The Modern Middle East, Third Edition: A Political History since the First World War - Softcover

Kamrava, Mehran

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0520277813 ISBN 13: 9780520277816

Publisher: University of California Press, 2013

Synopsis

From the fall of the Ottoman Empire through the Arab Spring, this completely revised and updated edition of Mehran Kamrava’s classic treatise on the making of the contemporary Middle East remains essential reading for students and general readers who want to gain a better understanding of this diverse region.

About this title

About the Author

Mehran Kamrava is Professor and Director of the Center for International and Regional Studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar. He is the author of a number of books, including, most recently, Iran’s Intellectual Revolution and Qatar: Small State, Big Politics. His edited books include The International Politics of the Persian Gulf, Innovation in Islam: Traditions and Contributions, The Political Economy of the Persian Gulf and The Nuclear Question in the Middle East.

From the Back Cover

"Kamrava provides an in-depth analysis of not just political history but also a variety of other issues that have plagued this part of the world for so many years and continue to remain unresolved for years to come."―Mahmood Monshipouri, author of Islamism, Secularism, and Human Rights in the Middle East

"This is an ambitious, stimulating book that synthesizes a broad range of literature on Middle East history and politics. The author analyzes many important issues in the region, emphasizing the challenges countries face in overcoming historical legacies, developing accountable leadership, recovering from conflict, and developing productive economies."―Bradford Dillman, author of State and Private Sector in Algeria: The Politics of Rent-Seeking and Failed Development

"At a time when sensational books on the Middle East fill the market, this is a serious and sober contribution that will help the students and lay people alike. The author approaches the highly charged emotional issues of the Middle East with sensitivity and objectivity. Kamrava should be commended for a very useful and highly needed book."―As`ad AbuKhalil, author of The Battle for Saudi Arabia: Royalty, Fundamentalism, and Global Power

"Professor Kamrava has written a very well-researched, accessible and up to date book. His themes are well chosen; his analysis is cogent and lucid. It is a welcome addition to the literature on Middle East politics"―Manochehr Dorraj, author of Middle East at the Crossroads

"Kamrava's political history of the modern Middle East enjoys that rare combination of insightful analysis and accessibility for the general reader. I recommend it."―Glenn Robinson, author of Building a Palestinian State: The Incomplete Revolution

From the Inside Flap

"Kamrava provides an in-depth analysis of not just political history but also a variety of other issues that have plagued this part of the world for so many years and continue to remain unresolved for years to come." Mahmood Monshipouri, author of Islamism, Secularism, and Human Rights in the Middle East

"This is an ambitious, stimulating book that synthesizes a broad range of literature on Middle East history and politics. The author analyzes many important issues in the region, emphasizing the challenges countries face in overcoming historical legacies, developing accountable leadership, recovering from conflict, and developing productive economies." Bradford Dillman, author of State and Private Sector in Algeria: The Politics of Rent-Seeking and Failed Development

"At a time when sensational books on the Middle East fill the market, this is a serious and sober contribution that will help the students and lay people alike. The author approaches the highly charged emotional issues of the Middle East with sensitivity and objectivity. Kamrava should be commended for a very useful and highly needed book." As`ad AbuKhalil, author of The Battle for Saudi Arabia: Royalty, Fundamentalism, and Global Power

"Professor Kamrava has written a very well-researched, accessible and up to date book. His themes are well chosen; his analysis is cogent and lucid. It is a welcome addition to the literature on Middle East politics" Manochehr Dorraj, author of Middle East at the Crossroads

"Kamrava's political history of the modern Middle East enjoys that rare combination of insightful analysis and accessibility for the general reader. I recommend it." Glenn Robinson, author of Building a Palestinian State: The Incomplete Revolution

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The Modern Middle East

A Political History since the First World War

By Mehran Kamrava

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS

Copyright © 2013 The Regents of the University of California
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-520-27781-6

Contents

List of Illustrations, ix, 
List of Maps, xi, 
List of Tables, xiii, 
Acknowledgments to the First Edition, xv, 
Acknowledgments to the Second Edition, xvii, 
Acknowledgments to the Third Edition, xix, 
Introduction, 1, 
PART I. A POLITICAL HISTORY OF THE MIDDLE EAST, 7, 
1. From Islam to the Great War, 9, 
2. From Territories to Independent States, 35, 
3. The Age of Nationalism, 68, 
4. The Arab-Israeli Wars, 108, 
5. The Iranian Revolution, 139, 
6. The Gulf Wars and Beyond, 170, 
PART II. ISSUES IN MIDDLE EASTERN POLITICS, 211, 
7. States and Their Opponents, 213, 
8. Repression and Rebellion, 265, 
9. The Palestinian-Israeli Conflict, 299, 
10. The Challenge of Economic Development, 347, 
11. Challenges Facing the Middle East, 387, 
Notes, 407, 
Bibliography, 467, 
Index, 503, 

CHAPTER 1

From Islam to the Great War

Since the Middle East is home to some of the world's earliest civilizations, it is difficult to choose a starting point for examining its political history, for no matter how far back the investigator searches, there still seem to be deeper layers of historical and political developments that influenced the course of later events. For convenience, and admittedly somewhat arbitrarily, I have chosen the dawn of Islam as the starting point of this book. This has some justification: Islam as both a system of beliefs and a historical-political phenomenon has distinctively marked the Middle East, and its rise and evolution created dynamics that continue to shape the destiny of nations today.

The rise, evolution, and spread of Islam in the seventh century A.D. were greatly influenced by the geography of the region in which it was born. Islam is not unique in this respect, for any religious or political phenomenon is shaped and influenced by its geographic circumstances. Thus the chapter begins with a brief survey of that larger context. It then traces Middle Eastern history from the birth and expansion of Islam to the rise of the Ottomans and, after nearly five centuries, their ultimate collapse and replacement by European colonial powers. Islam was born in the Arabian peninsula, a place nearly as harsh and inaccessible today as it was in the seventh century. The area was linked to the outside world primarily by the merchant caravans that left the Hijaz region (in western Arabia) for trading posts in Damascus and farther north along the Silk Road. By the time of the rise of Islam, many civilizations just north of the Arabian peninsula had already gone through cycles of birth, death, and regeneration—the Akkadians, Babylonians, and Hittites chief among them—although two formidable dynasties continued to exist and, in fact, thrive. The Sassanids, concentrated to the northeast of the Arabian peninsula along the two sides of what is now the Iran-Iraq border, were gradually restoring to the ancient Iranians some of the glory they had lost with the collapse of the Achemenid dynasty at the hands of Alexander the Great. The other great civilization was the Byzantine Empire, whose size and powers were as impressive as the great city that bore its name. Between the Sassanids and the Byzantines lay the ruins of a few other ancient civilizations, by then long abandoned, the most notable of which were the Babylonians. With these potential intermediaries long gone, frequent quarrels erupted between the two regional giants, steadily weakening both in the process. In 330 A.D., Constantine the Great made Byzantium the capital of the Roman Empire and changed its name to Constantinople, the City of Constantine. Islam appeared in 610 a.d. and expanded dramatically after the Prophet's death nearly twenty-three years later. This expansion was greatly influenced by the conditions in which Islam found itself and the heritage of the peoples and the regions it conquered along the way.

THE SETTING

By the time Islam appeared in the Arabian peninsula, the two other civilizations in the region, the Byzantines in the north and the Sassanids in the east, had come to adopt variations of two monotheistic religions, Christianity and Zoroastrianism, respectively. Several forms of Christianity prevailed elsewhere in the Middle East: the Coptic Church in Egypt, the Jacobite Church in Syria, and the Nestorian Church in Iraq. Parts of eastern Iraq were also Zoroastrian, as was almost all of Iran, where the tradition of divine kingship did not die out until after the Arab conquest, and even then not very thoroughly. Jewish and pagan communities were also scattered throughout the area, including in the Arabian peninsula, where a majority worshipped local deities.

The religious makeup of the Middle East at the time of Islam's appearance tells us much about other aspects of life in the region. With religion came the increasing differentiation of authority and the development of religious and administrative hierarchies. Depending on local circumstances and conditions, local priests (mobads for Zoroastrians), bishops, and popes could become tremendously influential in the day-to-day lives of ordinary people, some even influencing the fates of entire dynasties. Places of worship and congregation also assumed importance not only for articulating and perpetuating religious values but as sources of local organization and mobilization. Equally important were the use and manipulation of religion by existing or aspiring political leaders, whether at the level of the local community or the empire, the most brilliant manifestation of which could be found in Constantinople.

Life was organized, and still is today, into three distinct but at times interrelated communities. First were urban communities, cities where markets and money economies had been firmly established, elaborate political and administrative apparatuses had been set up, and religious power and authority, as well as liturgy and customs, had evolved. In broad, historical terms, cities in the Middle East can be divided into pre-Islamic and Islamic ones. With the rise and expansion of Islam, a few cities gradually died out as they ceased being centers of economic and political power. The Sassanid capital of Ctesiphon, near present-day Baghdad, is a case in point. Many more cities were established anew or grew out of military encampments. Kufa and Basra in southern Mesopotamia, Fustat in Egypt, Qayrawan in Tunisia, and, somewhat later, Marv in northeastern Iran were among the more notable in this group of cities. Still others were changed not just in name but also in their political and historical significance. For example, Yathrib, a town north of Mecca, became Medina and the capital of Prophet Muhammad's new Islamic state. Some eight centuries later and under very different circumstances, Constantinople became Istanbul and the capital of an expanding Ottoman Empire.

While Islam has essentially been an urban religion in both its genesis and its later evolution, there have been two other types of Middle Eastern communities as well: relatively small and often isolated villages; and tribes of nomads, many of whom were called bedouins (literally, "desert dwellers"). Both developed as a result of the "Neolithic Revolution," which began around 6000 B.C. and involved the development of agriculture and the domestication of new types of animals. The proportion of villages and nomadic tribes appears to have oscillated depending on political currents and the rise and fall of local dynasties. On the whole, strong central authority, and the concomitant security of the subject population from banditry and lawlessness, favored urbanization and the growth of cities. Political authority and urbanization assumed a mutually reinforcing relationship. With the decline of central authority and increasing levels of physical and economic insecurity, some of the less firmly settled urban groups or those in smaller towns and villages found it beneficial to migrate. The reliance of many of these groups on camels and horses, and thus the search for pastures and oases, made migration for many nomads a seasonal or a semipermanent necessity. Dynastic declines did not directly give rise to nomadic and other tribal groups, but they certainly appear to have added to their numbers. Throughout the centuries, the center of political and imperial power shifted from one city and region to another several times—from Medina to Damascus, then to Baghdad, and eventually to Istanbul, with Cairo, Cordoba, and Esfahan experiencing their own power fluctuations. Each time the center of political power shifted, the fortunes of the populations in the nearby areas changed as well.

As with other parts of the world, particular patterns of population dispersion and settlements in the Middle East have been greatly influenced by the region's geography. As is well known, the great river systems of the Nile, the Tigris, and the Euphrates became cradles of civilizations. Along their banks grew two of the most magnificent cities, Cairo and Baghdad. Wealth and power here depended on the ability to dig and manage canals and other irrigation systems, thus giving rise to "hydraulic" states whose administrative powers and popular legitimacy rested on their ability to organize large numbers of workers successfully, maintain canals and other sources of irrigation, and manage and distribute the resulting agricultural yields. But such river systems are few and far between in the Middle East, and the region, known for its aridity, is mostly filled with large expanses of desert and jagged mountains. At the foot of these low-lying mountains grew some of the Middle East's other major cities: Mecca and Medina in the Hijaz, Sanaa in Yemen, Esfahan and Shiraz in Iran, Konya and Bursa in Turkey, and Marrakesh and Rabat in Morocco, to name a few. Inhospitable to similarly large urban settlements, the desert did not become home to larger cities save for a few, such as Yazd and Kerman in Iran, Riyadh and Buraydah in Saudi Arabia, Waddan in Libya, and Adrar in Algeria. Rather, the desert saw the proliferation of numerous isolated village and rural communities, existing alongside migratory nomadic tribes. Middle Eastern cities nevertheless experienced a decline in size, number, and importance beginning in the sixteenth century and did not regain their preeminence until some four centuries later. Up until the 1950s, an overwhelming majority of people in the Middle East lived in villages, and to this day there are estimates of some fifty-five thousand villages in Iran and approximately forty thousand in Turkey, to name only two examples. Despite annual rates of urbanization of 4.5 to 5 percent in the 1980s and the 1990s, as of 2011 over 40 percent of the peoples of the Middle East still live in village or tribal communities. To this day, the urban centers of Egypt, Sudan, and Yemen are home to less than 50 percent of the population, and some 20 to 50 percent of the populations of Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco, Syria, and Tunisia live outside the cities.

This aspect of Middle Eastern geography—the development of one or two primary cities in each country and the widespread prevalence of village and other rural forms of life—has had a dual effect on the region's political history. On the one hand, population concentration in large cities has helped facilitate the establishment of central authority in the city because of social needs for order, physical and economic security, and, in cities close to bodies of water, maintenance of canals and irrigation facilities. On the other hand, the dispersion of populations outside the walls of the city and in remote and mostly inaccessible areas has often resulted in the state's inability to effectively establish its authority over the areas it has claimed to control. This was especially the case in places where river valleys were uncommon—that is, most of the Middle East—where, instead of centralized, hydraulic states, confederations made up of different local rulers emerged. With the diffusion of power and lack of central authority came problems of state penetration and control, exacerbated during the rule of the Ottomans, who sought to govern the multiple provinces of their vast empire through a carefully devised system of loose control. The outcome, as we shall see later, was national entities that at best came into only partial contact with political institutions, whether indigenous or imposed from Istanbul. The dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire at the end of the Great War by victorious European powers, namely France and Britain, and the mandatory system through which they ruled, only compounded the problem.

Religion, political administration, economic activities, place of residence, and other forms of shared experiences provide a sense of cultural identity. A discussion of the complex, evolving cultural identities in the Middle East is beyond the scope of this book. But despite the universalism of Islam and those of the dynasties that claimed its mantle at one point or another, distinct if somewhat related cultural identities were formed relatively early on, whereby the Other was distinguished from the collective self. Naturally, with the progression of history and the changing nuances of empires and dynasties, cultural identities—wrapped in symbols and folklore, flags, oral traditions, and ways of life—were transformed and muted but never quite universalized. Many, in fact, later became rallying cries around which dormant animosities erupted and led to cross-national or even intranational conflicts and war. The Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s, for example, had cultural and historical roots that were deeper than mere disagreements over boundaries, as did the sectarian strife that tore Lebanon apart for some fifteen years beginning in 1975.

It is within this larger context that the political history of the Middle East has taken place. Retelling the narrative of this history is beyond the scope of this book, and it has been masterfully told by many others. What follow are some of the more important highlights that have shaped the region's history and its current social, political, and economic landscapes.

THE RISE AND EXPANSION OF ISLAM

Muhammad ibn-Abdullah, Muhammad the son of Abdullah, was born in the city of Mecca in the Hijaz in 570 A.D. Mecca had emerged as an affluent and powerful caravan city for two principal reasons. First, it housed the shrine of Ka'ba, where Abraham was said to have offered his sacrifice to God, and it had thus become an important destination for pagan worshippers whose belief systems included paying homage to that holy site. Mecca was also the halfway point along the lucrative incense-trading route between Yemen in the south and Syria in the north, making it a potentially attractive resting place for passing traders. One of the more intriguing theses about the preeminence of Mecca is presented by the historian Richard Bulliet, who attributes it to the city's ability to control the surrounding camel-breeding tribes. These tribes could both supply transportation and, more importantly, raid caravans. Gradually, the thesis holds, the Meccans organized the tribes so that they would manage trade rather than raid caravans, leading to a rise in the city's importance.

Muhammad belonged to the Quraysh tribe, who had settled in and eventually dominated the city approximately a century earlier. Nevertheless, since its very founding Mecca had lacked central authority. Muhammad was not born into the most influential clan of the Quraysh. He lost both parents at an early age and was raised by his uncle, Abu Talib. As a young man, Muhammad worked for a caravan owner named Khadija, a woman twice widowed and with some wealth. She proposed to him, and the two married. Fifteen years his senior, Khadija bore Muhammad six children, four daughters and two sons, although only the daughters survived into adulthood. Khadija later become the first convert to Muhammad's religion, and he remained devoted to her throughout her life. Despite sanctioning multiple marriages and later practicing them himself, he did not marry anyone else until after Khadija's passing.

Disenchanted with the paganism of fellow Meccans, in 610 A.D., during one of his frequent visits to nearby Mount Hira, Muhammad was visited by the archangel Gabriel and given the command to recite (iqra in Arabic) what was to become verse 1 of chapter (surah) 96 of the Quran (recitations): "Recite in the name of your Lord who created." God (Lah), Muhammad was told, was one (Al-Lah, the God), and man must submit to his will. Life was to be reordered on the basis of submission (islam) to God.

(Continues...)

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Edition details

• Publisher: University of California Press
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0520277813
• ISBN 13: 9780520277816
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 3
• Number of pages: 576