The history of relations between the Arabs and the Ottoman Turks is not limited to the spread of Islam among them and the borrowing of Arabic words.
From the beginning of the 16th century, the Portuguese began to pose a threat to pilgrims seeking to travel from the Indian subcontinent to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. The Portuguese entered the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea and began to attack Muslim merchant ships. The Mamluks, who ruled Egypt, could not oppose the Europeans, and turned for help to the Ottoman Turks, whom, in turn, the Europeans could not resist in terms of military and naval power, since the Ottomans had a first-class army and the same navy.
And yet it is worth noting that for a start, the Ottomans annexed Syria and Egypt to their power. Egypt was needed in order, relying on naval bases, to fight the Portuguese pirates.
Having shown themselves to be true strategists, the Ottomans launched military operations against the Spaniards and the Portuguese in the Mediterranean Sea and tied up their forces. At the head of the fleet stood the legendary Hayretdin Pasha, whom his enemies gave the nickname Barbarossa - the red-bearded. In 1538, Barbarossa defeated the combined fleet of the West at Preveza, and in 1541 inflicted a heavy defeat on the Spaniards, commanded by the king himself, off the coast of Algiers. At about the same time, the fleet under the leadership of Khadym Suleiman Pasha entered the Indian Ocean. The Ottomans conquered Yemen and the northwestern regions of Ethiopia. Based in the Yemeni ports of Aden and Zebida, Ottoman ships constantly patrolled the Red Sea, covering the paths to the holy cities, and completely disrupted the Portuguese spice trade. Muslim trade, on the other hand, revived.
Cairo, Alexandria, Damascus, Tripoli and Aleppo experienced a rebirth. They still retain numerous traces of Ottoman influence, especially in architecture.
In 1578, the Portuguese were defeated in the Mediterranean at the Battle of Kasru-l-Kabir. At the same time, the Portuguese king himself died.
By 1590, as a result of wars with Iranian Shahs from the Safavid dynasty, Iraq was conquered.
According to the agreement of 1639, concluded in Qasr-i-Shirin, the Iranians recognized the Ottoman rule over Baghdad. At this time, the Arab territories became deep provinces (sanjaks) Ottoman Empire.
The sanjak rulers were appointed by the sultan. They were responsible for collecting taxes and exercising administrative control. Local rulers, as a rule, enjoyed wide autonomy during internal affairs. The Jerusalem Sanjak, which included the territory from Jaffa in the west to the Jordan River in the east and the territory from the borders of Syria to the border with Egypt in the south, was directly subordinate to the Sultan.
Mecca was ruled by successive sheriffs, who were considered descendants of the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him), who enjoyed greater independence than ordinary pasha governors.
The Arabian provinces were less industrialized, although the cities along the coast developed more rapidly thanks to trade than those located in the interior of the empire.
For example, Aleppo, along with Damascus and Cairo, were famous for the production of textiles. Crafts related to metal processing were also developed in these cities: the manufacture of household utensils, weapons, tools, horse harness. Egypt also grew cotton, which was widely consumed in the domestic market. And yet, most of the manufactured goods were delivered to the Arab provinces from Anatolia, the European provinces of the empire, from Iran and India.
The Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire were poorer than the European ones. This was largely explained low level education of the population and, as a consequence, their lag in development.
WITH early XVIII century, the Ottoman Empire entered a period of economic and political crises. The defeat near Vienna meant the end of the military advantage of the Ottomans, the power over the provinces began to weaken. The pashas who ruled them did not fail to take advantage of this in order to achieve greater independence.
The Ottoman Empire experienced the greatest shock as a result of Napoleon's attack on Egypt in 1798.
And although in the end the emperor of France was defeated, it was he who was the first to propose to the Jews to establish a state in Palestine. The weakening of Ottoman power in this region contributed to the consolidation of Europeans there.
In 1801, a Wahhabi rebellion began in Arabia, which was suppressed only after 17 years.
Since the 1820s, the Ottoman Empire was shaken by a whole series of uprisings and riots directed against the central government. At the same time, the population as a whole remained loyal to the Ottoman sultans. The actions of the Arab population of Syria and Palestine, who opposed the Egyptian pasha Mehmed Ali, who intended to seize power in the empire, played a decisive role in his defeat in 1840-41.
The unstable situation in the empire did not fail to take advantage of the European powers, primarily England and France. England opened a consulate in Jerusalem, the main task of which was to facilitate the movement of Jews to Palestine.
France gained a foothold in Lebanon, taking advantage of the fact that in this part of the empire, Christians made up a fairly large part of the population. Catholic missionaries began to open schools in Lebanon in in large numbers. Christians tried to increase their influence, and this led to conflict with the Muslim population of the region, which resulted in a clash that claimed thousands human lives. In response to the threat of France to intervene in the situation, the Ottoman authorities had to change the status of these territories, declaring them an autonomous province, the ruler of which was a Christian.
Over time, European interference in the affairs of the Ottoman Empire only grew.
In 1882, Great Britain occupied Egypt under the pretext of ensuring navigation through the Suez Canal. The British took an active interest in affairs on the Arabian Peninsula, supporting the desire of local sheikhs to secede from the Ottoman Empire, supplying them with weapons and providing political patronage.
The Turks acted with varying success, suppressing the revolts of the Arab tribes in Arabia and Yemen in 1871, 1889 and 1895. For the Ottomans, control over the territory of Arabia was very important: it is here that the holy places of Muslims are located and the sultan, who simultaneously held the title of caliph, had to ensure that his subjects from different regions of the empire could make the Hajj.
Since the end of the 1880s, when the struggle between the European powers for colonies became extremely aggravated, the Persian Gulf region has gained particular importance.
Germany received a construction concession from the Ottomans railway Berlin-Baghdad with branches to Kuwait and Hejaz to have access to the Middle East, bypassing the seas under the control of the British. Rapprochement between the two countries also took place in other areas, such as military cooperation.
Since then, the British have taken a direct course towards the division of the Ottoman Empire, intending, following Egypt and Sudan, to turn Arabia, the interfluve of the Tigris and Euphrates, into a zone of their colonial domination. At the same time, England in every possible way encouraged and provoked conflicts between the local Arab rulers and the Ottoman governors and the central government in Istanbul, promising the Arabs its support.
In 1901, a struggle broke out between the Turks and the British over Kuwait, the ruler of which attacked the Arab Shammar tribe in Eastern Arabia, which was subordinate to the Ottoman governor.
The crisis reached its peak when Emir Abdul-Aziz al-Saud, with a detachment of 40 fighters, entered Riyadh, killed the local governor and captured the city. Through the Kuwaiti Emir Mubarak, the British supplied him with weapons and provided diplomatic support: in December 1903, the Viceroy of India, Curzon, accompanied by a squadron of warships, visited the Persian Gulf region, demonstrating support for the allies.
In the summer of 1904, Abdulaziz established contacts with the British political resident in the Persian Gulf, Major P. Cox.
Realizing that what was happening threatened with the loss of Arabia, the Turks sent troops to suppress the rebellion, but they were defeated in the battle near el-Bukairiya.
In 1905, an uprising against the Turks took place in Yemen, led by Imam Yahya. The Ottomans could no longer control the east and center of Arabia and were forced to withdraw their garrisons from there.
To be continued
Ildar Mukhamedzhanov
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Interview of the Director of the Center for Regional Studies Richard Kirakosyan to the newspaper "Noah's Ark"
- IN Lately Türkiye has significantly strengthened the eastern vector of its foreign policy. Does this mean that Ankara has already given up hopes associated with negotiations on Turkey's accession to the EU?
- It seems to me that over the past year and a half, the Turkish strategy for European integration has undergone significant changes. The Turks have not asked Europe for a long time to accept them, seeking to turn their country into such a powerful regional state that the EU needs it more than Turkey needs the EU. At the same time, Turkey's membership in the European Union, in fact, proceeds from the interests of Armenia, since Turkey, having entered the EU with all the ensuing consequences, will become a more profitable and less dangerous neighbor for us. In particular, I have in mind the responsibility of the Turks in matters of genocide and historical heritage, indemnification of property. Türkiye will simply be forced to reduce military spending, aggression against Armenians or Kurds. All this will significantly limit Ankara's freedom of maneuver, and Turkey will not be able to remain a hostile neighbor for Armenia for a long time. At the same time, I would especially like to highlight the foreign policy vector of Turkey about the priority of the Balkans and the Balkan Turks. At the same time, this direction of Turkish policy reveals its dispersion, since Ankara does not focus on one thing, being active in the direction of Syria, Libya, Iraq, Bosnia, Cyprus, the Caucasus, Azerbaijan, Iran, etc. Thus, developing all these vectors in parallel, Turkey will inevitably fail, at least in many of its attempts.
- With the collapse of the USSR, Turkey stopped playing for NATO, and in particular for the United States, the exclusive role of a NATO outpost on the borders of the "evil empire." Nevertheless, the US-Turkish military-strategic cooperation, despite some rough edges, continues to develop.
- It's no secret that over the past decades, it was the Pentagon who more than once came to the defense of Turkey even when it should not have been done, for example, in the issue of the Armenian genocide. However, today the Pentagon has experienced real disappointment with Turkey and no longer needs it, which is justified by the presence american soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq, and new role USA in the Middle East. At the same time, Turkey itself, being a member of NATO, considers, for example, the Black Sea not from the angle of cooperation with the United States or within the framework of NATO, but in the context of partnership with Russia. Therefore, the military-political relations between Washington and Ankara, having undergone major changes, are unlikely to be restored to their previous level, which is good for the region as a whole.
– And even the recently signed agreement between Turkey and the United States on the deployment of a radar against Iranian missiles on Turkish territory is unable to correct this trend?
– In this case, it’s not even so much important as the fact that Turkey has been moving closer to Russia for several years in such areas as energy, diplomacy and geopolitics. And the deployment of the radar will be the first test of the strength of Russian-Turkish relations. This missile defense plan is, in fact, identical to what is being deployed in Poland and the Czech Republic and which Russia has so actively opposed. At the same time, Russia itself clearly does not have sufficient leverage over Turkey, given that these two countries are long-standing historical and regional rivals. In addition, Turkey's claims to the role of a regional power directly threaten Russia's interests in the Caucasus, however, for Armenia, such a scenario is unequivocally positive, since the more difficulties there are in relations between Moscow and Ankara, the better for Yerevan. Thus, by signing an agreement on the deployment of missile defense, Ankara has positioned itself as an ally of Washington for the second time. The first time is Turkey's position on Syria. The price of the agreement that Türkiye will receive from the United States is very interesting. It can be as American assistance or at least US neutrality regarding the bombing of villages and positions of the Kurds in Northern Iraq. As for Iran, against which the radar is supposed to be placed, it has no other alternative than to try to continue using Turkey as an intermediary.
– Many people today talk about the steady Islamization of Turkey, aimed at increasing its role in the region. Does this process take place in reality or is it reduced to imitation for political purposes?
– The whole question is that we still do not know whether Islamization comes from the ruling Justice and Development Party, which is basically Islamist, or whether the society itself begins to orient itself more towards Islam, and the government simply plays along with it. Accordingly, the trend towards Islamization can come in Turkey not only from above, but also from below. However, in any case, the AKP is clearly not going to turn Turkey into a theocratic state, following the example of Iran. Rather, it is about the orientation of the country towards a less secular and more democratic position. At the same time, the military, secular forces that stand guard over Ataturk's ideas have not yet lost this game and can still become the center for developing countermeasures.
However, the trend towards Islamization looks quite stable, given that the Justice and Development Party is still in power in the country. At the same time, the point here is not only the spread of Islam in Turkey, but who will lead in the Middle East as a result. Therefore, Turkey no longer needs Israel, since it is striving with all its might to win the favor of the Arab world, especially after the change of governments in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and, in the future, in Syria. However, most Arabs hated the Turks during the Ottoman period and now continue to remember all their “achievements”. Despite this, Ankara, continuing to declare an anti-Israeli position, continues to play on the moods of the Middle East. At the same time, having cut ties with Israel, Erdogan's party uses this to weaken the influence of its own generals, which has always been supported by Israel.
– How will this whole situation affect Armenia? Will the bill on the recognition of the Armenian genocide finally appear in the Knesset?
– I don’t know about the Knesset, but in the US Congress the genocide bill will no longer be a purely Armenian issue, but a convenient tool for the majority of the Israeli lobby, which will not fail to use it against Turkey. For years, Israel has helped sabotage efforts to recognize the genocide. Now the Israeli lobby in the United States and Europe will most likely unfold in reverse side, for a start trying to use the Armenian genocide as a retaliatory step against Turkey.
Therefore, in the issue of recognition of the genocide, more significant changes and upheavals may occur in the near future.
David Stepanyan
1047
The head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Arab Emirates insulted the Turks. Erdogan spoke sharply in his address and not only. Everyone ran for popcorn.
There is a discipline in conflictology that studies the behavior of the leaders of countries, their reaction to certain events, according to values or intolerance towards certain things. In addition, every leader has a need to play for the public, to express populist slogans. Topics may change depending on the needs of the electorate.
And here we have the same situation: Key players are known, their weak sides. Someone is adding fuel to the fire. The thought does not leave that this verbal skirmish is the beginning of something thoughtful and with a terrible end.
I don't read Arabic sources (I don't know Arabic), but maybe in the satellite countries of Saudi Arabia after the crisis with Qatar(where Ankara sided with Doha) Erdogan is not entirely flattering. At least in pro-government publications in Turkey, the Saudis are called pawns of the United States, crown prince - agent of Israel, like Foreign Minister of the Emirates - a secret agent of the Mossad.
If more about the conflict. How it all started: A few days ago, the Foreign Minister of the Emirates reposted the text on Twitter ( dated December 16) that the Ottomans allegedly stole Islamic relics at the beginning of the last century from Medina. At first, presidential adviser Ibrahim Kalyn reacted. Yesterday, Erdogan himself, speaking to the public, said that the Ottoman Turks defended the Islamic world, while the Arabs "hit in the back", going over to the side of the British "succumbing to their promises of independence from the Ottomans." Among the Turks, by the way, this is a very common idea that the Arabs betrayed the Turks, listening to the British and because of them the Ottoman Empire collapsed.
The historical artifacts referred to by the tweeter from Iraq are provided in Topkapi. And, if I am not mistaken, the Ottomans, being the country of the Caliphate, had the right (if we argue from the standpoint of faith) to protect these relics, which they did. Here I am probably biased, but what the Ottomans could not take to Turkey now flaunts in London museums and in private collections of Europeans.
Why does this conflict develop? Considering that Erdoğan and his electorate seriously revere the Ottoman Empire, it is easy to guess what the supposed reaction of the country's leader is. In addition, the President of Turkey does not go into his pocket for words, and the Arabs, as I see it, are deliberately pushing him to provocation, calling one of the Ottoman generals a “thief” and a quote: “This is such a connection between grandfather Erdogan and Muslim Arabs”. Erdogan's rhetorical question “Our ancestors defended the holy lands (Mecca and Medina), but where were yours at that time?” cannot but offend many Arabs, and it is addressed not only to the Emirates.
*telegram channel "Turkish Agenda" has nothing to do with the site "MK-Turkey" and the opinion of the author of the channel may not coincide with the opinion editors of the online publication "MK-Türkiye" .
Recently, more and more often you can hear about how Muslims living in Russia are leaving or are about to leave their homeland. They are mainly attracted to Türkiye. This is especially true for Muslims in Moscow. Even more - the most active of them. For example, businessmen. There are many reasons for this. Most often, along with increasing pressure on people leading an Islamic lifestyle, there is a reluctance to raise children in Russia.
Once I started a conversation with a friend about where he would like to live and raise children.
- Are you thinking of leaving Dagestan?
Not yet, but I'm thinking about it more and more. I want to live in a civilized society.
What exactly is driving you to these thoughts?
“I want my children to study properly and grow up in a normal society.
- Do you think the Dagestan society is abnormal?
- Well, how to say ... I just do not want my children to grow up the way I grew up. I want them to go to school and university for knowledge, and not for something else. We have youth educational institutions does everything except study. They learn there to harass each other, give bribes, learn to drink, smoke ... I do not want my children to grow up in a city where law enforcement officers stop people for appearance where at any time riot police can break into a cafe and detain waiters and visitors for half a day, where representatives of special services can shoot a car right on the road in broad daylight without trial or investigation ... I want to live where people love and respect others, respect their rights and their responsibilities to them. We have an abnormal society in which abnormal people live and grow up.
- And who will change it if people like you disperse? Do you not feel responsible for your homeland, for your people? Think you won't be pulled home? And where, for example, would you like to move?
- Don't know…
You won't go to Europe, right? To some Emirates, probably, too ...
Yes, I won't go there. I thought maybe in Turkey ...
Imagine that you have moved. Your children went to a Turkish school, began to speak Turkish, joined the Turkish culture and mentality, made friends, married Turkish women ... became Turks, in short ... they completely forgot their native Khunzakh ...
“That’s what really stops me.
“It seems to me that you will not be able to live anywhere but this 'abnormal society' of ours.
I think I figured out where I want to live...
After that, my friend named one small Dagestan village in which simple people live a simple rural life, which he liked because most of its inhabitants observe the precepts of Islam. The mosque of the village plays the role of an important social center, the imam has great authority among the people. In addition, there are enough people in the village who have Sharia knowledge, to whom they turn to solve everyday and social issues and problems. Children there are smart and smart, and adults are noble and hardworking.
Unfortunately, most of Dagestan is very different from similar villages, and life in it flows according to different rules. Sometimes it seems like there are no rules at all. Once torn off from their history and culture, firmly attached to Islam, the mentality of the Dagestanis has led us to a dictatorship of power, money and official authority. The values of people have become "crust and trunk". What should be done for free, people began to do only for money. Satisfaction with wages and refusal of bribes have become stupidity. And if you don't pay a man for what he gets paid for, you may be harmed. This vicious circle accompanies us from the maternity hospital to the cemetery inclusive.
Against this background, one can clearly see how a return to Islam and its values makes people better. People come to Islam today very different. It happens that yesterday those who were engaged in robbery and extortion today are interested in what mark-up the Sharia allows them to throw on the goods. Quite sincerely, ashamed of his past. Allah says in the Qur'an (meaning): “Worship Allah and do not associate partners with Him. Do good to parents, relatives, orphans, the poor, neighbors from among your relatives and neighbors who are not your relatives, nearby companions, wanderers and slaves who have been captured by your right hands. Verily, Allah does not love the proud and boastful…” (Surah “Women”, verse 36). This is the nature of Islam, the responsibility for the spread of which lies on our shoulders.
Each of us is responsible for the society in which he lives. You shouldn't run away from problems. Nobody will solve them for us. Turks and Arabs will not come here. They were kicked out not too long ago.
