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 WAR, OPPRESSION AND PESTILENCE

bright July day in 1908 the world was startled by the news that the long tyrannical rule of Abd-al-Hamid was approaching its end. A coup staged by officers in his own army had been successful. It was the work of the Com- mittee of Union and Progress, the striking arm of a secretly organized society, known as the Young Turks, which had had its inception years before at Geneva through the activity of students and youthful reformers and was later moved to Paris. It aimed at a constitution with an elective parliament and the building up of a homogeneous democratic state. Wily Abd-al-Hamid reacted favourably, restored the parlia- ment of 1876, ordered the abolition of espionage and censor- ship and the release of all political prisoners. A wave of jubilation spread over the Arab world. In Damascus, Beirut, Aleppo, Jerusalem and other towns the new measures were hailed with fireworks, bonfires and eloquent orations. It was the dawn of a new day. Ottoman Utopia lurked round the corner. Syria sent delegates to the parliament. Its nationalists founded in Constantinople the Arab-Ottoman fraternity to promote the new cause. But the sultan had no more intention of preserving this democratic paraphernalia of 1908 than that of 1876. The early constitution had been drafted by one of the most liberal-minded Turks of his day, Midhat Pasha, then grand vizir and later governor of Syria. Caught staging with reactionaries a counter-revolution in April 1909, Abd-al-Hamid was replaced by his doddering brother, Muhammad Rashad. Authority lodged in the hands of a military triumvirate of the committee.

With more zeal than experience the new regime em- barked upon a policy of centralization of power, Ottomaniza- Rh