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Sectarianism in the Syrian Jazira: Community, Land and Violence in the Memories of World War I and the French Mandate (1915- 1939)

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Sectarianism in the Syrian Jazira: Community, Land and Violence in the Memories of World War I and the French Mandate (1915- 1939) Sectarianism in the Syrian Jazira: Community, land and violence in the memories of World War I and the French mandate (1915- 1939) Cummunitarisme in de Syrische Jazira: Herinneringen aan Gemeenschap, land en geweld tijdens de Eerste Wereldoorlog en de Franse Mandaat (1915-1939) (met een samenvatting in het Nederlands) Proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit Utrecht op gezag van de rector magnificus, prof.dr. G.J. van der Zwaan, ingevolge het besluit van het college voor promoties in het openbaar te verdedigen op dinsdag 21 juni 2011 des ochtends te 10.30 uur Seda Altuğ geboren op 3 November 1975 te Istanbul Promotor : Prof.dr. M.M. van Bruinessen TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ..................................................................................................... 4 MAPS ......................................................................................................................................... 6 TABLES .................................................................................................................................... 9 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................. 17 Sectarianism ............................................................................................................................ 24 Memory ................................................................................................................................... 33 Memory-History ................................................................................................................... 33 Memory-Present-Community ............................................................................................... 36 Memory-Violence-Community ............................................................................................ 42 CHAPTER 1 THE POLITICS OF MEMORY IN THE SYRIAN JAZIRA: ALIEN INFILTRATORS, AUTOCHTHONES, AND LOYAL SUBJECTS ................................ 44 The Home ................................................................................................................................ 45 The Long 19th Century ......................................................................................................... 51 Post-1908 Years ................................................................................................................... 54 Seferberlik in Syrian Historiography .................................................................................... 64 French Mandate Rule in Syria .............................................................................................. 67 The Refugee Issue: The Refugees and the French Refugee Politics .................................... 72 French Religious Politics ..................................................................................................... 80 Post-Independence: Alien Infiltrators, Autochthones and Loyal Citizens (1946–) .......... 82 The Kurdish issue ................................................................................................................. 90 CHAPTER II MEMORIES OF THE FERMAN: RELIGION, HISTORY, POLITICS 96 Remembering the Ferman: Main Lines of Inquiry ........................................................... 103 1 Remembering the Violence and Reconstructing the Community in the Past: “Religious Sect is the Memory of People.” [Mazhab huwa zikriyat al-bashar] .................................. 110 Anxiety of Mixing and Memories of Difference ................................................................ 116 Reconstruction of the 1915 Massacres in the 1930s .......................................................... 127 Silencing the Present in Syrian Jazira through the Past Violence in Turkey: Civilizational Hierarchy and New Categories of Exclusion ............................................. 135 CHAPTER III OBSCURING THE COLONY AND OVERSTATING THE COLONIZED: CHRISTIANS’ AND KURDS’ MEMORIES OF THE EARLY FRENCH MANDATE RULE IN THE FRENCH JAZIRA ............................................. 146 (Post) Memories .................................................................................................................... 149 Syriacs ................................................................................................................................ 149 Armenians .......................................................................................................................... 158 Kurds .................................................................................................................................. 161 Syrian-Arabs ....................................................................................................................... 163 The French lenses ................................................................................................................. 166 Land .................................................................................................................................... 166 People ................................................................................................................................. 172 Economics .......................................................................................................................... 178 Imperial Control and the Jaziran Question(s) in the 1920s ............................................. 180 Making of a the French Jazira and Sectarianism ............................................................. 191 The Countryside: Detribalization, New villages, Sectarianism ......................................... 191 The Urban Scene: Le Paradis à l’Ombre des Sabres .......................................................... 196 Maintaining the Security Through the ‘Staunch Agent’ .................................................... 196 “Dewlet Xiristîyan e”: A Christian State or the Christians’ State? .................................... 203 The Refugee Question in the Eyes of the Arab Nationalists in the 1920s ....................... 214 2 CHAPTER IV MINORITIES AND MAJORITIES IN FLUX: RE-TRACING THE YEARS OF THE FRANCO-SYRIAN TREATY (1936-1939) IN THE SYRIAN JAZIRAN (POST) MEMORIES ........................................................................................ 225 The Main Features of Jazirans’ (post)memories of the Regionalist Movement ............. 228 Syria During the Treaty Negotiations (1934-1936) ........................................................... 240 Minority-Majority Debates in French-Syria ..................................................................... 244 The Regionalist Movement in the French Jazira: A Critical Historical Account .......... 251 A brief history of the events ............................................................................................... 251 The Regionalist Bloc: Constituents, Ideology, Politics ...................................................... 258 Regionalists in the Eyes of the Arab Nationalists: A ‘Non-Movement’ ............................ 268 Re-membering the French Jazira in the Excess of Memories: Syriac Exceptionalism . 274 Reclaiming Jazira and the Jazirans from the “La Minorité”: Land, People, History, and Economics ............................................................................................................................. 279 Land .................................................................................................................................... 279 People (Autochthony) ........................................................................................................ 283 History ................................................................................................................................ 286 Economic Agency .............................................................................................................. 291 CONCLUSION: POWER, POLITICS, VIOLENCE ....................................................... 300 BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................................................ 312 SAMENVATTING ............................................................................................................... 335 SUMMARY ........................................................................................................................... 336 3 Acknowledgements I would like to thank to the Utrecht University Research Institute for History and Culture (OGC) for providing me with the financial means to conduct my doctoral research and offering me a peaceful and supportive working environment. They provided me with funding towards research trips to Syria, Lebanon, Britain and France as well as to conferences and workshops in different parts of the world. I am greatly indebted to many people in different parts in Syria, in particular in Qamishli who wholeheartedly shared their stories with me and helped and supported me along the way. I am more than grateful to my supervisor, Martin van Bruinessen, who supported me both intellectually and morally, promoted me to engage with both the spoken and the unspoken words as well as single out the voice of the marginalized peoples in the course of my research. I acknowledge his help, enthusiasm and motivation with special gratitude. My archival research was carried out at the Centre d’archives diplomatiques, Nantes; the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris; the Quai d’Orsay; Centre
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