[Music] World War [Music] I four years of bitter [Music] conflict known as the Great [Music] War or the war to end end all wars it's Grim trench warfare with Europe the main theater of war but this was a war fought on many fronts so there's another story rarely told of huge importance during the war and of lasting significance a story of troops who fought and died but who are often [Music] forgotten and of an outcome that shaped the Middle East of today this is World War one through Arab eyes [Music] Malik tarii the chunian writer and broadcaster is taking us on a personal journey across a dozen countries his grandfather's generation fought in the War so far he's looked at the contributions made by Arab North African troops conscripted by the British and French Colonial powers in North Africa and how and why the Ottoman Empire joined Germany in the war pitting its Arab troops against their Muslim brothers fighting for the allies and as ottoman fortunes declined how the Europeans Russians and Arabs looked to fill the power vacuum in this episode he sees how the shape of a new Middle East was decided in secret by British and French diplomats if you look at a map at the beginning of the war you have an Ottoman Empire that ruled over a tiny sliver of Europe all of the Anatolian Peninsula Southwestern Asia parts of North Africa parts of the Arabian Peninsula at the end of the war that it's gone how Britain made separate promises to three different interest groups that were all incompatible with each other according to the Hussein McMahon correspondence Palestine belonged to an Arab State according to the sypo agreement Palestine was going to be internationalized according to the balfor Declaration it was going to go to the Jews so how do you square that Circle and how this colonial self-interest blew away the Nationalist hope of millions of Arabs for post-war [Music] Independence this is White Hall the center of power from where the British Imperial establishment decided to destroy their old Ally the Ottoman Empire and create a new New Order in the Arab East the Arabs are still living with the consequences to this very day almost as soon as the Ottoman Empire joined the war in November 1914 the European allies began staking their claims in March 1915 Russia announced it wanted Istanbul and the Straits linking the Black Sea to the Mediterranean France accepted Russia's claim and set out its own plans they wanted the southeast Turkish coast and greater Syria then in June 1915 Britain announced it wanted the whole western coast of the Arabian Gulf plus all of Mesopotamia Britain also wanted to control a strip of land from there to hia on which to build a railway it would give them an alternative route to India and one day might carry Gulf oil the British already had serious interests in the Ottoman Empire they had already occupied Egypt they had already moved into the Gulf States they already had interests in southern Mesopotamia they already had oil interests in the Gulf so the war suddenly brought all of this then right to the Forefront so in order to achieve this between 1915 and 1917 Britain entered into three separate agreements which all conflicted with one another one with Hussein bin Ali the Sharif of Mecca to give him an Arab state in return for leading a revolt against the Ottomans another with the Zionist movement to create a Jewish National home in Palestine and a secret pact with its all Taun Ally France to divide the Levant and Mesopotamia between them while the British were still negotiating with Sharif hin over his potential Revolt in 1915 they and France appointed delegates to draw up this secret deal for dividing up ottoman territory the French were represented by Sha fris George Pico the former Consul General in Beirut and the British by the government's Middle East adviser Sir Mark Sykes Sykes was from a wealthy English family whose country home was here at sledmere house in in Yorkshire he had a privileged upbringing and was taken on a trip to Egypt when he was 11 his knowledge of the Middle East had been picked up writing religion and travel books though Sykes liked the prime minister to think he was an expert in fact he spoke neither Turkish nor Arabic George Pico was a French lawyer turned Diplomat who'd spent several years in Beirut and was a sta supporter of French interests abroad though they paid lip service to Independence for the Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire the Ambitions of their respective countries were their real priorities it's often the case that people assume people like samares and other British and the French policy makers were being disingenuous in their support for the idea of national freedom in the Middle East that at base it was just frankly a lie that they weren't sincere in their support for this idea of a new era of national freedom because how could they be when they had their own very clear British French Imperial objectives in the Middle East [Music] at this stage this was a paper exercise dependent on the course of the war egpt h a world away from the Arab provinces at the heart of British government in London Sir Mark Sykes prepared for his negotiations with Jor Pico he told British prime minister Herbert asworth I should like to draw a line from the the e in acre to the last K in Kook and face to face with George Pico that's precisely what he did he called it practical Politics the syes Pico agreement was concluded in October 1916 Russia supported it on condition that its own claims to ottoman territory were accepted by Britain and France syes Pico drew the map of the Middle East in red and blue the Red Zone marked the province of Baghdad in which the British would have the right to establish such direct or indirect Administration or control as they desire the Blue Zone covered celissia and the Syrian Coast where France would have the same rights Britain also claimed informal control over an area of Northern Arabia from kkuk to Gaza the French claimed the same informal control over a triangle from mosul to Aleppo and Damascus this deal was what the Palestinian writer George Antonius later called a startling piece of double dealing in June 1916 Sharif Hussein started the Arab revolt against the Ottomans fulfilling his part of his deal with the British only 4 months later Sykes Pico was signed contradicting the British pledge to the Arab people what we have to realize though is that what we see as duplicity was actually explained by their ideas of the people of the region at the time and at root of this was their racial Outlook of the British policymaking Elite at the time of the first world war they assumed that these peop couldn't possibly believe for a moment that when the British and the French talked of national Freedom that it actually meant political Independence that would have been a completely crazy idea to their minds because of their racial conviction that the Arab world was backward and to a lesser degree the Jewish world [Music] too the syes pord deal remained a British French and Russian secret for a year but after the Russian Revolution in November 1917 the Bolsheviks took Russia out of the war the new leaders lenon and Trotsky soon discovered that the tarist government had supported the Sykes Pico agreement the Communist Daily Newspaper Pravda broke the story of the Three European allies deception to the world following the Revolutionary government's decision to extract Russia from the war Pravda published what might be its only great exclusive in November 1917 under the directions of both lenon and Trotsky it revealed the details of the secret syes Pico agreement thus the Soviets uncovered Europe's Imperial plans to divide the Middle East between Britain and France the cat was out of the bag but difficult to believe it had little immediate impact on the course of the war or on the Arab world all that really mattered now was military conquest boots on the ground politicians could make whatever Deals they liked but occupation was was 9/10 of the law from the Red Sea to Turkey the entire region from akaba uh to to the Taurus Mountains was occupied they were occupied because they were crucially important to British war aims because of Suez because of Egypt because of the air route to India because of the oil fields in in uh in Iran uh and Mesopotamia because of the the trucial states around the gulf all of these were crucial British war aims from the very beginning but now what to do with all this occupied land the answer new States whether or not they respected ethnic religious or tribal borders not only did Sir Mark Sykes draw lines on the maps his artistic skills were put to further use it is the ultimate irony that Mark sites a and so universally detested in the Arab East should be responsible for the design of the flags the symbols of national sovereignty of so many Arab countries Jordan Iraq Syria Sudan Kuwait Yemen the Emirates even the PLO the Palestine Liberation Organization sy's deal with George Pico was never were forly enacted on the ground but it did Bear a close resemblance to the way the British prime minister and French president carved things up at the end of the war the partition was a fact of occupation and then the British and the French negotiated and clemo and Lloyd George themselves negotiated probably in a taxi between Victoria Station and uh and 10 Downing Street when Clemens so arrived in in London uh in in December of 1918 so it was completely casual and resisted and opposed by virtually everyone in the region Sir Mark syes died soon after the war aged 39 he cast a long Shadow across the Arab world especially Palestine [Music] on syes Pico's map it was colored brown an area under International Administration yet to be decided of Britain's three wartime promises the one made by foreign minister Arthur balur proved the most enduring and controversial [Music] there were many reasons for balur promise after centuries of anti-Semitism in Russia and Europe Jews had started to settle in Palestine the Jewish nationalist movement Zionism was gaining momentum its leader was a russian-born chemistry professor in Manchester called hyim vitman the vitman process for producing acetone fed Britain's wartime Munitions production and his notoriety enabled him to Lobby the British government to support a Jewish National home in [Music] Palestine in June 1917 vitman and the Jewish banker and politician Walter Rothchild met Arthur balur in London to request a formal Declaration of support for Zionism 5 months later came his reply on the 2nd of November balur wrote to Rothchild to say that the government viewed with favor The Establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people and will use their best Endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this project this is the famous Bala declaration the letter that foreign secretary Arthur Bala sent in November 1917 to Lord Rothchild as Arthur kler put it the belfa Declaration meant that one nation promised to a second Nation the country of a third what is extraordinary is that this letter was not drafted by balur or his staff instead it was drafted for him by Kim vitman the future president of Israel I think if we're trying to understand the British Imperial establishment's uh relationship with Zionism from the time of the first world war that it's absolutely key that we recognize the significance of the Bible in British culture so that The Narrative of Zionism of the ancient Jewish nation in the landscape of the Bible returning to its former glories was an idea that was not only familiar to many people in Britain by the time of the first world war but romantic as well there were also wider strategic reasons for supporting Zionism Jewish influence was strong in the government of Britain's new war Ally the United States under President woodro Wilson two of woodro Wilson's top advisers Felix Frank footer on the one hand and Louis brandise on the other hand were Ardent zionists now the British were very suspicious of woodro Wilson although that the United States had already entered the war that and the British were also very suspicious of the huge amount of German uh German immigrants in the United States and Irish immigrants in the United States uh that were opposed to Britain and the British Empire so what they wanted to do is somehow get the United States make sure the United States stayed on board in the first world World War and what that of course entailed was making sure that woodo Wilson's top advisers kept on pushing him giving him a goal giving uh them a goal to fight for uh to The Bitter End and the other power the British wanted to keep happy was Russia the idea that as the British thought most many of the Bolsheviks had Jewish backgrounds leant try's uh real name was brunstein and after all uh and what the British thought once you scratch these people underneath they're really Jewish so therefore what we've got to do is we've got to give them something that will um uh appease them to make sure that they would stay in the war and fight to The Bitter End as well didn't quite work out that way and just as Mark Sykes had called his approach to negotiating with the French as practical politics there was good old British pragmatism the idea of having a Jewish Colony somewhere to the north of the Suz Canal the British were in Egypt you had the Suz canal and in the north you would have a Jewish Colony that would be very dependent on the British and of course the main British strategic uh goal was to protect the rout to India Lloyd George and the people around him sat down and thought to themselves what's it going to cost us if it doesn't cost us anything it might have some benefit why don't we just do it little did they know how much it was going to end up costing still to come the Arab bid for independence from ottoman rule Sharif Hussein's Revolt the idea of the Mandate the League of Nations term for continued foreign rule [Music] and the long-term impact on the Arab world of British and French double dealing salon Malik tqi the Tunisian writer and broadcaster is telling the story of the first world war from an Arab perspective [Music] in 1915 and 16 the war in Europe was Bloody merciless and unrelenting the British and French were bogged down in the trenches against a stubborn German enemy but it was a different kind of war in the Middle East Britain's strategy was to capitalize on growing Arab nationalist feeling against four centuries of Ottoman rule 1915 the British High Commissioner in Cairo Sir Henry McMan began negotiating an alliance with Hussein Ben Ali the Sharif of Mecca an exchange of letters took place between McMahon and Hussein about the possibility of joining some sort of revolt against the Ottomans the result of that was that the British promised uh Sharif Hussein and his sons uh gold and guns uh and an Arab state or states to be founded after the war was over and in return for that they would declare war on the Ottomans themselves Sharif Hussein was also the choice of Arab secret resistance groups [Music] but it was far from simple all of this maneuvering was going on at the same time as the British and French Representatives Mark Sykes and fris Jor Pico were carving up the Middle East between them Sharif Hussein dreamt of a great Arab state to include the lavant from the Egyptian border up to the Taurus Mountains in Turkey plus all of Mesopotamia to the B order in the North and the whole of the Arabian Peninsula except for the British colony of Aiden Britain weighed up the benefits and agreed to Sharif Hussein's demands for his part Hussein called for an Arab Uprising against the Ottomans on the 5th of June 1916 the hashimite forces under the command of Hussein's son fisel mobilized from their base at akaba they attacked the ottoman supply line the hijaz railway they found the Arab tribesmen of trans Jordan a tough nut to crack the line here today at alcat Trana is near the Jordanian town of Maan a tribal strong hold that the hashimites were never able to capture before the war the hijaz railway had been a way for Arabs here to travel from alcana to new destinations 100 years on the trains don't stop here anymore [Music] when fil's hashimites moved North in 1918 and formed a pinsu movement with General alen's British divisions in Palestine they were able to take Damascus on the 2nd of October the big battles were occurring in Europe This was the right flank of an army that was invading North from Egypt up the coast of the Mediterranean eventually to end up in Aleppo after taking greater Syria fisel felt he'd achieved his objective and fully expected the British to deliver on their promises ottoman rule of the Levant was at an end and in a month the war would be over the Armistice was signed on the 11th of November [Applause] 1918 the Arabs who'd fought for the Victorious allies thought it was payback time they expected sovereignty and Independence that was how it was understood in the Arab world the real problem for the region is that although the British government Unleashed this idea took the genie outle of the bottle of the idea of national Freedom the British understanding and certainly the French understanding of what national Freedom would mean for the region was very very different from how it was conceived across the region itself first to react was Egypt its people had paid a high price for supporting the British of the 1.2 million men deployed in different roles in World War I battlefields 500,000 perished a few months after the war ended the Egyptian politician and Statesman sad zaglul asked the British High Commissioner if he could lead a delegation to the Paris peace conference he wanted to negotiate Egyptian independence zul and his supporters tried to put pressure on the king to change the relationship with the britsh the King has a respect within I would say ordinary Egyptians but at that stage that respect has disappeared why because of the Lost of Egyptians in the war with the economic ramification on the people's life all of this actually created a wider gap between the king and the Egyptian people which facilitate the effort of at zul to wider the Gap more and more with the with the King and with the britich because they wanted to make sure that British has no place in Egypt after what happened in the first World War the British arrested zaglul and his companions in March 199 and exiled them to Malta Egypt exploded Into Revolution faced with mass Civil Disobedience the British released zaglul and allowed him to travel to pan Paris but when he arrived he was devastated to learn that the British protectorate over Egypt had already been recognized the Allies sit down in Paris afterwards and it it should be pretty easy to to hammer out some sort of Peace settlement but it's virtually impossible there's just too many contradictory agreements which is why they had to start again from scratch and one of the agreements was with the hashimites prince fisel also traveled to Versa in the hope of achieving his family's goal of a greater Arab state but a united Arabia was the last thing the Allies wanted and the Arabs would now learn a new term mandate can fil's disappointment in versailes didn't stop him from seizing his opportunity in Damascus in March 1920 he declared the Syrian Arab Kingdom as an independent state with himself as king [Music] fil's Declaration of an independent state was the deal he had with the British but the French with Sykes Pico heavily in mind had very different ideas on the 24th of July 1920 a small force of Arab volunteers gathered at molon to try to stop the French army reaching Damascus but the French troops routed the Arab nationalists and swept on to the Syrian Capital King fisel fled to London the First Independent Arab State the kingdom of Syria lasted less than 4 months the French occupation of Syria turned into to a mandate in 1922 and lasted until 1936 with all the problems it entailed and which are still felt today [Music] the French mandate also had a big impact on Lebanon muham the religious and ethnic divisions created by the French mandate in the 1920s and 30s have had a lasting effect on both Syria and Lebanon leading to a string of internal and crossb conflicts in both countries the problem experienced in the past three decades in Iraq also date back to the British mandate in March 1917 British forces captured Baghdad ending ottoman rule in Mesopotamia 3 years later in April 1920 the League of Nations assigned Iraq to Britain as a formal mandate they had interest of Iraq because they have also string presence in the Gulf as well and in south of Iran so basically they have a good knowledge about what's happening in Iraq and they built strong relations with the tribes in Iraq in the light of what's Happening basically and and the failure of of deliver to the Arabs and establish what So-Cal an Arab State and and the hashimite basically they have good linkage with Arab nationalist in Iraq all of this together helped to mobilize people and they have 1920 revolution in May 19 19 20 the Iraqis a mix of Kurds Sunny Arabs and Shia began peaceful protests in Baghdad the British arrested the leaders and sparked violent confrontation they then crushed the Iraqi Uprising with overwhelming Force 2,200 British and Indian soldiers were killed but around 8 and half thousand Iraqis were killed or wounded by now many Arabs were starting to look back on ottoman rule as preferable to being under the British and French mandates Arab people believed that they could seek greater ties with the turke people because most Arab people saw the Turks as fellow Muslims who were fighting a similar issue European occupation but the defeated Ottomans were also facing a changed world five countries occupied parts of present day Turkey the treaty of sever near Paris in August 1920 laid out the Allies harsh post-war terms the Turks turned to the hero of galipoli the army officer who led the ottoman defeat of the Allies in The Darden LS in 1915 the conditions the treaty Observer placed on the Ottoman Empire were extreme so extreme that murk and the Turkish Nation would refuse them and repel five invading European armies Mustafa Kamal managed to command the Turks to victory in what became the Turkish War of Independence for with the bond between Arab and Turk now broken Mustafa Kamal and the independent turkey State turned their backs not only on their own past but on the Arab peoples as a whole the Arabs were now on their own when it becomes clear that the occupation of these regions is going to take place that the British and French armies are not going to leave that the British and French Empires states are going to impose a colonial regime armed opposition armed Revolt becomes an obvious and almost foregone conclusion FY Al haaji was one of the Arab generation that lived through the horrors of World War I he started as an officer in the ottoman Army but after the war he joined King fil when he ruled Syria and fousy also fought at Salon in 1920 when the Syrian Revolution against the French erupted 5 years later he didn't hesitate to join the Nationalist side Malik talked to alawaji close friend Yak Alim in this house in Beirut where he and fi used to meet for [Music] [Music] [Music] after two years of heavy fighting 6,000 Rebels were killed and 100,000 syrians dis placed the Revolt was ultimately put down by French forces but fi alaji continued his struggle in 1948 he led the Arab Liberation Army of Volunteers in alaka meaning the catastrophe the Arabic term referring to the founding of Israel [Music] can for [Music] [Music] [Music] the Arab world could not unite to prevent the state of Israel becoming a reality in the heart of the Arab [Music] world of the three British wartime promises this was the only one that was realized and and the aftermath has been felt throughout the Middle East ever since in terms of the Harvest of Misery the The Suffering The injustices the difficulties the trauma that has resulted from this period from 1918 and the post-war settlement I think that the first world war is the greatest Calamity to befall the Middle East since the Mongols in 1250 and the Bubonic plague in the 14th centur and I don't think that this is actually an overstatement the whole debate about sectarianism the whole debate about Arab nationalism the whole debate about the role of the state the whole debate about corruption about the elite all of those elements now Arabs and and others are engaged on in 2014 were rooted there and I think in addition to all of that the fingerprint of The Outsiders in that time British France in 20145 the Americans it's the same with different players in some stages but the same scenarios the same ideas the same slogan the same debates sometime with different players the new Middle East was formed by the first world war many hoped the end of the war would Harald a new age of Independence and peace but the the region has proved to be one of the most tragic and troubled of modern times and 100 years on is still striving to find that lasting peace [Music]