This post is going to mainly be quotes from
www.wikipedia.org . Please read them. I will list the source above the quote.
Let's begin with the Ottoman Empire, which comprised the entirity of the middle east for more than 1000 years. There is little point in discussing the Middle East before the Ottoman Empire, since the Ottoman Empire unified or expelled all prior different religious sects and semitic ethnicities.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottoman_Empire
wikipedia wrote:
In 1453, after the Ottomans captured Constantinople (modern ?stanbul), the last remnant of the Byzantine Empire, it became the Ottoman capital. From 1517 onwards, the Ottoman Sultan was also the Caliph of Islam, and the Ottoman Empire was from 1517 until 1922 (or 1924) synonymous with the Caliphate, the Islamic State.
Following World War I, during which most of the Empire's territories were captured by the Allies, while the Ottoman state was in complete disarray, Turkish nationalists (many of whom were former Ottoman officials and high-ranking militaries) established modern Turkey as an outcome of the Turkish War of Independence, a continuation war fought between Greeks and Turks, mostly on what was to become Turkish soil as of the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923.
In 1914, the Ottoman Empire sided with Germany in WWI.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_ ... man_Empirewikipedia wrote:
The Ottoman Empire joined the Central Powers in October–November 1914, due to the secret Turco-German Alliance signed on August 2, 1914, threatening Russia's Caucasian territories and Britain's communications with India and the East via the Suez canal. British Empire action opened another front in the South with the Gallipoli (1915) and Mesopotamia campaigns, though initially the Turks were successful in repelling enemy incursion. But in Mesopotamia, after the disastrous Siege of Kut (1915–16), British Empire forces reorganized and captured Baghdad in March 1917. Further to the west in Palestine, initial British failures were overcome with Jerusalem being captured in December 1917 and the Egyptian Expeditionary Force under Edmund Allenby going on to break the Ottoman forces at the Battle of Megiddo (September 1918).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_ ... %281918%29wikipedia wrote:
The Battle of Megiddo of September 19-21, 1918, was an important milestone in British General Edmund Allenby's conquest of Palestine during World War I. His forces made a massive push into the Jezreel Valley from the west, through the Carmel Ridge then engulfed the Turkish forces in the valley (mentioned as the site of the Battle of Armageddon in the Book of Revelation) and on the River Jordan. When he was created a viscount, Allenby took the name of this battle as his own, becoming the First Viscount Allenby of Megiddo.
Following the Battle of Armageddon foretold in Christian scripture, the Ottoman Empire fell to the Allies and was divided up by the League of Nations into the different states that comprise the modern Middle East.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sykes-Picot_Agreementwikipedia wrote:
The Sykes-Picot Agreement of May 16, 1916 was a secret understanding between the governments of Britain and France defining their respective spheres of post-World War I influence and control in the Middle East. The boundaries of this agreement still remains in much of the common border between Syria and Iraq.
Britain was allocated control of areas roughly comprising Jordan, Iraq and a small area around Haifa. France was allocated control of South-eastern Turkey, Northern Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. The controlling powers were left free to decide on state boundaries within these areas.
The agreement was later expanded to include Italy and Russia. Russia was to receive Armenia and parts of Kurdistan while the Italians would get certain Aegean islands and a sphere of influence around Izmir in southwest Anatolia. The Italian presence in Anatolia as well as the division of the Arab lands was later formalized in the Treaty of Sevres in 1920.
The agreement's principal terms were reaffirmed by the inter-Allied San Remo conference of 19–26 April 1920 and the ratification of the resulting League of Nations mandates by the Council of the League of Nations on July 24, 1922.
The Russian Revolution in 1917 led to Russia being denied its claims in the Ottoman Empire. At the same time Lenin released a copy of the confidential Sykes-Picot Agreement as well as other treaties causing great embarrassment among the allies and growing distrust among the Arabs.
In 1932, Saudi Arabia was granted independence from the British Empire. It was handed over to the Saudi royal family (who continues to rule today). The Saudi royals had long opposed the Ottoman Empire.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_royal_familywikipedia wrote:
The House of Saud is the royal family of Saudi Arabia. While the modern nation of Saudi Arabia was established in 1932, the House of Saud has been around for much longer. Prior to Ibn Saud, this family ruled the Nejd and often came into conflict with the Ottoman Empire and the Rashidis. The House of Saud is also linked with Wahhabism through the marriage of the son of Muhammad ibn Saud with the daughter of Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab in 1744.
The history of the House of Saud has been marked by a desire to unify the Arabian Peninsula and to spread a more pure and simple view of Islam embodied by Wahhabism. As such, the House of Saud has gone through three phases: the First Saudi State, the Second Saudi State, and the modern nation of Saudi Arabia.
"The royal family today is made up of an estimated 25,000 members, of whom around 200 are princes wielding influence."
In 2005, the dejour Saudi ruler became the defacto King. He had long held ties with the United States, and is considered a "friend" of the Bush family.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdullah_of_Saudi_Arabiawikipedia wrote:
Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud (born 1924) became the King of Saudi Arabia on August 1, 2005. Formerly known as Crown Prince Abdullah, he succeeded the throne following the death of his half-brother, King Fahd. He had previously acted as de facto regent and thus ruler of Saudi Arabia since 1995 when King Fahd was incapacitated by a major stroke. He was formally enthroned on August 3, 2005, but he inherited the title of King immediately after the death of his half-brother. [1]One of his sons, Prince Mutaib serves as a deputy commander in the Saudi National Guard.
Abdullah also serves as Prime Minister and Commander of the Saudi National Guard. He is one of 37 sons of King Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman Al-Saud, the founder of modern Saudi Arabia.
The primary difference in thought between the Saudis and the rest of the Muslim denominations (which had been unified in the Ottoman Empire until WWI) is that the Saudis represent a much stricter, more conservative sect.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wahhabism#Thoughtwikipedia wrote:
There are many practices that they believe are contrary to Islam, such as:
? The invoking of any prophet, saint or angel in prayer, other than God alone (Wahhabists believe these practices are polytheistic in nature)
? Supplications at graves, whether saints' graves, or the prophet's grave
? Celebrating annual feasts for dead saints
? Wearing of charms, and believing in their healing power
? Practicing magic, or going to sorcerers or witches seeking healing
? Innovation in matters of religion (e.g. new methods of worship)
? Erecting elaborate monuments over any grave
This is particularly important because Medina, the grave of Muhammad, founder of Islam, is located in Saudi Arabia.
Here:
http://www.masud.co.uk/ISLAM/nuh/littlk.htm is an article about some of the different interpretations of the Quran by the Sunnis Muslims and the Saudi Wahabists.
A brief look into the history of Saudi Arabia reveals the difference between their radically conservative fundamentalist values and those of their more liberal and less repressive neighbors.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Arabiawikipedia wrote:
By the Treaty of Jedda, signed on May 20, 1927, the United Kingdom recognized the independence of Abdul Aziz's realm, then known as the Kingdom of Hijaz and Nejd. In 1932, these regions were unified as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
The discovery of oil in March 1938 transformed the country economically, and has given the kingdom great legitimacy over the years.
Saudi Arabia remains the only country in the world named after its ruling family. Opponents of the House of Saud - including locally-born Osama bin Laden - reject the family's legitimacy and speak of the country as "the land of the two temples", a reference to Mecca and Medina.
The formation of political parties is forbidden, and no national elections take place. Saudi courts continue to impose corporal punishment, including amputations of hands and feet for robbery, and floggings for lesser crimes such as "sexual deviance" (i.e. homosexuality) and drunkenness. The number of lashes is not clearly prescribed by law and varied according to the discretion of judges, and range from dozens of lashes to several thousand, usually applied over a period of weeks or months.
Compare these practises with the Ba'athist party regime of Saddam Hussein in Saudi Arabia's northern neighbor Iraq.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_Husseinwikipedia wrote:
A leading member of the revolutionary Ba'ath Party, which espoused secular pan-Arabism, economic modernization, and socialism, Saddam (see 2 regarding names) played a key role in the 1968 coup that brought the party to long-term power.
At the center of this strategy was Iraq's oil. On June 1, 1972, Saddam Hussein led the process of expropriating Western oil companies, which had had a monopoly on the country's oil. A year later, world oil prices rose dramatically as a result of the 1973 world oil shock, and Saddam was able to pursue an all the more ambitious agenda through skyrocketing oil revenues.
Within a period of just a few years, the state provided some social services to Iraqi people unprecedented in other Middle Eastern countries. Saddam initiated and controlled the "National Campaign for the Eradication of Illiteracy" and the campaign for "Compulsory Free Education in Iraq," and largely under his auspices, the government established universal free schooling up to the highest education levels; hundreds of thousands learned to read in the years following the initiation of the program. The government also supported families of soldiers, granted free hospitalization to everyone, and gave subsidies to farmers. Iraq created one of the best public-health systems in the Middle East, earning Saddam an award from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
The single crime for which America, the ally of the oppressive conservative Saudi royal family, dethroned the "mad man" Hussein was an act commited by his regime's military during a time of war with Iraq's neighbor Iran.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_Hus ... 93Iraq_Warwikipedia wrote:
Saddam feared that radical Islamic ideas—hostile to his secular rule—were rapidly spreading inside his country among the majority Shi'ite population.
Iraq quickly found itself bogged down in one of the longest and most destructive wars of attrition of the twentieth century. During the war, Iraq used chemical weapons against Iranian forces and Kurdish separatists. Many of these chemical weapons, along with Iraq's nuclear program, were developed with the help of Germany.
([5]) On March 16, 1988 Iraqi troops, attempting to crush a Kurdish uprising in the Al-Anfal Campaign, attacked the Kurdish town of Halabjah with a mix of poison gas and nerve agents, perhaps killing around five thousand people, mostly civilians. Iraqis claimed at the time that Iran was responsible for that and some other chemical attacks, but there was not ever found any evidence on that.
The gassing of the Kurds at Hallabjah, while an undeniable war crime and atrocity against humanity, was nonetheless in direct alignment with the motives of the Saudi royals. The Kurds are Sunni Muslims, and the Saudi are opposed to this more liberal religious sect.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqwikipedia wrote:
Between 75-80% of Iraq's population consists of Arabic speakers (mainly Iraqi but some Hejazi); the other major ethnic groups are the Kurds (15-20%). Most Kurds are Sunni Muslims.
To understand better why the Saudi royals are opposed to the liberal Sunni sects of Islam, we must return briefly to a study of what each sect claims to be its origins during the time period immediately following the death of Islam's founder, Muhhamed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunni#Hist ... iite_Splitwikipedia wrote:
The principal issue upon which Islam's first major sectarian split occurred centers on the question of leadership. According to Sunni thought, Muhammad died without appointing a successor to lead the Muslim community. After an initial period of confusion, a gathering of Muslims at Saqifah accepted Abu Bakr, the Muhammad's father-in-law, as the first Caliph. Sunnis consider Abu Bakr to have been Muhammad's closest friend. Accounts of this meeting are highly contentious. Sunnis believe this process was conducted in a fair and proper manner and accept Abu Bakr as a righteous and rightful Caliph. The second major sect, the Shia, believe that the Prophet had appointed his son-in-law Ali ibn Abi Talib as his successor years earlier during an announcement at Ghadir Khom. Shi'a regard the election of Abu Bakr as illegitimate and accuse the companions involved of ulterior motives ranging from enmity towards 'Ali to outright hypocrisy. Though both Sunnis and Shias believe that Muhammad delivered a major speech at Ghadir Khom, Sunnis interpret any references to Ali as mere praise, and do not view them as constituting his appointment as a successor. Thirty years after Muhammad's death, the Islamic community plunged into a civil war, called the Fitna.
The Fitna led to the emergence of three distinct Islamic sects:
? Sunnis - Sunnis regard the first four caliphs (Abu Bakr, Umar ibn al-Khattab, Uthman, and Ali) as Rightly Guided Caliphs, that is, Caliphs who followed the tradition of the Prophet in terms of their lifestyles and styles of governance. According to Sunni Muslim tradition, though Caliphs that followed 'Ali were mostly legitimate and entitled to obedience, most departed from the standards laid down by the prophet. Sunnis regard Muawiyah as a legitimate Caliph, but not a Rightly Guided one. Though most Sunnis acknowledge that 'Ali had the stronger claim in his dispute with Muawiyah, Sunni authorities usually refrain from questioning the sincerity of Muawiya's intentions and generally give him the benefit of the doubt. The Sunni are the majority group.
? Shi'a - Shi'a generally reject all caliphates except that of Ali. In contrast to Sunnis, Shi'a regard Muawiyah as a conniving usurper who used Uthman's murder as an excuse to make a power grab. Some Sunnis, particularly the Wahhabis, do not accept the Shias as Muslims.
So, in conclusion, what we are seeing in the Middle East should NOT be misconstrued as a difference between the religions of Judaism (supported by Christianity) and Islam. It is, rightly stated, a split between conservativism (represented by Ariel Sharon's Israeli nationalism, George W. Bush and his associates' neo-conservativism, and mainly by the Saudi royal family) and more liberal sects such as the Sunni philosophy and the Ba'athist party of Iraq. By turning these liberal thinking Muslims against one another, the conservative allies in Israel, the US, and Saudi Arabia benefit.
-ben
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