Faisal I of Iraq

Participation in the Paris Peace Conference

In 1919, Emir Faisal led the Arab delegation to the Paris Peace Conference and, with the support of the knowledgeable and influential Gertrude Bell, argued for the establishment of independent Arab emirates for the predominantly Arab areas previously held by the Ottoman Empire.

Greater Syria

British and Arab forces took Damascus in October 1918, which was followed by the Armistice of Mudros. With the end of Turkish rule that October, Faisal helped set up an Arab government, under British protection, in Arab controlled Greater Syria. In May 1919, elections were held for the Syrian National Congress, which met the following month.

Faisal–Weizmann Agreement

On 4 January 1919, Emir Faisal and Chaim Weizmann, President of the Zionist Organization,^[12] signed the Faisal–Weizmann Agreement for Arab-Jewish Cooperation, in which Faisal conditionally accepted the Balfour Declaration, an official declaration on behalf of the British government by Arthur Balfour, promising British support to the development of a Jewish homeland in Palestine.^[13] Once Arab states were granted autonomy from the European powers, years after the Faisal-Weizmann Agreement, and these new Arab nations were recognized by the Europeans, Weizmann argued that since the fulfillment was kept eventually, the agreement for a Jewish homeland in Palestine still held.^[14] In truth, however, this hoped-for partnership had little chance of success and was a dead letter by late 1920. Faisal had hoped that Zionist influence on British policy would be sufficient to forestall French designs on Syria, but Zionist influence could never compete with French interests.^{[citation needed]} At the same time Faisal failed to enlist significant sympathy among his Arab elite supporters for the idea of a Jewish homeland in Palestine, even under loose Arab suzerainty.

Following the decisions taken by the San Remo conference in April 1920, on 13 May 1920, Lord Allenby forwarded to the British War Cabinet a letter from Faisal which stated his opposition to the Balfour proposal to establish a homeland for the Jews in Palestine.^[15][16]

Accession to the Iraqi throne

In 1920, Iraqis gathered in sociable meetings in coffeehouses and tents during the winter of 1920 to discuss which form of government and leader the new Iraqi state should have.^[18] The British government, mandate holders in Iraq, were concerned at the unrest in the colony. They decided to step back from direct administration and create a monarchy to head Iraq while they maintained the mandate.^[19] The idea was to set up a native leader who would be popular among the Iraqi people while still maintaining close relations with the British government.^[18]

In March 1921, at the Cairo Conference, the British decided that Faisal was a good candidate for ruling the British Mandate of Iraq because of his apparent conciliatory attitude towards the Great Powers and based on advice from T. E. Lawrence (more commonly known as Lawrence of Arabia). But, in 1921, few people living in Iraq even knew who Faisal was or had ever heard his name. With help of British officials, including Gertrude Bell, he successfully campaigned among the Arabs of Iraq and won over the popular support of the minority Sunni. However, the Shia majority were at first lukewarm about Faisal, and his appearance at the port of Basra was met with indifference.^[20] From 23 April to 8 May 1921, Iraqis including most notably Nuri Pasha al-Sa'id would send telegrams to Faisal, inviting him to Iraq as its prospective king. Between May and June, Faisal sent representatives to confirm his election.^[21]

On 12 June 1921, Faisal left Jeddah for Iraq alongside several Iraqi nobles and Sir Kinahan Cornwallis on the RIMS Northbrook, and on 23 June, Faisal first landed in Iraq on the main port of Basra.^[22] Faisal's arrival was met with a mixed response, while most Iraqis welcomed him in large numbers and groups, some people, especially the Ulama' at Najaf and the tribesman of Southern Iraq, including Samawah, were either disappointed or hostile which shocked Faisal. Despite this, the Mayor of Baghdad at the time sent a telegram to greet Faisal. The city of Hillah also welcomed him. When Faisal arrived in Baghdad on 26 June, he was widely welcomed by Baghdadis. The next day, an ovation was given to him in al-Kadhimiyya, where he prayed at its main mosque and was welcomed.^[23]

Faisal became a candidate for King of Iraq alongside other candidates such as the Sayyid Muhammad al-Sadr, and Ali Jawdat al-Ayyubi.^[22] Following a plebiscite showing 96% in favor, Faisal agreed to become king. On 23 August 1921, he was made king of Iraq. Iraq was a new entity created out of the former Ottoman vilayets (provinces) of Mosul, Baghdad and Basra. Ottoman vilayets were usually named after their capital, and thus the Basra vilayet was southern Iraq. Given this background, there was no sense of Iraqi nationalism or even Iraqi national identity when Faisal took his throne.^[19] Anecdotally, the band present played God Save the King, as Iraq did not yet have a national anthem and would not have one until 1932.^[24]

Reign

During his reign as King, Faisal encouraged pan-Arab nationalism that envisioned ultimately bringing the French mandates of Syria and Lebanon together with the British mandate of Palestine under his rule. Faisal was keenly aware that his power-base was with the Sunni Muslim Arabs of Iraq, who comprised a significant minority.^[25] By contrast, if Syria, Lebanon and Palestine were incorporated into his realm, then the Sunni Muslim Arabs would comprise the majority of his subjects, making the Arab Shi'i Muslim and the ethnic Kurds of Iraq into minorities.^[25] Furthermore, the Arab Shi'i Muslims of Iraq at the time had traditionally looked towards Persia for leadership, and the rallying cry of Pan-Arabism might unite the Arab Sunnis and Shi'a around a common sense of Arab identity.^[26] In Iraq, a majority of the Arabs were Shi'i Muslims who had not responded to the call for Sharif Hussein to join the "Great Arab Revolt" as the Sharif was a considered a Sunni Muslim from the Hejaz, thus making him a double outsider.^[10] Rather than risk the wrath of the Ottomans on behalf of an outsider like Hussein, the Shi'i Muslims of Iraq had ignored the Great Arab Revolt.^[10] In the Ottoman Empire, the state religion was Sunni Islam and the Shi'i Muslim had been marginalized for their religion, making the Shia population poorer and less educated than the Sunni population.^{[citation needed]}

Faisal himself was a tolerant man, proclaiming himself a friend of the Shi'i Muslim, Kurdish and Jewish communities in his realm, and in 1928 criticized the policy of some of his ministers of seeking to fire all Jewish Iraqis from the civil service, but his policy of promoting pan-Arab nationalism to further his personal and dynastic ambitions proved to be a disruptive force in Iraq as it drew a wedge between the Arab and Kurdish communities.^[27] Faisal's policy of equating wataniyya ("patriotism" or in this case Iraqiness) with being Arab marginalized the Kurds who feared that they had no place in an Arab-dominated Iraq, indeed in a state that equated being Iraqi with being Arab.^[27]

Faisal also developed desert motor routes from Baghdad to Damascus, and Baghdad to Amman. This led to a great interest in the Mosul oilfield and eventually to his plan to build an oil pipeline to a Mediterranean port, which would help Iraq economically. This also led to an increase in Iraq's desire for more influence in the Arab East. During his reign, Faisal made great effort to build Iraq's army into a powerful force. He attempted to impose universal military service in order to achieve this, but this failed. Some see this as part of his plan to advance his pan-Arab agenda.^{[citation needed]}

During the Great Syrian Revolt against French rule in Syria, Faisal was not particularly supportive of the rebels partly because of British pressure, partly because of his own cautious nature, and mainly because he had reason to believe that the French were interested in installing a Hashemite to govern Syria on their behalf.^[28] In 1925, after the Syrian Druze uprising, the French government began consulting Faisal on Syrian matters. He advised the French to restore Hashemite power in Damascus. The French consulted Faisal because they were inspired by his success as an imposed leader in Iraq. As it turned out, the French were merely playing Faisal along as they wished to give him the impression that he might be restored as king of Syria to dissuade him from supporting the Syrian rebels, and once they crushed the Syrian revolt, they lost interest in having a Hashemite rule in Syria.^[29]

Faisal saw the Anglo-Iraqi Treaty of 1930 as an obstacle to his pan-Arab views, although it provided Iraq with a degree of political independence. He wanted to make sure that the treaty had a built-in end date because the treaty further divided Syria and Iraq, the former which was under French control, and the latter under British rule. This prevented unity between two major Arab regions, which were important in Faisal's pan-Arab agenda. Ironically, Arab nationalists in Iraq had a positive reception to the treaty because they saw this as progress, which seemed better than the Arab situation in Syria and Palestine. Faisal's schemes for a greater Iraqi-Syrian state under his leadership attracted much opposition from Turkey, which preferred to deal with two weak neighbors instead of one strong one, and from King Fuad I of Egypt and Ibn Saud of Hejaz and Nejd, who both saw themselves as the rightful leaders of the Arab world.^[30] When Nuri al-Said visited Yemen in May 1931 to ask the Imam Yahya Muhammad Hamid ed-Din if he was interested in joining the "Arab Alliance" under Faisal's leadership, the Imam replied with a confused look what would be the purpose of the "Arab Alliance" and to please explain the meaning of the phrase "Arab World", which he was unfamiliar with.^[31]

Relations with religious groups

Faisal regularly attended Friday prayers as it helped him meet with the public Iraqi people more.^[32] Faisal was noticeably unaffected by sectarian considerations, and was noted by al-Rihani to have a faith that reflected all Islamic dominations, which made him respect, and be tolerant to all world religions. Abbas Baghdadi, a young writer, recounted how Faisal would pull up in the Arab attire to the al-Sarai Mosque for Friday Prayers, which was decided to be the main Friday Prayers mosque. Faisal has also ordered the reconstruction of Sufi shrines in Mosul such as the tekke of the Shadhili Order.^[36] Faisal also met with leaders of smaller religious communities such as chief Rabbis from both Baghdad and Mosul.^[37]

Faisal had great tolerance for Shi'i Muslims and was a component of inter-faith.^[33] Faisal's main link with the community was the Sayyid Muhammad al-Sadr, who was one of the only people who could enter the king's prescience without further notice.^[34] Faisal always wanted to remind Shi'i Muslims of his linage to Ali. Due to this, his coronation took place on 18 Dhu al-Hijja according to the Islamic Calendar, which coincided with Eid al-Ghadir.^[38] Throughout his reign, especially in his early days, Faisal had wanted to increase the prescience of Shi'i Muslims in administrations. Example being the hiring of Tawfiq al-Suwaidi in the Baghdadi Law College, accepting qualifications of Shi'i Muslim-based schools, help fund the commemorating of Muharram,^[39] working with Ayatollah Medhi al-Khalissi who was a friend of Sharif Hussein, and visiting Najaf and Karbala to strengthen his position. Reportedly, Faisal once told Sir Percy Cox that the Iraqi Shi'i Muslim Mujtahideen were prepared to back him up.^[40]

In March 1932, just months before independence, Faisal wrote a memorandum where he criticized the Iraqi people's lack of Iraqi national identity in the newly established country, writing:

Iraq is a kingdom ruled by a Sunni Arab government founded on the wreckage of Ottoman rule. This government rules over a Kurdish segment, the majority of which is ignorant, that includes persons with personal ambitions who lead it to abandon it [the government] under the pretext that it does not belong to their ethnicity. [The government also rules over] an ignorant Shiite majority that belongs to the same ethnicity of the government, but the persecutions that had befallen them as a result of Turkish rule, which did not enable them to take part in governance and exercise it, drove a deep wedge between the Arab people divided into these two sects. Unfortunately, all of this made this majority, or the persons who harbor special aspirations, the religious among them, the seekers of posts without qualification, and those who did not benefit materially from the new rule, to pretend that they are still being persecuted because they are Shiites.^[41]

Palestinian issue

In 1929, when bloody rioting broke out in Jerusalem between the Arab and Jewish communities, Faisal was highly supportive of the Arab position and pressured the British for a pro-Arab solution of the Palestine crisis.^[43] In a memo stating his views on Palestine submitted to the British high commissioner Sir Hubert Young on 7 December 1929, Faisal accepted the Balfour Declaration, but only in the most minimal sense in that the declaration had promised a "Jewish national home".^[30] Faisal stated he was willing to accept the Palestine Mandate as a "Jewish national home" to which Jews fleeing persecution around the world might go, but he was adamant that there be no Jewish state.^[30] Faisal argued that the best solution was for Britain to grant independence to Palestine, which would be united in a federation led by his brother, the Emir Abdullah of Trans-Jordan, which would allow for a Jewish "national home" under his sovereignty.^[44]

Faisal argued that what was needed was a compromise under which the Palestinians would give up their opposition to Jewish immigration to Palestine in exchange for which the Zionists would give up their plans to one day create a Jewish state in the Holy Land.^[30] Faisal's preferred solution to the "Palestine Question", which he admitted might not be practical at the moment, was for a federation that would unite Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Palestine under his leadership.^[30]