Rashid Rida and Faysal's Kingdom in Syria

8/22/2019 Rashid Rida and Faysal's Kingdom in Syria

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T H ~USLIMORLD Vol. LXXXV, NO. 3-4 Tulv-October, 1995RASHID R IP A A N D FAYSAL'S KINGDOM IN SYRIA*

The first encounter between the Muslim thinker Muhammad RashidRida (1865-1935) and the Hashimite family occurred in 1914. In that year,(Abdallah, the second son of the Sharif Husayn of Mecca, passed throughEgypt and entered into discussions with the British which sowed the seedof the McMahon-Husayn Correspondence a year later. While still in Cairo,Rida made him a member of his pan-Arab "Society of the Arab Associa-tion' flarn$&mtal-JZmi*&/-hbi+ya)and presented him with the society'sprogram for an alliance among the rulers of the Arabian Peninsula. Ac-cording to it the rulers of the Hijaz, Najd, Yemen, and 'h i r were to form aunion, based on internal independence for each of them and joint protec-tion of the peninsula against any foreign aggression. Husayn was to be thepresident of the council of this alliance since its meetings would be heldin Mecca. (Abdallah favored the program and promised to deliver it to hisfather. Husayn turned the plan down.Rashid Rid& second encounter with the Hashimites occurred duringWorld War I, in 1916, this time with Husayn himself. At first, Rida sup-ported the Arab Revolt of Sharif Husayn and even came to the Hijaz andoffered Husayn his services. Husayn, who was not at all pleased with Rida'santi-European tendencies and was most certainly offended by Rida's op-position to the idea that he, Husayn, would be nominated Caliph, did notwelcome Rid& willingness to assist him. However, their main discordoccurred in regard to Rida's plan to reach an Arab union. Rida's mainpurpose for visiting the Hijaz was to convince Husayn to join the programof his 'Society of the Arab Association' to form an alliance among therulers of the Arabian Peninsula. Although he once again offered Husaynthe presidency of the alliance's council, Husayn refused the program. Rid2returned to Egypt empty-handed, and from then onwards began to de-velop an enmity towards Husayn.2In the first half of 1918 the particularistic tendencies among the Syr-ian emigres in Egypt began to get stronger. It turned out that the dwellingtogether of Syrians and Hijazis following the establishment of the Hashimitegovernment in the Hijaz brought on an increasing dissociation on the part' This is a complementary article to the author's 'Rashid Rids as Pan-Arabist before WorldWar I, ' Tbe Mushh Wd' vol . 79 (19891, pp. 102-12, and 'Rashid Ri&t's Attitudes duringWorld War I,' TbheMushm Worf' vo l . 85 (1995). pp. 107-21.For this see Tauber, 'Rashld Rids as Pan-Arabist.' pp. 109-10.For this see Tauber. 'RashId Rids's Attitudes,' pp. 112-16,

235


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236 THG MUSLIM WORLDof the Syrians from the idea that after the war they would be ruled byHusayn. A group of Syrian activists began to form-Rid8 among them-whose basis for joint activity was the growing dissatisfaction with Husaynbecause of his being, in their opinion, a stubborn man inconsiderate ofthe views of others. There were those who also feared that Husayn wouldagree to the partition of Iraq and Syria between Britain and France inorder to secure his personal position in the Hij8z. They came to the con-clusion that they had to work for Syria independently of Husayn, to pro-mote the separation of the Syrian problem from the general Arab one,and to strive for the establishment of an independent Syria which wouldfit its degree of development and the will of its inhabitants.

The Anglo-French declaration of November 1918, concerning the needto set up local governments according to the wish of the inhabitants in theregions liberated from the Ottomans, was therefore the final incentive forthe founding in Cairo of the "Syrian Union Party' (flizb a/fih&Fda/-Srrr/;/in December 1918. Elected as president of the party was Amir Michel LutfAllah, of a very wealthy family of Syrian 6migrks. Elected as vice-presidentwas Rida, even though he was known for his pan-Arab views. Severalmonths later Rid3 explained in his periodical a/-Ma~@rThe Lighthouse)why he was a partner in the founding of this particularistic Syrian party.According to him, this was the only way to bring about cooperation be-tween Muslims and Christians for the independence of Syria. And at anyrate, activity on behalf of the liberation of part of the Arab countries didnot contradict the desire to liberate all of them. However, the fact thatRid8, who was the outstanding pan-Arabist of the early twentieth cen-tury, was also one of the prominent members of this particularistic party,is a good example of the dilemma the Arab activists had to face, beingforced to choose between the pan-Arab Utopia and the more realistic ap-plication of the particularist ideas. Indeed, Rid8 admitted that not all thearticles of the party platform pleased him.The platform of the party was drafted by its central activists, of whomthere were several prominent men of letters such as Rafiq al-(Azm, thepast president of the Decentralization Party, and Rida, himself a past

India Office Library and Records (Londo n),LIPdrS1111146: etter, M ichel Lutf Allah (Cairo)18 a nua r y 1919.Archives du M in is th e des Affaires Etrang6res (Paris) [MAE], Levant 1918-1929,Syrie-Liban-Cilicie 8 n d Th e Public Record Office (London-Kew). Foreign Office Records [FO]141/710/3156:Liste des m emb res du ComitC Central d u Part i de I 'Union Syrienne au Cake 'n.d. uanuary? 19191. A/Man#..21:4 28 (June 1919): pp. 202-4. min Sa'id, Asr& ~J-Thawra8 / h & j p 8/-xUbf# w8- M 8 ~ ~ 8 / - S ~ a . f ~ ~ u ~ y f f ( B e i r u t .1960]),p. 241-2.de m , A/-?hawra8f-hfbf/j3.8 /-xob/B (Cairo, [1934]),ol. 2, pt. 1, pp. 37. 41. M uham mad h a t Darwaza,H8W.b 81-&zk4 8/-5lrffb&y.9 f-Fad7h.4 Sidon, 1950-1953),ol. 1 , pp. 89-90. nis al-Nusuli.h h h W8-.%9h8d/U (Beirut, 1951), . 25.


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RASHfD RID& AND FAYSALS KINGDOM IN SYRIA 237member of that party.4 Rida relates that prior to the formulation of theplatform there was a prolonged debate between those advocating abso-lute independence and those interested in foreign aid, at least tempo-rarily. In the end the former prevailed partially, although, Rida pointsout, not all of the articles of the platform were accepted unanimously,and some of them were approved only by majority vote. The second ar-ticle of the platform stated that Syria should enjoy absolute independence.Yet apparently in order to appease those party members who demandedforeign aid, the third article stated that the Syrian government would beassisted by the League of Nations in selecting foreign advisers to help itat the outset. The last article of the platform was probably more to Rids'sliking. It established that in the event that the general national unity (wabdaqawm&ya $mma/ of the Arab nation would be realized, Syria wouldjoin this unity, on condition that this would not impair in any way itsparticularist national unity /warfidatii5a l-qawmiyya l-kh


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238 THG MUSLIM WORLDto Syria in April 1919, but in September was obliged to leave again inorder to enter into negotiations with the French about Syrias fate. Thefact that Faysal stayed in Europe for a considerable part of this periodresulted in the actual rule of his short-lived state being in the hands of thesecret nationalist society a/Bt& and several other political organizations,while Faysals influence in Syria was rather limited.7In mid-1919, Rida decided to return from Egypt to Syria. He first vis-ited his native village al-Qalamtin and Tripoli, then continued on to Beirut,and from there he went on to Damascus, arriving there in September.RiPa was about to visit Beirut several times during the next followingmonths. On his visit of early October he came to Franqois Georges-Picot,the French high commissioner there (and one of the signatories of theSykes-Picot agreement), and while not hesitating to express his anti-Frenchattitudes he also condemned the British, stressing that they were not ca-pable of administering Muslim countries. Yet the interesting point of thisconversation was that Rida claimed before the French representative thatFaysals government in Syria was a deception for everybody and thatmany Muslims were already interested in the return of the T urks8 Thisattitude of Rid3 did not bode well for his future relations with Faysal.

When he arrived in Damascus, Rida was elected to be one of the rep-resentatives of Tripoli in the Syrian Congre~s.~here were two parlia-mentary parties in the Congress: the Progress Party /&zb af-Tagaddum),which represented a / B t Z and the Independence Party (see below), andin this capacity actually represented the government circles in the Con-gress; and the Democratic Party (al-flizb af-Dihugrdt!,which was con-sidered the opposition party. Rida was among the founders of the ProgressParty and was also elected its president. From the very nature of its posi-tion the Democratic Party was more extreme and vociferous in its opposi-

Al-f+ftd/was founded in 1909 in Paris by several Arab students as a reaction to theTurkification policy of the Young Turks In 1915 it contacted Sharif Husayn and started theprocess which eventually led to the Arab Revolt. The society survived the war and became themost influential political body in postwar Syria.On Faysals kingdom in Syria in general and af--rc8/8rinparticular, see Darwaza, 4%rvh 81-4%8r8.48 8f-$rab&ya, vol. 1; Said, af-TbBwfadhrab1yy8, vol. 2. pt. 1; Ahmad Qadri,Surf- a Wd-hhd af-Faysah Beirut, 1966). See also Khayriyya Qiisimiyya, A/-&ukUmaaf-kab19ya lD 1hadq h p a /9J&V92O(Cairo,971); Zeine N. Zeine, TheSfrumfeb/ArabIndependence: Western D@fomacy and the Rise and Falf of Fay+ds Kingdom in Syria(Beirut, 1960).MAE, Syrie-Liban 18: telkgramme 1316, Francois Georges-Picot (Beyrouth) B Minist2re desAffaires Et ra ng hs (Paris) 8 octobre 1919. Shakib Arslan, Al-S-yyidRashfbRig! aw fkhdA f h h &n8 (Damascus. 1356/1937),p. 156. Ahmad al-Sharbasi. f?8shi%jfi$a2418 a/Mand...Asruhu wu-~ay~/uhuO - M ~ H ~ >~ ~ w q a h t i ~ v ( ~ a i r o ,389/1970),p. 155.The Syrian Congress was established in June 1919. before the arrival of the King-Cranecommission, in order to create a unified Syrian front in the demand for absolute independence.Its members were not elected in orderly general elections-some were elected by the survivingelectors from the Ottoman period, while others were appointed to the position.

MUdh&5khkf/1-b 8f-TbBWr8 8/-h8bib88f-KUbfd Damascus, 1375/1956); YiiSuf al-Hakim,7


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RAS HfD RIDA A N D FAYSALS KINGDOM IN SYRIA 239tion to any foreign intervention. It seems that there was a shift of Con-gress members from the former party to the latter, and according to Ridait was done intentionally in order to influence the conduct of the opposi-tion party from within. loDuring his whole stay in Syria, Rida was a staunch adherent of abso-lute independence. In his periodical aLMn2r he called for a completeabsolute total independence (aLhtiq&Y aLf2mm al-muflaq a/-na;.ji/ o-gether with the establishment of a representative democratic governmentbuilt on the fundaments of justice and equality and the preservation of therights of minorities. Indeed, Ri@ joined the most influential politicalbody in Syria in this period, the veteran aLAf2fsociety, which led theSyrian campaign for absolute independence. Since aLBt2t kept its se-crecy also in this period, its influence was mainly behind the scenes. How-ever, since its prominent activists held most of the senior positions in thenew state, the society actually ruled Syria in this period. Rida assessedthis situation accurately when he wrote in a/-MaHrthat the power of thesociety over Faysal was stronger than Faysals power over the society, andthat it was the society which did everything for Faysal. For conducting itspublic activities aLBaf3ffounded the Arab Independence Party (mzba/-h!!q12la/hrab#, which was no more than its overt mouthpiece. Ridaalso joined the party, presided over some of its conferences, and soon wasconsidered one of its prominent members. In this period Rida was alsoparticipating in the demonstrations held by the Committee for NationalDefence, the most extremist political body in Syria in that time, whichwas not content even with the nationalist activity of al-FatZfand was themost anti-French organization in the country. l2When Rid2 arrived in Syria, Fay$al was already on his second visit toEurope. Therefore, Rida met Faysal for the first time only in mid-January1920, in Beirut, when the latter returned from Europe. For the next fewweeks they met several times for private conversations and Rida tried toconvince him to accept his plan to form an alliance between the rulers ofthe Arabian Peninsula. He explained to him the damage ensuing from thehostility existing between the Hijaz and Ibn Sa%d of Najd, and pointed

lo Af-Mun&23:5 (27 May 1922): pp. 395-6. Darwaza, flawfa af-Harak8af-hab&yz, vol. 1.pp. 97,115-16. Al-Hakim,SiZfl-8 wa/-%da/Faph;p. 93. Qiisimiyya,a/.?F/ukgma / -hb4yz,p. 170.A/-ManJr 21:6 (24 October 1919): pp. 303-4 (an article on the subject What isIndependence?).

I* h i d , 22:6 (6 June 1921):pp. 464-5; 23:4 (27 April 1922):p. 316; 33:9 (28 February 1934):p. 712 (excerptfrom Rashid Ri(las diary 9 February 1920);33:lO (15 April 1934):p. 796 (excerptfrom R i qH s diary 21 February 1920). Darwaza,flarvlaa/flaraka a/-(rrab&yz,vol. 1, p. 77. I t isnoteworthy that RidHs Society of the Arab Association continued to exist during this period.but as inactive body. Ripe relates that in July 1920 he swore IBdn al-Jabiri,then Fay$alschiefsecretary, in as n member of the society. See 8/Man&34:5 (7 October 1934):p. 398.


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240 THG MUSLIM WORLDout that if his plan for such a union would be realized then it would placethe amirs of the Hij& at the head of the Arabs, since the general councilof this alliance /h@i a/-&Ya/-hm) would naturally be in Mecca. Thiscouncil would convene once a year under the presidency of the Amir ofMecca to discuss the common interests of the Arabs. Faysal related to himthat Abdallah had never told him about his meeting with Rida in Cairo in1914 in this regards but he approved of the plan and promised Rida thathe would do his best to convince his father to agree to it too. Faysal evenshowed optimism that an understanding could be reached with Ibn Saad,if the latter would be satisfied with reasonable borders to be determinedby a neutral commission. Rida then told him that while he himself hadbeen to the Hijaz, he had talked about his plan with Husayn, and thatwhen he had left Husayn had told his retinue: There is a thing todaycalled the Imam of Yemen and another thing called Ibn Sacad. Tomorrow,nothing will be left of these names. All the Arab countries will constituteone single kingdom, submitting to one king. About this, Ridii told FaySal,that Unity can be achieved only by complying with the law, not by sub-mitting to a ruler. The nation would not be prepared to be ruled by anautocrat. l3

Another subject in these conversations was Faysals grudge againstDamascus politics. He complained to Rid2 that The sheikhs and the con-servative notables are completely ignored, while most of the youth areconceited and disunited. Rida, for his part, tried to mediate between FaySaland the nationalists and to persuade him that they were trustworthy intheir work for the sake of the fatherland. H e especially tried to improverelations between Faysal and K2mil al-Qassab, the leader of the Commit-tee for National Defence, and several other leading nationalists, like (Abdal-R*m?in al-Shahbandar of the Syrian Union Party. His success in thiswas rather limited. l4In March 1920 the Syrian nationalists obliged Faysal to convene theSyrian Congress in order to discuss the declaration of Syrias indepen-dence and Faysals enthronement. On the eve of the declaration the mem-bers of the Independence Party were meeting constantly every night todiscuss the subject of independence and the form of the state after thedeclaration. They discussed the status of the future Syrian governmentand the status of the Congress, and decided that the Congress would con-

Is fbh!,3 3 3 (31 December 1933): pp. 633-4; 33:9 (28 February 1934): p. 712 (excerpt fromRashid RiQiisdiary 9 February 1920). RiQP also suggested to Faysal to send a messenger to IbnSaiid, with letters from each of them to Ibn Sakid about the need to accomplish Arab unity.Fay$al approvedof the idea, though it was carriedout in practice only in June. See /aid, p. 713(excerpt from Ridas diary 10 February 1920);34:s (7 October 1934):p. 397.I /bid, 33:9 (28 February 1934): pp. 711, 713-14 (excerpt from RashId RidBs diary 10February 1920); 33:lO (15April 1934): p. 792 (excerpt from Rids's diary 13 February 1920).


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RASHfD RIDA AND FAYSAL'S KINGDOM I N SYRIA 241tinue to exist after the declaration. The party also saw to summoning theCongress delegates for the debate on the declaration of independence,and when it found out that the representatives from Beirut abstainedfrom coming to Damascus, party member Rida was sent there to per-suade them to come. Rida left for Beirut on 1 March and it took him awhole week to persuade them. They arrived in Damascus only on 7March,in the middle of the Congress session in which it was decided to declarethe independence ofSyria. l5Fay$al believed that after the declaration of independence the Con-gress would be dispersed and a committee would be formed to draw up aconstitution for the state. But, as mentioned above, the members of theIndependence Party thought otherwise. They decided that the Congresswould continue to function until a permanent parliament would be estab-lished to replace it, and that it would be the Congress which would writethe constitution. At this stage a sharp controversy between the Congressand Faysal developed. According to the declaration of independence, thegovernment that would be formed in Syria was to be subordinate to theCongress until a parliament should be established. Consequently the Con-gress decided that the government had to present its political programbefore the Congress for approval and a vote of confidence.The designated prime minister, 'Ali Rida al-Rikabi, reported this toFay$al, who got angry and announced that the Congress had exceeded itsauthority and that he would not agree that the government would be sub-ordinate to the Congress, "most of whose members are inexperiencedyoungsters, mindless, and of no importance.' The Congress persisted inits opinion and Faysal persisted in his. Congress member Rida was sent tomediate between the two sides. Faysal told him that since the Congresswas not a parliament it was not entitled to the authority to require thegovernment to request its confidence. Rida answered him that this con-gress stood at a higher level than a parliament. Faysal replied that he hadcreated the Congress and that he was not prepared to grant it such author-ity. Rids answered: "No! The Congress created you. Before that, you wereonly a commander on behalf of Allenby, the supreme commander of theBritish army, and it was the Congress that made you King of Syria." Andin addition to this, the Congress met in the name of the nation, which hadthe supreme authority according to the Islamic shar&, and at the sametime that the Congress decided to make Faysal king it also decided onsubordinating the government to it.

[bid,91:8 (17 une 1920):p. 435; 33:9 (28 February 1934):p. 714 (excerpt from RashidRida's diary 10February 1920); 310 (15April 1934):p. 798; 34:l (14May 1934): p. 68-9; 42(13 une 1934):p. 152. Rid&claims that he was the first to suggest to declare the independenceof Syria in order to present Europe with a hi? ccompk


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242 THG MUSLIM WORLDRida also explained to him that if already in the first moment after thedeclaration of independence there was dissension between the Congressand the government, they would become a byword, and it would be proof

that the Syrians were not qualified for independence. And for conclusion,he calmed Faysal that in any case "most of the members of the Congressare of our party [meaning the Independence Party], and the members ofthe government are also of our party', so there was nothing to worryabout. The argument ended with FaySal consenting to permit al-Rikabi topresent the government program before the Congress.In this argument, and also in his former conversations with FaySal,Ri@ expressed his firm conviction that the rule over the nation, accordingto Islamic law, should be in the hands of the nation itself. Rida opposedany form of tyranny or autocracy, and by this he followed his two spiri-tual teachers JamBl al-Din al-Afghani and Muhammad (Abduh who hadsaid in an article in their newspaper ad-urwaa/-Wuthg2(ThehdssohbleEe-1884) that if an evil tyrannical ruler arose over a nation, then it wasthe nation's duty to depose him and to put a new, better ruler in his place.Also in his book on 'Islam and Christianity' (Abduh wrote that it wasnecessary to depose a ruler if he was not worthy and harmed the publicinterest. Being a civilian ruler, the ruler was under the supremacy of thenation and it had the right to remove him.17 As a matter of fact, threeyears later Rid3 himself explicitly wrote in his book M-KhiYih wa/Im&ma/- zm2 [The Cah>hate or the Great 1mJmate)that according to Islam"the rule over the nation is in its own hands . . . and its government is asort of a republic.' And he added: 'The nation has the right to depose theImBm-Caliph, if it finds a reason for doing so.'18Al-Rikabi's government formed after the declaration of Syria's inde-pendence did not last long. Accusations cast on it that it was too moderateand did not prepare the country to fight the French brought about itsdownfall. On 3 May the task of forming a new government was assignedto the president of the Syrian Congress, HBshim al-Atasi. Two days laterRida was elected president of the Congress in his place. l9

IhZ , 2 3 5 (27 May 1922): pp. 392-3: 3 4 2 (13 June 1934): pp. 152-4.I 'The Nation and the Rule of the Tyrant', a/-bhv8~/-@'h!hq#(Beirut ed., 1970), pp. 145-6.Muhammad 'Abduh, A/-///Bm W8 / - & r& ? l ~ 8 m 8 s 8 / - h l W8/-M888nlhdCairo,367[11948]),I' Muhammad Rashid Rid& A l - f i f B h w af-fmZm8a/-Vzma(Cairo,341[11923]), pp. 5,15.CL a/-M88nB/,10:5 (1 1 July 1907): p. 342: 'Was not i t the secret political societies whichcleansed Europe of the tyranny of kings and popes, eliminated the governments of the nobility,and replaced them with republican and monarchic governments limited by laws and thesupremacyof the members of the nation council?'l9 Archives du Ministere de la Guerre, Service Historique de 1'Armee de Terre (Vincennes),6N189: 'Rapport hebdomadaire (Semaine du 4 au 10Mai [1920])'. FO 37115035: telegram 555G.G H Q Egypt to War Office (London) 13 May 1920. Le Temps 13 mai 1920. A/-Man#r34:2 (13

p. 84.

June 1934): pp. 156-7. A-Hakim, s&lw8W8/-53hdd f 8 9 h ; pp. 157, 160. Darwaza, ? y B d 8


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RASHID RIPA AND FAYSALS KINGDOM I N SYRIA 243All the members of the new government, except two, were membersof a / A t Z 2o However, during this period, the peak of a/AtWspower,

in which it in effect dictated the course of the Syrian state, there beganalso its disintegration. The first and foremost cause was the political dif-ferences of opinion that became apparent concerning the path that thestate should take, with the society divided in effect into two main streams:those identified with the aggressive nationalist line and those consideredmore moderate, of the type of al-Rikabi. (Izzat Darwaza, one of the promi-nent members of a/At#t during this period, relates that the disputeswere caused also by the very strength of the society and the desire ofgovernment officials to weaken it and thereby remove its yoke from theirshoulders. The internal confrontations sometimes took on a personal tone,and the society could no longer impose its view on government officialswho were members of it but did not obey its decisions. There were eventhose who openly withdrew from the society.

The deteriorating condition of a/-Fat% found clear expression inmid-June, when 40 of its members convened for a meeting, and in a dis-cussion headed by Rida dealt with means to repair the situation. It wasagreed among those present that the special status of the founders/a/-mu$ss%V..-those who entered the society before or during the war;the central committee of the society could be elected only from them)should be abolished and that an administrative council of 30 or more mem-bers should be elected from among the whole society. This council wouldthen elect from within a new central committee for the society. In an-other meeting presided over by Rid% it was decided that the memberswho agree to this proposal should sign a petition to be delivered to thepresent central committee of the society, and in which they would de-mand that it convene all the members within a week for a comprehensivediscussion on this question. Should the committee not do this then thesigners, being the majority, would themselves convene the meeting.

This crisis had no end because of the rapid events that began to unfoldin Syria during the following days, events which brought to an end boththe state and a/-Fafa%On 14 July General Gouraud, the French high com-

d f l n k a 8/19rabfhv, vol. 1, p. 122. Said, af-?%?wm d - h a b f M , vol. 2,pt. 1 , pp. 144-5.Qadri, Mudhdki>#tJ pp. 205, 207.Ri#i did not think highly of the new war minister, YUsuf al-Azma He blamed him forbehaving in his office like a dictator and not reporting to anyone, except perhaps for Faygal, onwhat he was doing. A year later, after the defeat of Maysaltin, RiQa wrote of him that his deathin that battle atoned for his sin of negligence that had originated from overconfidence andconceit. See d-Mn&22:6 (6 June 1921): p. 471./bid, 4:4 (7 August 1934): pp. 318-9 (excerpts from Rashid RiQHs diary 13 and 14 June1920). Damaza, ?F/sW/B d-flkcakaaL%abf&z, vol. 1, pp. 79-82, 86. a m a d b a t al-Azami,Af-Qu&va af-habi&z: AstrBbuhe Muqaddm#tuhd TBawwur#tah# waNata $uhABaghdiid,1350-1353 11931-1934),V O ~ .4, pp. 103-4.


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244 THE MUSLIM WORLDmissioner in Beirut, sent his famous ultimatum to Faysal, to the effect thathis forces would take over Syria by force unless the Arab governmentaccepted the French mandate without any reservations. When Gouraudsultimatum arrived, a delegation from the Independence Party, headed byRida, came to Faysal, and demanded that he replace the al-Atasi govern-ment with one more suited to the new situation, preferably one headed byYBsin al-Hashimi, the former chief of the general staff. Faysal answeredthem rudely that he would not act according to the opinion of any societyor party and not even according to the opinion of the Congress. RelatesRiga: I gave him an answer harder and ruder than his answer.22

Faygal decided to accept the ultimatum, but his acceptance reachedthe French too late; they in any case were determined to bring the inde-pendence of the Syrian state to an end On 24 July the French forces crushedthe Syrian army in Khan Maysalfin, and the next day they entered Dam-ascus. On 28 July Faysal left Syria. Rid& for his part, decided to leaveSyria after its occupation by the French, and return to Egypt. However,he was considered by the British high commissioner there a p e r s m a nongra& and it took Ridsquite a while until he managed to return to Egypt.23It is interesting to note, however, that it was precisely after the battle ofMaysaliin and the collapse of the Faygal regime in Syria that the activityand importance of the Syrian Union Party increased. This party decidedthen to be the coordinating body among the various Syrian and Palestin-ian nationalist organizations, which were suddenly left without backing.The president and vice-president of the party, Michel Lutf Allah and RashidRida, were also the president and vice-president of the Syrian-PalestinianCongress held by the party in 1921 in Geneva for a discussion of the newsituation created in Syria and Palestine. But this story already exceeds thescope of this article. 24

ConclusionIn 1920 the Muslim thinker Rashid Rida met with a member of the

Hashimite family for the third time, this time with Amir, later King, Faysal.This third encounter was also to be ended in tense relations. The situationthis time was entirely different from that which had been in the past. Itwas within the framework of the Syrian state which existed from October1918 until July 1920, and which at least for all practical purposes was

A/-Mm&23:4 (27 April 1922):p. 316.On the Syrian-Palestinian Congress of Geneva see Marie-RenCe Mouton, Le CongresSyrio-palestinicn de Genthe (1921), Rehhons fn/ernahonafeo/es,9 (1979), pp. 313-28. See also

dM8n&23:2 (27 February 1922):pp. 114-20 (anarticle by Rashid RidH on this subject).

23 Al-SharbaI, J?8.5hfd&y#, p. 156. A d a n , 8/-&9fl12fl85h/vfi#4 . 157.


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RAS HID RIDA A N D FAYSALS KINGDOM IN SYRIA 245independent. While in the past Rips strived to promote the idea of theArabs seceding from the Ottoman Empire and establishing a new pan-Arabempire, now he had to cope with the existence of an already independentseparate Syrian state. He did not abandon his Utopia of establishing thesingle great Arab state, or at least achieving union between the rulers ofthe Arabian Peninsula, yet in the current situation the more importanttask for him was to contribute to the formation of the new regime. Ridabecame one of the leading personalities among the nationalist circles inpostwar Syria, eventually being appointed president of the Syrian Con-gress. However, Ri$fs perceptions of what was the proper regime accord-ing to Islamic law, brought him to vigorously oppose any attempt by FayGalto rule autocratically, exchanging harsh words with him even on the eveof the final battle against the French. By doing this, Rids in effect fol-lowed what had been said in this regard by his two spiritual teachers,Jamal al-Din al-Afghani and Muhammad (Abduh. And as he himself put itin his later book on the issue of Caliphate: The rule over the nation is inits own hands. . and its government is a sort of a republic.Department of GeneralHiitocyBar-flan Unikersi?yRamat-Gan, firael

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