CHAPTER SEVEN

EPILOGUE: THE SULTAN AND THE KHEDIVE

In 1838, Mu˙ammad 'Alì officially refused to send revenues to the Porte.1 Hostilities between Mu˙ammad 'Alì and the Sultan ultimately were renewed in April 1839 when Ma˙mùd II ordered his army to cross the Euphrates, challenging the Khedive over his position in Syria. In two months Ibràhìm Pasha emerged the victor after a furi- ous battle at Nezib. Then, suddenly, before he could hear news of his defeat, Sultan Ma˙mùd II died on 1 July 1839. The Khedive’s long rivalry with the Porte, in astonishingly quick order, began its final denouement. The Qab†àn Pashà A˙mad, Admiral of the Ottoman Navy, turned over his entire fleet to Mu˙ammad 'Alì at Alexandria. Mu˙ammad 'Alì continued to insist upon the dis- missal of his old nemesis, Khusrev Pasha, and seemed to be readying himself for an attack upon the Porte with the help of France. Alarmed, Russia, Prussia, and Austria, in their effort to preserve the territorial integrity of the Ottoman Empire, allowed England to help the Porte to remove Mu˙ammad 'Alì. This they did without the knowledge of France. The European coalition signed the Convention of London on 12 July 1840, guaranteeing the protection of the new Sultan against the Khedive, and setting the terms to persuade him to with- draw from Bilàd al-Shàm. In a separate article, it was agreed that if Mu˙ammad 'Alì ended his aggression against the Porte within ten days, his progeny would be allowed to succeed him as rulers of Egypt, thereby establishing his dynasty, and he himself would be allowed to govern southern Syria, including Acre, for the rest of his life. If, however, after ten days he refused to yield, he would lose the right to govern Syria and Acre, and if, after another ten days he still would not yield, the entire offer would be withdrawn and the signatories would reconsider their position. Mu˙ammad 'Alì, encouraged by the French, remained defiant. When the combined navies of Great Britain, Austria, and Turkey

1 Anderson, Eastern Question; Spyridon, Annals of Palestine, 15 and Kinross, Ottoman Centuries, 468. This last must be used with considerable caution. epilogue: the sultan and the khedive 195 arrived off the coast of Beirut on 11 August, a general rebellion broke out in Syria. An observer wrote, “. . . in the hour of conflict Syria was lost to Mehemet Ali not more by the arms of the Sultan and his allies, than by a revolt which made the whole land rise as a huge wave throwing off an incubus.”2 On 3 October Beirut was lost, “and Ibràhìm, cut off amidst a hostile people, began a hurried retreat southwards.”3 His retreat was a miserable one.4 When the ser'asker arrived in Gaza, which had just been reoccupied by Ottoman troops, his arrival was quite different from his father’s triumphant arrival in Acre just five years before. Sir Charles Napier, commander of the British naval forces off the coast of Syria and Egypt, wrote: His reception at Gaza was remarkable: the people flocked from curios- ity to see him, but his entry formed a singular contrast to that of the Turkish troops into the different towns and villages which they had occupied for the first time. In the latter case, the reception was enthu- siastic, the men lining the roads and saluting with all the varieties of an Eastern welcome, and the women crowding the housetops and mak- ing with their tongues the extraordinary noise which is meant to denote pleasure, but with Ibrahim Pasha there was a look of deep-rooted dis- like on the faces of the people, which even their dread of him they could not conceal. He, contrary to Eastern fashion, saluted no one,— not one saluted him; certainly, as an inhabitant afterwards told me, “not a tongue or a heart blessed him.”5 The European coalition captured Acre on 2 November 1840, and Mu˙ammad 'Alì called for the general evacuation of Syria. The English Admiral Napier sailed from Acre to Alexandria and threatened Mu˙ammad 'Alì with bombardment if he did not accept his terms. After realizing that no help would come from France, Mu˙ammad 'Alì agreed to sign the Convention on 25 November 1840 which stipulated that the signatory European powers would ensure that the Porte would confirm him and his heirs in the government of Egypt. In return, he agreed to relinquish all claims to Syria and to restore the Ottoman fleet to the Sultan. The matter was settled in 1841 when at long last Mu˙ammad 'Alì and his family were invested by the Porte with the hereditary

2 J. D. Paxton, Letters on Palestine (London: Charles Tilt, 1839), II:121–2. 3 Spyridon, Annals of Palestine, 15. 4 Ibid., 132–7. 5 Sir Charles Napier, The War in Syria (London: John W. Parker, 1842), II:167–8.