The Ottoman Empire
1300 – 1922 AD
A. Introduction to the Ottomans.
To review: The Seljuk Turks came from a region in southwestern Mongolia, migrated into northern Persia/Iran, became Muslims, united the fractured Sunnis in the eastern portion of the Muslim Empire and invaded the territory of the Byzantines. They also displaced the Fatimids who controlled Palestine and who had been overall reasonably tolerant of Christian pilgrims. The Seljuk invasion caused the panicked Byzantine emperor to seek help from Latin Christians to save his kingdom and to regain access to The Holy Lands for Christian pilgrims. The Pope sent out a call for help and the Latin Christians enthusiastically responded. Fast forward 200 years. After early victories, the Latins were completely expelled from Palestine and the Byzantine Empire was reduced to a shell of itself because of the Crusaders. The Seljuks, the ones who precipitated the Crusades, are no longer players. However, they are very important to our story because it was their descendants, spawned in northwestern Turkey, that created the Ottoman Empire.
The actual founder of the Ottoman dynasty was Osman Gazi, aka as Ottomano, hence the English term Ottoman. Osman was born in 1260 around the time that the Byzantines reclaimed the rule of Constantinople from the Crusaders. He became a tribal chieftain around 1300 and through both warfare and diplomacy, he was able to unify inherited and captured lands held by the Seljuks. One of his goals was to one day make Constantinople the capital of his nascent empire. His triple great grandson, Mehmed II, would fulfill that ambition.
B. The Rise of Ottoman Empire.
Nine generations and two and a half centuries after Osman I, the Ottoman Empire would be a world power on par with, if not superior to England, France, or Spain. Its ruler, Suleiman The Magnificent, was a contemporary monarch with, and close in age to: Henry VIII, Frances I, and Charles V. How to account for such progress?
The first 10 Sultans were, for the most part, excellent leaders. The Ottomans’ method of choosing successors was effective. The current ruler would have multiple wives and sons. When he died, the most capable and ruthless son would find a way to seize power and usually would have all his brothers killed, typically by strangling. Rarely did the eldest son prevail. In cases where male siblings survived a brother’s ascension to the sultanate, it usually resulted in conflict and disorder in the realm. It was accepted that royal fratricide was in the best interest of the Empire.
There was a power vacuum in the region. The Mongols crushed the last vestiges of Seljuk Empire’s army in 1243 but had chosen to make the western border of their empire about midway into Anatolia. The Byzantine Empire had been so ravaged by the Crusaders in 1204, that it never really recovered. And the Mamelukes in Egypt had so much internal fighting and unrest, they could not venture into Anatolia. So, an opportunity existed for new enterprising leaders to make hay.
The early Ottoman leaders changed the business model of their state. Four or five Ghazi states, of which the Ottomans were one, emerged from the destruction of the Seljuk Empire. A ghazi state possessed as the reason for its existence a duty to do battle against the infidel (the Crusaders had diminished the “fellow people of the book” image of Christians). The ghazi business model was to ride out on raids to the frontiers of Islam and bring back rich plunder. This worked well during a time of chaos. But as order returned, the lucrative raids ceased, and most ghazi states lacked the solid internal economy to continue. The Ottomans went from simply raiding to capturing, holding, and wisely administering conquered territory and cities.
The Ottomans attracted and welcomed competent people from throughout the region through moral integrity and tolerance. As ghazis, they had a merit-based society. To be a ghazi, one had to prove his worth by deeds and by evidence of good character. Quoting Fisher: “Another feature of ghazi life was recognition and acceptance of the futuwwa, a set of rules by which the virtuous life should be lived. Mutual fidelity among the membership was particularly emphasized. Likewise, almost every ghazi brotherhood recognized a spiritual leader… the early arrival of Muslim lawyers and theologians tempered the ghazi crusading fervor so that Orhan (the 2nd Sultan) accepted the older Muslim practice of allowing Christians and Jews to live in Muslim land by paying taxes and special tribute.” The tolerance of Christians and Jews remained a feature of the Ottoman Empire throughout its history.
They conquered Constantinople and made it the Empire’s Capital. Muawiya, the fourth Caliph of Islam, besieged Constantinople for four years in the late 670’s. Muawiya recognized the strategic importance of this great city straddling Europe and Asia to the Muslim Empire. Nearly a dozen more attempts and eight centuries would pass before Constantinople would finally fall to a Muslim leader, Mehmed II whose moniker is “The Conqueror”. He is a fascinating person with a fascinating history. His father, Murad I, got tired of being Sultan and wanted to do other things so he abdicated to his 12 year old son. When that happened enemies came out of the woodwork – both foreign and domestic – to take advantage of the boy Sultan, which forced his father to come out of retirement and spend 5 years putting things back in order until his son was ready to rule on his own. Read more here.
In 1452, Mehmed II assembled a fleet of 400 ships, and an army of 170,000 soldiers armed with 70 canons including the largest cannon yet cast in the world. Even though Constantinople was only a shadow of its former self, its defenses were still formidable. The great solid stone walls were 15’ thick and 40’ high. The massive iron sea chain protecting the Golden Horn remained impenetrable. To circumvent the chain, Mehmed had to build an oiled wooden ramp to portage his ships into the Golden Horn. The Byzantine army and population continued to resist valiantly until they learned that their Emperor, Constantine IX, had offered to submit to the Latin pope in exchange for support from the West. The Byzantine citizenry preferred to submit to a Muslim leader rather than to Latin Christians.
On May 29, 1453, Constantinople was conquered by Mehmed II. No doubt, there was some initial slaughtering and looting by the Muslim invaders. Afterall, the Byzantines had rejected Mehmed’s offer to surrender and avoid bloodshed. After a time, Mehmed entered the City and restored order.
This is a link to a YouTube video that provides a good synopsis of the history of Constantinople and its fall to the Ottomans.
This was a huge psychological blow to the West. After two millennia, the Roman Empire had finally come to an end. Quoting Fisher: “To the Muslims, the Fall of Constantinople was a great and glorious achievement … Its acquisition served as the keystone in creating the Ottoman Empire.” The City’s name did not officially change to Istanbul until 1930.
Mehmed II worked hard to please and attract Christians and Jews to Istanbul. Constantinople had been dying for centuries and was only half populated. Mehmed focused on repopulating the City. Christians were encouraged to reside in the City and allowed to live according to their own ways and laws as long as they did not infringe on the Muslims. The Church Patriarch was dead, so Mehmed appointed a new Patriarch who was favored by the citizens. There were very few Jews in Constantinople when it fell. Mehmed reached out and recruited Jews to move there. In time, Jews seem to have become so well accepted by the Ottomans that it infuriated the Christians, who felt that the Jews had gained too much influence in the Ottoman Empire.
C. The Myth that Muslims and Jews have always been arch enemies is wrong.
Time and again, we see in the history of the Middle East, that the Jews preferred living under Muslim rulers rather than under Christians. And Eastern Christians preferred living under Muslims rather than under Latin Christians. This myth that Arabs/Muslims have been at war with the Jews since the days of Abraham is continually and totally debunked by true history.
D. The Zenith of the Ottoman Empire.
Mehmed II aka “The Conqueror” of the Eastern Roman Empire, ruled for 32 years before dying in 1481. Three decades later, his grandson, Selim would become Sultan and in his short reign of eight years, would be one of the OE’s most effective rulers. Additionally, he fathered a son who lead the Empire to its zenith.
Selim I/Palestine. Selim I ruled from 1512-1520. He would have the single greatest impact of any of the OE sultans on Palestine. He fought and won two decisive battles against the Mamelukes which resulted in Egypt, Palestine and Syria becoming part of the Ottoman Empire. He increased size of OE by 70%. The OE would rule Palestine for four centuries with only occasional interruptions along the way. Selim I, who was Suliman’s father, ranks among the top 3 or 4 of all Ottoman rulers. Here is a link to him.
Suliman the Magnificent. The longest reigning of all the Sultans would come to power in 1520. Suliman, often referred to as “Suliman the Magnificent” was the great grandson of The Conqueror. He would rule until 1566. During Sulieman’s long reign, the OE expanded westward as far as Hungry and extended its reach along the entire Mediterranean coast of North Africa. In the mid-16th century, the OE under Suliman was arguably the most powerful and respected nation-state in the world.
Among the Monarchs of his day, which included Henry VIII and Charles V, Sulieman was certainly the most powerful, respected, and envied. He had tremendous wealth and unchecked power. Sulieman was more than just a monarch. In addition to being Sultan, he was also recognized as the Caliph, the spiritual leader of Islam. So, both church and state were co-equal partners embodied in that single individual.
This is a link to an 8 minute video on Suliman that will be shown in class.
Though the OE would add additional territory subsequently (the dark green areas shown on the map below), an argument can be made that it reached its apex during the reign of Sulieman and then began a slow decline over the next three and half centuries.
E. The Slow Decline of the Ottoman Empire after Suliman.
Let’s examine some of the reasons for the Empire’s decline:
1. Mediocre to totally incompetent rulers. One reason dates from day of Sulieman’s death. Sulieman had 8 sons yet only three were capable of succeeding him: Mustafa, Bayezid and Selim. (One son was a hunchback and the others died by natural causes.) As a result of disinformation about Mustafa and miscommunication relating to Bayezid, Sulieman executed them leaving only Selim II, who was mediocre at best. He was the first Sultan not to go personally on campaign. Also, Selim II was an alcoholic and was openly gay. None of that sat well with his military leaders. Following Selim II, there was a long string of less than competent Sultans. According to this article in Britannica, This was almost by design. There were different power centers who vied for power by promoting a prince who would serve their interests if he became the next ruler. The harem and the Janissaries were among the two most significant. They did not want a sultan who was a strong ruler in his own right – but rather someone they could control.
2. The Age of Discovery and the shift of the trade routes from East to West. As we all know, it was access to the spices from the Orient that lured both Columbus and Magellan to make their famous voyages. The Portuguese controlled the eastern sea lanes around Africa and so a western route was hoped for. Not well known is that when the Victoria, the only one of Magellan’s ships to return to Spain, and the next to smallest of the five ships that left 3 years earlier, unloaded its cargo of spices, its value more than paid for the cost of the entire expedition. That gives an idea of the profits that had been going to the Ottomans who controlled the land routes between Europe and the Indies. The European sea traders significantly reduced those profits.
3. Advent of the Renaissance followed by the Industrial Revolution. Prior to the Renaissance, the Muslim world had been the intellectual and scientific center of the world. A case can be made that when Mehmed II conquered Constantinople in 1453 and the best educated minds from Byzantium scattered to Italy and beyond, this supercharged the Renaissance so that in time, the Western Europeans would eclipse the Ottomans with technological advances. The Industrial Revolution, which followed two and half centuries later, allowed the Western Europeans to further outstrip the conservative Ottomans, who were hamstrung by super-conservative institutions such as the Janissaries.
4. The Janissaries. Janissaries began as an elite corps created through a system of child levy enslavement by which Christian children were taken from regions of the Empire, converted to Islam and then incorporated into the Ottoman army. (Similar to the Mamelukes.) They were the first modern standing army, and perhaps the first infantry force in the world to be equipped with firearms. They served as shock troops and were greatly feared in the West. Over time, though, they went from being a key source of the Ottomans’ military success to being a reason for the Empire’s failure. They became a dominant force within the Ottoman court to the point that they played a role in choosing Sultans and on occasions, assassinated ones they opposed. The biggest problem they presented was that they were opposed to change – particularly as it related to modernizing military tactics and weapons. As a result, the Ottoman military, which had been state-the-art in its heyday, started falling behind the other powers beginning in the 17th century. In 1807, a Janissary revolt deposed Sultan Selim III, who had tried to modernize the army along Western European lines. The new Sultan, Mahmud II, played the long game and in 1826, he notified the Janissary generals that he planned to modernize, knowing they would revolt. When they did, he had a force at the ready with artillery that killed over 4,000 Janissaries and those who survived were beheaded. Following that, the Ottoman Empire undertook a modernization plan. They made progress, but remained weak relative to the major European powers, including Russia.
5. Centuries of Wars with Russia. There were a series of 12 wars between the two beginning in 1568 and ending in WWI. Only one of those wars, the fourth one which ended in 1711, went fully in the favor of the Ottomans. In the years between 1712 and 1807, the Russians wrested from the OE some of its territory in the Balkans and the Caucasus. The map below begins in 1807 and shows the “Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire” between then and WWI.
Looking at this map, it is obvious why Russia fought so many wars with the Ottomans – Russia needed a warm water port and ideally one that would give them open access to the Mediterranean and the world at large. The Russians’ ultimate goal was to control both Crimea and the two straights at Constantinople. They obtained the first, and had it not been for the Bolshevik Revolution, they may well have obtained control of the Bosporus and the Dardanelles. As it is, Turkey owns those critical waterways, and could technically close them to Russia. The many wars with and defeats by the Russians greatly diminished the military might and the morale of the Ottomans.
6. The Rise of Nationalism. The rise of nationalism in Europe was stimulated by the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars. Defined: “Nationalism calls on people to identify with the interests of their national group and to support the creation of a state – a nation-state – to support those interests.” Rule by monarchies and foreign control of territory was replaced by self-determination and newly formed national governments. Keep in mind that the OE was not so much a country as it was an assemblage of people groups and in some cases, previously existing nations such as Egypt and Greece.
In 1821, Greece became the first nation to declare itself independent from the OE and by 1830, it made good its endeavor. People groups in the Balkans began forming nations and breaking away. Among them were Bulgaria, Moldova, Rumania, and Bosnia. That the rise of nationalism did not completely unravel the OE before WWI is surprising.
Palestine was not among the sections of the OE that showed an interest in breaking away and becoming an independent nation. Even though 85% of its inhabitants were Muslims. They were from different sects, spoke different languages and had different cultures. So too were the Christians and Jews living in Palestine in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
As we know, WWI spelled the end of the OE. They did not have to become a combatant since, unlike the initial belligerents, they did not have a treaty that obligated them to come to the aid of an ally if that ally was attacked by an adversary.
F. World War I
Concatenations into a world war. Let’s pause to review how a single assassination resulted in a world war: When the Archduke of Austria-Hungary (“Austria”) was assassinated in June 1914 by a Serbian nationalist, Austria made harsh demands on Serbia which Serbia rejected, and so Austria invaded Serbia. Serbia had an alliance with Russia which required the Russians to attack any Serbian invader; so, Russia declared war on Austria. Austria had an alliance with Germany which required Germany to attack an invader of Austria, so Germany declared war on Russia. France had an alliance with Russia which required it to declare war on Germany. Great Britain got involved when Germany invaded Belgium.
The decision to enter WWI on the side of Germany proved to be the death knell of the Ottoman Empire. it made logical sense at the time for the Ottomans to join in an alliance with Germany and Austria Hungary against Serbia, Russia, France, and Great Britain. That assumed that their team, the Central Powers, prevailed. They didn’t. The defeat of the Central Powers by the Allies resulted in the fall and dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.
With the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the people living in Palestine would find their future in the hands of the victors of WWI and especially Great Britain. They would not prove to be wise and judicious overlords.
G. WHOA! – What have we missed? Let’s Backtrack a little.
1. The Black Death.
In the fourteenth century, the Black Death spread rapidly throughout Asia and Europe, including in Greece and across the Byzantine empire. The Black Death is the most fatal pandemic ever recorded, as an estimated 75 to 200 million people died from the plague across Europe, Asia, and North Africa from 1346 to 1353. The pestilence is believed to have killed 30 to 60 percent of Europe’s population and one third of the population of the Middle East.
Although its origins are disputed, the first historical record of the plague is from the Crimean Peninsula in the Black Sea in the year 1347. Historical records indicate that the Black Death nearly destroyed the army of Jani Beg, the Khan of the Golden Horde, as he was besieging the Genoese port of Kaffa in Crimea at the time. Rather than admitting defeat due to the plague, Jani Beg threw the infected corpses into the town to infect his enemies. Due to the highly infectious nature of the plague, residents of the town were quickly infected. As it was a port town, the plague soon spread throughout the world, but first to Mediterranean ports in Italy, North Africa, Spain, and Constantinople. From there, the disease soon spread to the rest of Europe.
Regarding Palestine, in April–May 1348, “the Black Death migrated from the Northern Egypt to the city of Gaza, where the population fled to the countryside, after which their homes were pillaged by criminals, who themselves died, while the peasants outside of the city reportedly fell down dead in their fields during their plowing.”
For our region of study, we see that the Black Death came one century after the horrific and devasting Mongol invasion. The Plague may well be the single greatest disruptor of life in recorded human history. Can you imagine living in those times and trying to make sense of life? Can you imagine trying to explain to someone from that era why you fear that if Donald Trump or Joe Biden is elected in 2024, it will destroy life as you know it?
2. What’s happened in Russia?
Last time we were there, Russia had been invaded by the Mongolian leader Batu Khan, the founder of the Golden Horde. Batu’s army crushed the Kievan Rus at a battle in 1240. In 1242, the new leader of the Golden Horde, Berke Khan, was convinced by caravan leader to convert to Islam. In 1342, Uzbek Khan made Islam the official religion of the Golden Horde. The Golden Horde would rule Russia until they were decisively defeated by Ivan the Great in 1480. Russia was isolated and dysfunctional until the rule of Peter the Great (1682-1725.) Note, at the end of Peter’s reign, the OE still controlled Ukraine, Crimea and the Sea of Azov
Russia took another leap under the rule of Catherine the Great (1762-1796).
The growing strength of Russia proved to be the bane of the OE’s northern territory. Had it not been for the Bolshevik Revolution, Russia would almost certainly now control the Bosporus.
3. Egypt/Ali Bey. Although Selim I defeated the Mamelukes, he did not destroy them; he allowed them to hold positions of power in both the government and the military. However, “The Sublime Porte” (as the Ottoman Empire’s administrative head came to be called), appointed a governor of Egypt who was usually a Turk. Egypt proved to be one of the most difficult territories for the Porte to manage. The Mamelukes were the main problem and the most problematic of all Mameluke leaders for the Porte was Ali Bey, a Caucasian slave, who for a time in the 1760’s controlled Egypt, Palestine, Syria and parts of what’s now Saudi Arabia completely independent of the OE. By 1774, following Ali’s death, Egypt, Palestine, and Syria were back in the OE’s fold, but the Mamelukes still had a lot of sway. Of note, the Mamelukes were typically not of Egyptian descent. They were former slaves from other regions of the OE and they owned much of the land in Egypt and oppressed the native Egyptians. Within three decades, everything in this region would be upended with the advent of the Napoleonic Wars.
4. Napoleon & The Egyptian Campaign. Arguably, the single most consequential circumstance that affected Palestine and the near Middle East in both the 18th and 19th centuries was the decision of the Directoire, (the executive branch of the French government in 1798), to send Napolean with over half of France’s naval forces and nearly 90,000 soldiers to make Egypt a French colony and its primary naval base in the Mediterranean. Had it been successful, France would have been able to join forces with princes in India and severely threaten England’s most prized colonial possession – India. Hoping to give the expedition a scientific purpose as well, Bonaparte secured the services of 167 of the most distinguished scientists and scholars in France.
The campaign began with the conquest of Malta in June of 1798. It ended in August of 1801 with French General Menou surrendering to the British commanders in the theater. (Napoleon had abandoned his army in August 1799). Over that three-year period, the French lost 15,000 men killed in action and a like number killed by disease. They also lost nearly all of their navy. The forces who opposed them lost many times as many lives. In almost every engagement between the French and their opponents – be they Ottomans, Mamelukes or Bedouins, the French forces with their superior training, modern equipment and brilliant generalship prevailed. (Napoleon did prove his military genius time and again in this theater.) There were several key engagements fought in Palestine and one crucial one did not go Napoleon’s way. In the spring of 1799, the defenders of the city of Acre were able to stave off a siege and hold their City. Had they not, the French campaign may well have succeeded. The single most lethal opponent was the Black Plague which struck the army in Jaffa.
The French Campaign (“the FC”) brought about a multitude of major changes for nearly every entity involved. It became obvious to the Ottoman and Egyptian leaders that their military had become greatly inferior to the Western powers. They had to modernize quickly or become irrelevant. The Porte had discouraged the use of printing presses in the OE for centuries fearing it would undermine its authority. The Mamelukes held a similar view. The FC changed that view. Printing presses were critical to bringing about modernization throughout the Muslim world. The FC was responsible for the rise of one of the most significant leaders in the region during the 19th century – Mohammed Ali and the demise of the anti-modernizing Mamelukes.
5. Egypt/Mohammed Ali / Palestine. Mohammed Ali was born in Kavala, Macedonia, which was part of the Ottoman Empire. His parents were originally from Albania. His initial occupation was as a tax collector before becoming commander of Kavala’s militia. In 1801, his unit was sent to Egypt to help restore order following the French army’s withdrawal. There was a lot of friction between the Mamelukes and the Ottomans. (The Mamelukes had been a huge problem for both the native Egyptians and The Porte for centuries) Ali was a master politician and by 1805 he played his cards so well that the local leaders in Cairo insisted that The Porte make Ali governor of Egypt. The Mamelukes were an obstacle to progress and modernization. In 1811, Ali invited their leaders to a celebration for his son at the Cairo Citadel. At the appropriate time, Ali’s forces came rushing in and killed all the Mamelukes in attendance. He then had his army ferret out and kill Mamelukes throughout Egypt. And that was the end of the Mameluke problem. (In June 1826, Sultan Mahmud II followed a near identical script and ridded the OE of its Deep State slave army, the Janissaries, with what’s known as “The Auspicious Incident”. )
Muhammad Ali’s goal was for Egypt to leave the Ottoman Empire and be ruled by his own hereditary dynasty. To do that, he had to reorganize Egyptian society, streamline the economy, train a professional bureaucracy, and build a modern military. Through God’s blessings and his own adeptness, Ali was given three and a half decades to accomplish his goals – and he achieved many of them. As an example of his ingenuity to affect positive social change, read this article on Hakimas and the school of medicine for women.
At the height of his rule, Pasha Mohammed Ali controlled Egypt, Sudan, Hejaz, Najd, the Levant, Crete and parts of Greece. However, when it came to our specific topic, Palestine, the Pasha overreached and a major revolt resulted, which some refer to as the Peasant’s Revolt. Jerusalem was sacked and plundered, Hebron leveled – bad scene. The Pasha reached a point of power where he could have conquered the Ottoman Empire. At that point the British stepped in and said no. They did not want big changes in the status quo. “The Father of Modern Egypt” had to settle for an independent Egypt with hereditary rule by his family.
6. The British/Suez Canal. The French completed the Suez Canal in 1869. It was the fourth in history built between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean – all the previous ones had had fallen into disuse.) It was done as a joint venture with the Pasha of Egypt. The British were opposed to canal since they had a railroad between the two seas plus they controlled the sea lanes around Cape of Good Hope. Once the canal was completed, though, the British Lion had to get its paws on it. The Pasha, who owned 44% of the stock, got in financial trouble and the British bought his shares for a song. When there was unrest in 1882 in Suez, the British navy weighed in, bombarded Alexandria for half day and took control of the Canal. (France had initially joined with the Brits but got cold feet.) The Brits did not relinquish control of the Suez Canal until 1956, when Gabal Nasser overthrew the Ali’s dynasty, nationalized the Canal and booted the British. To the Brits great dismay, the US backed the new Egyptian government on this. In the interim, the Suez Canal was considered to be of paramount strategic interest to the British Empire. It being right next door to Palestine helps explain why Great Britain took such a keen interest in Palestine.
7. Palestine between Ali and WWI. It went back under the control of the Ottoman Empire, somewhat. Things seems to have been very fractured then and I was not able to get a clear bead on who was doing what to whom. Here is an excerpt from a Wikipedia article entitled: “The History of Palestine”.
And we are out of space – time to move on to Session #5.
Passcode and Zoom link for Session #4: Passcode: =rG9gCYk
Power Point Presentation for Session #4 is below. When you click on it, choose “Open In” and selected Power Point on the Web. When you open it, then select “Slide Show” and then “Start Beginning”
Links to other Session Essays: https://quotesbydavid.com/history-of-palestine/