Faisal knew this was the French mandate and tried to negotiate with Clemenceau, but the Syrians rejected the French and forced his hand. Embracing Britain’s Zionist promise within this Arab kingdom, Lawrence arranged meetings between the Zionist leader Weizmann and Faisal, who backed Jewish immigration but only if it was subject to his authority. This was all part of Lawrence’s plan, while Faisal’s elder brother Abdullah would get Iraq.
But the French were determined to claim their new empire and they defeated Faisal’s ragged army. While he believed in ‘take, then ask’, Faisal understood ‘the art of flexible politics: the Syrians lost independence by insisting on all or nothing’.
On 12 March 1921, at the Semiramis Hotel, Cairo, Churchill, now LG’s colonial secretary, revelled in a gathering of his ‘Forty Thieves’, experts who would redraw the map of western Asia, including Lawrence, Sir Percy Cox and Gertrude Bell. She however, thought ‘you might search our history from end to end without finding poorer masters of it than Lloyd George and Winston Churchill’.
Churchill’s first task was to crush the anti-British rebellions in Iraq, by Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds, the latter’s sheikh Mahmud Barzani having declared himself king. While Churchill ordered the RAF to bomb the rebels (‘a wonderful training ground’), he devised a cheaper way to govern the mandates. Britain would run Palestine directly – welcoming Jewish immigrants though there was no actual plan for a ‘Jewish Homeland’ – and offer Iraq to the Hashemites. Yet Churchill learned fast that the Hashemites were not what they claimed: ‘I hadn’t appreciated the weakness inherent in King Hussein’s position … Ibn Saud’s much stronger.’
King Hussein, an Arabian King Lear, raged from his Meccan palace not only against British betrayal but also against filial betrayal. Hussein had arrogantly disdained Abdulaziz, but the Saudi sheikh now deployed a fanatical Wahhabi army, the
In May 1919 Abdullah advanced towards the Saudi capital Riyadh. Hearing rumours that the British were giving Iraq to Faisal, Abdulaziz reflected that the British ‘have surrounded me with enemies’. His
Now Churchill offered Iraq’s throne to Faisal, who would be confirmed by plebiscite but rule under British protection. Faisal accepted: in August 1921, he was crowned king in Baghdad with the British proconsul Cox shouting, ‘Long live the king!’ as soldiers of the Dorset Regiment fired a salute. Faisal, long-faced, sad-eyed and wise, ruled through cabinets of Sunni notables, Jewish grandees and his lieutenant from the Arab Revolt, Nuri al-Said, who would dominate Iraq until a macabre downfall three decades later.
Abdullah raged against Faisal. Infuriated by the loss of Iraq, ‘even if it belonged to his brother’, he led thirty officers and 200 Bedouin into the eastern section of Palestine, Transjordan, seizing the town of Maan (Amman). Abdullah was a
Churchill gave him his fiefdom. ‘Amir Abdullah is in Transjordania,’ wrote Churchill, ‘where I put him one Sunday afternoon in Jerusalem.’ He turned out to be the most capable Hashemite – his family rule Jordan into the twenty-first century – but they swiftly lost Arabia.*
In March 1924, Hussein declared himself caliph, outraging most Muslims after his mismanagement of Mecca and embarrassing his own sons. Abdulaziz ibn Saud attacked Mecca’s resort town, Taif. The
King Ali waited in Jeddah as Abdulaziz’s cameleteers burst into Mecca, crying, ‘The peoples of Mecca – neighbours of God – are under the protection of God and Ibn Saud.’ That November, Abdulaziz rode into Mecca on a camel, before kneeling as a humble pilgrim to the Holy City. He carefully portrayed himself as the new Guardian of the Two Sanctuaries. When King Ali fled by boat, Abdulaziz was proclaimed king of Nadj and sultan of Hejaz. After 112 years, the Saudis were back.
