1. Ahmad describes the Unionists as “representatives of the provincial petty bourgeoisie.” Though the Unionists were proponents of administrative centralization and wished to exercise control over state organs, they were suspicious of “cosmopolitan İstanbul.” “Vanguard of a Nascent Bourgeoisie: The Social and Economic Policy of the Young Turks, 1908–1918,” in Türkiye’nin Sosyal ve Ekonomik Tarihi, 1071–1920, ed. Osman Okyar and Halil İnalcık (Ankara: Meteksan, 1980), 336. [BACK]

2. William Miller, The Ottoman Empire, 1801–1913 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1913), 495. [BACK]

3. Zeine, Arab Nationalism, 76. [BACK]

4. PRO. FO 371/662/17914. Lowther to Grey, no. 584 (Therapia, 21 July 1909). [BACK]

5. Tanin, 31 August 1909. [BACK]

6. Resignations, reelections, and variant names in the records for the same individuals complicate the tally. Feroz Ahmad and Dankwart Rustow summarized data on Ottoman parliaments provided by previous studies and contributed considerable further useful, though still inconclusive, information to the existing data. “İkinci Meşrutiyet Döneminde Meclisler, 1908–1918,” in Güney-Doğu Avrupa Araştırmaları Dergisi 4–5 (1976): 247–48. See also Zeine, Arab Nationalism, 71–72. Prätor has worked with Ahmad and Rustow’s data pertaining to the Arab provinces and offered some amendments and further statistical analysis. See Prätor, 37–48. [BACK]

7. According to Fargo, there were 152 Turkish and 50 Arab deputies. See Fargo, 205. [BACK]

8. Especially noteworthy are the figures supplied by the German consul in Beirut. To refute an article titled “The Turkish Hegemony” by Orientalist D[avis] Trietsch in Osmanischer Lloyd (24 July 1910), Consul Padel analyzed and adjusted existing census data and estimated the number of Turks at 12.1 million and Arabs at 12.6 million. According to Padel’s figures, 9.1 million Turks lived in Anatolia (as opposed to Trietsch’s 7.5 million) and 3 million in the European provinces. 5.6 million Arabs (according to Trietsch, 5 million) lived in Syria and Mesopotamia, 6 million in Arabia, and 1 million in Libya. AA Türkei 165/32. Padel to Bethmann-Hollweg, no. 138 (Beirut, 30 September 1910). The inflated figures for Arabia are consistent with official Ottoman estimates. See Kemal Karpat, Ottoman Population, 1830–1914 (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1985), 150. On various other figures on the number of Arabs and Turks, see Zeine, Emergence, 140–43, and Dawn, Ottomanism, 153. [BACK]

9. Karpat, Ottoman Population, 164–68. [BACK]

10. Assignment of parliamentary contingents to regions where an eligible votership did not exist posed a certain incongruity, even in the presence of more or less reliable population estimates. In view of the general disinterest in elections, deputies from many tribal areas could only be “elected” by fiat, as was done in Yemen. [BACK]

11. Syed Ali El-Edroos, The Hashemite Arab Army, 1908–1979 (Amman: The Publishing Committee, 1980), 8. Quoted in Linda L. Layne, “Tribesmen as Citizens: “Primordial Ties” and Democracy in Rural Jordan,” in Elections in the Middle East, ed. Layne (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1987), 114. El-Edroos claims that the Arabs outnumbered Turks three to two (and Layne misquotes him as three to one) in 1908. [BACK]

12. Prätor tabulates ethnic affiliations largely relying on Ahmad and Rustow’s data. See Prätor, 29. [BACK]

13. Prätor, 203. [BACK]

14. Tanin, 31 August 1909. [BACK]

15. Tanin, 8, 10, 15, 16, and 19 April 1910. [BACK]

16. Indeed, even under Abdülhamid, who employed many Arabs in the Palace, Arabs had not “permeated” the bureaucracy that had evolved under the Tanzimat. Ruth Roded, “Ottoman Service as a Vehicle for the Rise of New Upstarts among the Urban Elite Families of Syria in the Last Decades of Ottoman Rule,” Asian and African Studies 17 (1985): 85. [BACK]

17. Tanin, 19 April 1910. [BACK]

18. For this committee’s declaration dated April 1909, see Tunaya, Türkiye’de Siyasal Partiler, 1:206–7. [BACK]

19. See Tauber, Emergence, 101–8. [BACK]

20. Masami Arai, Turkish Nationalism in the Young Turk Era (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992), 6–20. [BACK]

21. Orhan Koloğlu, in his preface to Jeltyakov, makes this argument about Young Ottomans (no page number). [BACK]

22. Arai, “The Genç Kalemler and the Young Turks: A Study in Nationalism,” in Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi Gelişme Dergisi 12 (1985): 227–30. [BACK]

23. On Akçura, see François Georgeon, Aux Origines du nationalisme turc: Yusuf Akçura (1876–1935) (Paris: ADPF, 1980). [BACK]

24. Jacob M. Landau, Pan-Turkism in Turkey (London: C. Hurst & Company, 1981), 40–41. [BACK]

25. Tevfik Tarık, Muaddel Kanun-u Esasi ve İntihab-ı Mebusan Kanunu (İstanbul: İkbal, 1327 [1911]), 55, 76. [BACK]

26. Tunaya, Türkiye’de Siyasal Partiler, 1:66–67. [BACK]

27. Knut Eriksen, Andreas Kazamias, Robin Okey, and Janusz Tomiak, “Governments and the Education of Non-Dominant Ethnic Groups in Comparative Perspective,” in Schooling, Educational Policy and Ethnic Identity, ed. Tomiak (New York: New York University Press, 1991), 392–93. [BACK]

28. Ibid., 395. [BACK]

29. Buzpınar, 132. [BACK]

30. Hüseyin Cahid mentioned that theoretically, and from the point of view of the constitution, the Ministry of Justice was right in implementing Turkish, but “we should confess that a state cannot be administered with theories.” Tanin, 11 November 1909; also 19 April 1910. [BACK]

31. Tanin, 11 February 1911. [BACK]

32. Prätor, 167–68. [BACK]

33. Prätor, 164–65, 169. [BACK]

34. Ergin, 2:617; Çankaya, 93–95. [BACK]

35. Hobsbawm, 117. [BACK]

36. 25 February 1909. [BACK]

37. This concern is explicitly voiced by Hüseyin Cahid in his article on the language of the courts. Tanin, 11 November 1909. [BACK]

38. PRO. FO 618/3. Devey to Lowther, no. 28 (Damascus, 12 July 1910). [BACK]

39. Hanna Batatu, The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1978), 171. [BACK]

40. BBA. DH-SYS 64/33. Aleppines to the Grand Vizier and the Ministry of the Interior (6 February 1911). [BACK]

41. BBA. DH-MTV 19/20. Deputy Governor Cemal to the Ministry of the Interior (Aleppo, 13 September 1911). These documents suggest that prostitution by non-Muslim women was tolerated in Aleppo. [BACK]

42. Prätor, 280. [BACK]

43. BBA. DH-MTV 21–1/51. Sa‘id Mu’ayyad al-‘Azm and associates to the Ministry of the Interior (Damascus, 10 April 1911). [BACK]

44. BBA. DH-MTV 6–2/4. The Ministry of the Interior to the Muhafız of Medina (15 April 1911). [BACK]

45. BBA. DH-SYS 64/27 (15 April 1911). [BACK]

46. Ahmad, Young Turks, 54. [BACK]

47. Tunaya, Türkiye’de Siyasal Partiler, 1:80. [BACK]

48. For the party’s declaration to this effect, see Tunaya, Türkiye’de Siyasal Partiler, 1:217. [BACK]

49. Ibid., 151–52, 170. İsmail Kemal played a leading role in the Albanian movement. See The Memoirs of İsmail Kemal Bey (London, 1920). [BACK]

50. Tunaya, Türkiye’de Siyasal Partiler, 1:214–17. [BACK]

51. “Although a constitutional government necessitates the equal treatment of all Ottoman classes (sunuf ), the Party will seek special legislation that will enable the administration of those regions backward in their social and material conditions and inhabited by nomadic tribes until such people are settled and are induced to fulfill their civil and political obligations.” [BACK]

52. Ahmad, Young Turks, 83. [BACK]

53. Tunaya, Siyasi, 295–96. Tunaya renders the Jerusalem deputy as Sa‘id. While Sa‘id al-Husayni is the likely signatory because of his oppositional activity at this stage, Hafiz al-Sa‘id was another Jerusalem deputy. [BACK]

54. Fikri, 34–35. [BACK]

55. Ibid., 25–26. The social composition of these currents, Fikri said, showed variation from one polity to the other. For instance, unlike in Europe, the lower classes [ayak takımı] were conservative in the Ottoman Empire. [BACK]

56. Tunaya, Siyasi, 186–87. [BACK]

57. MMZC, I/3/59, 16 March 1911. [BACK]

58. Prätor, 47. [BACK]

59. Roger Owen, The Middle East in the World Economy, 1800–1914 (London and New York: Methuen, 1981), 181. In 1861 Lynch Brothers established the Euphrates & Tigris Steam Navigation Company. Despite the name, the company operated only on the Tigris, as the Euphrates was not navigable. (I thank Professor Roger Owen for this information.) Holt, 253. [BACK]

60. Feroz Ahmad, “Great Britain’s Relations with the Young Turks, 1908–1914,” Middle Eastern Studies 2 (1966): 317–18. [BACK]

61. MMZC, I/2/14, 13 December 1909. [BACK]

62. İ. Mahmud Kemal İnal, Osmanlı Devrinde Son Sadrazamlar (İstanbul: Milli Eğitim Matbaası, 1940–1953), 1161–63. [BACK]

63. The vote was 163 to 8. Two Arab deputies (Sulayman Bustani of Beirut and Amir Arslan) voted with the majority, while two others (Shafiq al-Mu’ayyad of Damascus and Haji Sa‘id of Musul) voted against the grand vizier. MMZC, I/2/14, 13 December 1909. [BACK]

64. İnal, 1763–64. [BACK]

65. In his analysis of the incident, Mahmoud Haddad describes the Iraqi reaction as “proto-nationalist.” “Iraq before World War I: A Case of Anti-European Arab Ottomanism,” in Origins of Arab Nationalism, ed. Khalidi et al., 120–29. [BACK]

66. BBA. DH-SYS 57–1/9. Governor of the Hijaz Kamil to the Ministry of the Interior (13 November 1910) and the Grand Vizier to Kamil (6 December 1910). [BACK]

67. See BBA. DH-SYS 57–1/15 for a copy of the poem (7 December 1910). Also see in the same file the Ministry of the Interior to the province of Beirut (8 January 1911). [BACK]

68. BBA. DH-SYS 64/25 (3 May 1911). [BACK]

69. BBA. DH-MTV 52–2/20. Aleppo and Urfa deputies to the Ministry of the Interior (9 February 1911). [BACK]

70. BBA. DH-İ.Um 26/4–8. The Ministry of Imperial Records (Defter-i Hakani) to the Ministry of the Interior (13 September 1910). [BACK]

71. Zahrawi was an âlim who had contributed to the Young Turk agitation in Syria before 1908. On Zahrawi, see Ahmed Tarabein, “ ‘Abd al-Hamid al-Zahrawi: The Career and Thought of an Arab Nationalist,” in Origins of Arab Nationalism, ed. Khalidi et al., 97–119. [BACK]

72. MMZC, I/3/47, 25 February 1911. [BACK]

73. See Neville J. Mandel, The Arabs and Zionism before World War I (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1976), 97ff., for a discussion of the parliamentary debates based on information from British diplomatic and Zionist correspondence. See Ali Nejat Ölçen, Osmanlı Meclisi Meb’usanında Kuvvetler Ayırımı ve Siyasal İşkenceler (Ankara: Ayça, 1982), 49–58, for a partial rendering of this debate in modern Turkish. [BACK]

74. MMZC, I/3/49, 1 March 1911. [BACK]

75. See Kayalı, “Jewish Representation in the Ottoman Parliaments,” in The Jews of the Ottoman Empire, ed. Avigdor Levy (Princeton, N.J.: The Darwin Press, 1994), 513–15. [BACK]

76. Mandel, 107. [BACK]

77. Ibid., 107–12. [BACK]

78. MMZC, I/3/99, 16 May 1911. [BACK]

79. Nisim Masliyah (İzmir) said that neither Ottoman nor foreign Jews could be held responsible for what is written in Jewish scriptures. The Torah, he added, was superseded by the Quran. [BACK]

80. See also Mandel, 112–14. [BACK]

81. Ahmad, “Unionist Relations,” 426; Mandel, 114; Ölçen, 57–58. [BACK]

82. MMZC, I/3/100, 17 May 1911. [BACK]

83. MMZC, I/3/68, 29 March 1911. See also Prätor, 203–4. [BACK]

84. Prätor, 43; Tauber, Emergence, 154. [BACK]

85. BBA. DH-SYS 64/26 (8 April 1911). [BACK]

86. Selahaddin, 38. [BACK]

87. The British high commissioner in Egypt, Kitchener, held this view (Dawn, Ottomanism, 62). This helps explain the increased involvement of the British administration in Egypt in the affairs of Syria and Arabia during the next few years. [BACK]

88. 18 (1912): 214, 220. [BACK]

89. ATASE. Italian War, 12/34–35, nos. 3, 7–1, 10, 11, 14, 17, 18, 20, 24, 37–1 (September–October 1911). [BACK]

90. See, for instance, Mousa, Al-haraka, 27. [BACK]

91. Hüseyin Cahid remarked in October 1909 that Hawran had become quiet without the use of force, thanks to the constitution. Tanin, 25 October 1909. [BACK]

92. On Faruq Sami, see Gövsa, 345. [BACK]

93. US 867.00/307. Vice Consul to Secretary of State (Beirut, 12 August 1910). [BACK]

94. HHS. PA 38/347. Pinter to Aehrenthal (Beirut, 18 October 1910 and 15 December 1910). Also, Ritter von Zepharovich to Aehrenthal (Jerusalem, 17 December 1910). [BACK]

95. PRO. FO 618/3. Devey to Marling (Damascus, 13 December 1910). [BACK]

96. HHS. PA 38/347. Pinter to Aehrenthal (Beirut, 21 December 1910). [BACK]

97. PRO. FO 618/3. Devey to Marling (Damascus, 19 November 1910). [BACK]

98. US 867.00/329. Ravndal to Secretary of State (Beirut, 19 December 1910). [BACK]

99. PRO. FO 618/3. Devey to Lowther (16 March 1911 and 13 July 1911). [BACK]

100. HHS. PA 38/350. Pinter to Aehrenthal (Beirut, 8 February 1911). [BACK]

101. BBA. BEO Defter 698/28/9, no. 141. Sharif Abdullah to Grand Vizier (25 September 1910). See also no. 146. Husayn to Grand Vizier (7 October 1910). [BACK]

102. PRO. FO 195/2376. Monahan to Lowther, no. 101 (30 May 1911). [BACK]

103. Bayur, 2 (pt. 1): 45. [BACK]

104. Ahmed İzzet Pasha (1864–1937) became war minister in 1912 and served as grand vizier during the Armistice period. [BACK]

105. BBA. BEO Defter 705, no. 89. Grand Vizier Hakkı to the Emirate (19 February 1911). [BACK]

106. Bayur, 2 (pt. 1): 46–47. [BACK]

107. PRO. FO 195/2376. Monahan to Lowther, no. 30 (9 February 1911). [BACK]

108. AA. Türkei 165/Bd. 33/4. Tschirschky to Bethmann-Hollweg, no. 49 (Vienna, 10 February 1911). [BACK]

109. Tanin, 2 July 1910. [BACK]

110. In 1897, for instance, Russia and Austria discussed the partitioning of the Balkan Peninsula among the Balkan states and the setting up of an Albanian principality (Karal, 152). [BACK]

111. BBA. DH-SYS 60/3. Al-‘Asali to the Ministry of the Interior (15 October 1911). [BACK]

112. BBA. DH-SYS 60/3. Excerpt from Al-mufid of 18 November 1911. [BACK]

113. BBA. BEO 290793 (290672). The Ministry of the Interior to the Grand Vizier (5 April 1911); AA. Türkei 165/Bd. 33. Clipping from Dresdner Anzeiger, 18 February 1911, “Die Lage in Arabien.” [BACK]

114. BBA. BEO Defter 705, no. 95. Grand Vizier Hakkı Pasha to the Egyptian Commisariat (23 February 1911). The government was of the opinion that the ex-sharif of Mecca ‘Ali Pasha and ‘Izzat Pasha played a role in Egypt to incite the Yemenis to rebellion. [BACK]

115. Bayur, 2 (pt. 1): 38–39. [BACK]

116. BBA. DH-MTV 25/22 (31 April 1911). [BACK]

117. Richard Allen, Imperialism and Nationalism in the Fertile Crescent (London: Oxford University Press, 1974), 136. [BACK]

118. Simon, 159. [BACK]

119. In his memoirs Talat Pasha mentions the reluctance of the Christian, specifically Greek, deputies to cooperate with the CUP toward the achievement of the Ottomanist ideal. See H. Cahit Yalçın, ed., Talat Paşa’nın Hatıraları (İstanbul: Bolayır, 1946), 14–15. See also Lewis, 218; Zeine, Arab Nationalism, 76. [BACK]

120. Zeine, Arab Nationalism, 77. [BACK]

121. Ahmad, Young Turks, 93. [BACK]