.

9.3.1 The Arab Spring: Modernity and Tradition

The Arab Spring rose up against the background of the struggle between tradition and modernity.

The democracy-autocracy dichotomy is often used to describe the Arab Spring but the struggle
between tradition and modernity is a more relevant way to analyse the Arab Spring.

Political Islam, sectarianism and tribalism are leading the Arab Spring.

In the case of Egypt, neither the army or the Muslim Brethren really represent democracy but
here we see the modernity/tradition struggle playing out.

Neo-traditionalism is not inherently opposed to modernity and has certainly been affected by it; it
is a product of the modern world.

The UN human development reports over the last decade discuss three decits in the Arab
world: political freedom, rst world education systems and gender equality. Gender equality
especially leads to poorly performing economies and high population growth.

The 18-30 period has been called waithood, where Arabs wait in hopeless expectation.

Spring is a misnomer when describing recent events as it has a European connotation and a
slant towards democracy. Technology such as social media has also been used to explain the
Arab Spring to give the movements a universal character, at the expense of recognising the
other and the religious and cultural realities of the Middle East.

Edward Saids rejection of culture has been inuential in this way.

The Arab awakening of the early 20th century was essentially secular (Arab nationalism) but this
new Arab awakening has greater religious signicance.

Reasons for the secular retreat: the emulation of the West is no longer as desirable as it once
was; the Soviet Union is no longer a model that can be followed; the failure of Arabism and the
rise of non-Arab countries as regional powers (Turkey and Iran).

Turkey and Iran both have a sphere of inuence in Iraq and are the new symbols of Sunni
(Turkey) and Shii (Iran).

The Muslim states were once divided by allegiance to the USA or USSR or by monarchies v
republics; now they are Sunni v Shii.

Bahrain: Shiite majority ruled by a Sunni minority. The Shiites rose in rebellion but Saudi Arabia
would not support a Shiite state of Iranian inuence on the peninsula so did not permit it and
invaded Bahrain to put down the rebellion.

All examples of the Arab Spring show a resurgence in political Islam, sectarianism and/or
tribalism.

9.3.2 The Arab Spring: Egypt, Tunisia, Syria, Yemen and Libya

Egypt: After the overthrow of Mubarak, the Muslim Brethren won by wide margins in all elections
except the presidency which was a narrow victory for Muhammad Mursi.

Mursi was removed from power by a popular military coup in June 2013. His weaknesses
included his dictatorial ways towards the Islamisation of the state, inept governance, presiding
over a rapidly declining economy and the chaotic breakdown of law and order.

The military and the Islamists are the two great powers in Egypt, without a large movement of
secular democracy.

Copts were exposed to rising sectarian violence following the removal of Mubarak and therefore
supported demonstrations against Mursi. After the coup, Copts were targeted and accused by
dispossessed Islamists and a new wave of violence ensued.
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Tunisia: The ruling dictatorship was overthrown in January 2011 and the Islamists won the
subsequent elections. However, Tunisias experience of Islamist rule also proved disappointing.

Tunisia is perhaps the most secular Arab state, so the Islamists have been more willing to
compromise there. However, extremists assassinated two liberal politicians in early 2013.

The Islamist government stood down in favour of a caretaker government which would prepare
Tunisia for new elections.

Syria: The opposition is mainly Sunni, though urban Sunnis have largely remained neutral and
uncommitted.

The Kurds in Syria are newly assertive and now control territory in the north of the country.

In Iraq and Syria, territoriality and nationalism has been shown to have been a facade and the
Bathi regimes were in fact sectarian to the core. Once they lost control, the sectarian genie was
let out of the bottle.

Jordan: even opponents of the monarchy see the monarchy as the thing that holds the country
together.

Yemen and Libya have degenerated from sovereign entities into tribal battleelds since the fall of
their respective regimes. Yemen could end up being redivided into north and south.

Libya doesnt have strong state institutions and has split into three areas that had previously
been thrust together by the Western allies to form Libya in the rst place.

20th century: Arab nationalism and the formation of the Arab states were the two most important
developments. Now, Arab nationalism is dead and the states themselves are being challenges.

9.4.1 The Non Arab Countries - The Republic of Turkey: From WWII to the Present

Turkey and Iran had long histories of independent statehood, unlike the Arab countries.

There is no serious challenge to the territorial integrity or national identity of Turkey or Iran.

Ataturk died in 1938 and since his death his secular vision has been gradually eroded.

Religion reestablished a high prole beginning with the advent of multi-party politics after WWII.

1960: a military coup deposed the Democratic Party, the rst of three military coups.

The military regarded itself as the ultimate guardian of the secular order.

1960s: rising radicalism from the extreme left and extreme right. Violence between the two sides
escalated in 1970-71 and another military coup followed.

In 1970, the National Order Party was the rst Islamist party in Turkey. It was banned but
succeeded by another, similar party.

The Iranian revolution in 1979 further encouraged the Islamists. In 1980, the army staged a third
coup, remaining in power until 1983.

The Imam Hatip schools (mixed secular-religious curriculum) peaked during the 1990s with many
of its graduates joining Islamist movements.

Ironically, it was the army who presented the Turkish-Islamic Synthesis which was a controlled
Islamisation process through the vehicle of state-supervised religious education. Religiosity
became much more publicly visible beginning in the 1980s.

The army intervened again by way of pressuring a dissolution of the government in 1997. The
ruling Welfare Party was then banned and replaced by the moderate Islamist AKP - the Justice
and Development Party.

The AKP won elections in 2002, 2007 and 2011 and marginalised the military, imprisoning
ofcers on charges of conspired against the government.

There are more imprisoned journalists in Turkey under the AKP than anywhere else (in the
Middle East or the world?).

The Kemalist revolution had never penetrated into the rural periphery and that periphery brought
religion back to the cities when they migrated there.

Population increase: 21m in 1950, 52m in 1986, 75m in 2012.

A more popular view of the Ottoman heritage is now being encouraged.

The AKP has been more conciliatory towards the Kurds. As Sunni Muslims, the Kurds are more
easily brought into the national orbit with a more Islamised state.

9.4.2 The Non Arab Countries - Iran: From the Pahlavi Dynasty to the Islamic Republic

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In Iran, Islamic politics went even further and overthrew the monarchy.

The Pahlavi monarchy sought to emphasise the pre-Islamic (Sassanid) nation of Persia as part
of its secular character.

The monarchy was always thought of as one with foreign inuence.

The Reza Shah was inuenced by Ataturk and sought rapid modernisation, the creation of a
modern army, transportation and communication networks and the promotion of Iranian
nationalism.

In 1935, European hats were required!

The Iranians had a less westernised elite to implement these reforms because they hadnt been
as involved in the modernising reforms of the 19th century that took place in the Ottoman
Empire.

Reza Shah was an admirer of Hitler and during WWII Iran was occupied by Soviet, US and
British forces. The shah was forced to abdicate in favour of his son.

Muhammad Musaddeq (1882-1967) was a prominent critic of the regime. He was eventually
made prime minister because of his inuence.

The shah was forced to briey ee the country in the 1950s but the army supported him and he
returned to resume control, with Musaddeq forced out.

1963: White Revolution - moderate land reform, economic and social reforms; attempt to reduce
illiteracy; attempt to bureaucratise the ulema and expand Western-style secular education;
attempt to raise the standards of public health.

Ayatollah Khomeini was forced into exile in 1964 after being critical of these Western reforms.

1971: the Shah initiated the celebrations of 2500 years of the Persian monarchy since the rise of
Cyrus the Great. He also started a new Persian calendar beginning with Cyrus in 1976, but it was
later cancelled.

The shahs ineffective use of oil wealth in the 1970s led to further opposition.

From early 1978, a cycle of riots developed, with an effective alliance between the urban poor
and the religious authorities against the shah.

The opposition used mosques as a way of mobilising and listening to recordings of Khomeini,
which the regime was unable to prevent.

Khomeini returned from his exile in Paris on 1 February 1979, and the monarchy fell 10 days
later.

This was the rst instance of a revolution of the masses in the modern Middle East and can be
explained by four factors: massive disaffection and dislocation; revolutionising of the men of
religion by Khomeini; the failure of the regime to maximise its coercive potential; and the absence
of the traditional external forces in Iranian politics.

Population: 14m in 1945, 40m in 1980 and about 75m now.

The revolution was characterised by a Shiite form of mobilisation, using the narrative of the
traditional exploitation of the Shiis at the hands of the Sunnis.

In the Shiite example, more attention was paid to the personality of the ruler (Khomeini),
whereas Sunni religious rebellions have placed all their faith in the sharia.

All legislation passed by the Iranian parliament must be in accordance with the sharia. 1982:
drastic legal changes.

The transition from Khomeini to Ayatollah Khamenei after Khomeinis death in 1989 was smooth.

The Islamic Republic has developed an impressive regional inuence.

The population has doubled since the revolution and the economy has been unable to keep up,
but the ayatollahs enjoy unrivalled legitimacy.