User:Al Ameer son/1860 Damascus massacre

Background

See also: 1860 Mount Lebanon civil war

War in Mount Lebanon and inter-communal tensions

Between May and June, a civil war in Mount Lebanon between Christians and Druze ended with a Druze rout of Christian militias and the destruction and massacre of Christian communities in the mountain and the adjacent Beqaa Valley. The initial reports in Damascus of the war's progress were generally sketchy but evolved into more graphic reports from Beirut-based newspapers. The reports were often distorted or amplified in mosques, churches, marketplaces and in neighborhoods throughout the city. In early June, the French and Belgian consuls of Damascus reported news of decisive Christian victories and the arrival of Druze reinforcements from the Hauran and Damascus. Soon, the stories were replaced by more accurate reports of decisive Druze victories and massacres against the Christians.

The news and rumors from Mount Lebanon heightened existing inter-communal tensions between Muslims and Christians in Damascus. Local Christians and European consuls feared Druze and Muslim plots against the Christian community, while local Muslims feared plots by the European powers, particularly France and Russia, and their perceived local sympathizers. The local Christian chronicler Mikhail Mishaqah expressed surprise at Muslim panic about the local Christians due to the major military advantage of local Muslims and the Ottoman authorities against the local Christians, who were largely unarmed. Rumors spread in the Christian community, including one in which the Druze requested the Ottoman governor of Damascus, Ahmad Pasha, to hand over 72 Christians who were wanted by the Druze. A related rumor among the Muslims held that 72 Christian notables had signed a petition calling for a Christian king to rule Zahle and Mount Lebanon. Other rumors circulating among the Muslim community regarded alleged Christian attacks on mosques.

As the war in Mount Lebanon began to spread to the Beqaa Valley, which was geographically closer to Damascus, a number of Damascenes volunteered or were dispatched to the battlefronts, including Muslims from the al-Salihiya quarter who marched towards the Melkite Christian town of Zahle, the last major Christian stronghold in the war, which was assaulted by the Druze on 18 June. A few days later, Muslims and Druze throughout Syria celebrated the fall of Zahle, a town viewed by many Damascene Muslims as "insolent and ambitious [sic]", according to the historian Leila Tarazi Fawaz. Fawaz asserts that the Damascene Muslims' rejoice at the fall of Zahle stemmed from what they believed was the end of Zahle's threats to the interests of Damascene grain and livestock merchants. Mishaqah wrote that the extent of the celebrations would lead one to believe that "the [Ottoman] Empire conquered Russia". Chaos spread in the Beqaa Valley in the aftermath of Zahle's fall, with Sunni and Shia Muslim bands, the latter led by the Harfush clan, raiding at least 34 Christian villages and attacking the local Ottoman garrison. Most Damascenes were not directly involved in the civil war in Mount Lebanon, but tensions in Damascus were raised by the arrival of Christian refugees.

Christian refugees in Damascus

The war precipitated an influx of Christian refugees to Damascus, mostly women and children and smaller numbers of adult males, from Hasbaya and Rashaya, two towns where Druze forces carried out massacres against Christians. Many Christians living in towns between Damascus and Mount Lebanon, such as Zabadani, also fled to Damascus due to the potential threat of attack by Druze forces. By the end of June, estimates of Christian refugees in Damascus ranged from 3,000 to 6,000, most of them from the Greek Orthodox denomination. In addition to the refugees, large numbers of Christian peasants from Mount Hermon who had traveled to work in the agricultural plains around Damascus and in the Hauran were unable to return due to the threat of violence and were stranded in Damascus. The influx of refugees and peasants caused overcrowding in Damascus, particularly in the city's Christian quarter, which had a demoralizing effect on the local Damascene Christians.

Damascene Christians, many of them poor themselves, helped care for the new arrivals, and much of the efforts to aid the refugees came from the city's Greek Orthodox and Melkite churches, but also from large contributions from some Muslim notables, such as Muhammad Agha Nimr, Abd Agha al-Tinawi, Muhammad Qatana, al-Sayyid Hasan and Abd al-Qadir al-Jaza'iri, an Algerian Sufi cleric who had previously led resistance against the French in Algeria. Aid for the refugees was the nonetheless insufficient and most refugees did not have shelter and slept in lanes between the churches and in stables. Although Muslim notables in the city contributed aid to the Christian refugees, the refugees were seen as a threat by some Damascene Muslims, according to Fawaz. There was a high incidence of random and hostile acts against Christians, particularly refugees, by Muslims. Violence became more common between June and early July, after news of Druze victories in Rashaya, Hasbaya and Zahle. According to Mishaqah, the anger towards the refugees by "ignorant" Damascene Druze and Muslims grew in the aftermath of the Druze victories.

Attempts to defuse tensions

Muslim notables such as Mahmud Effendi Hamza and Ahmad Hasibi u attempted to stop celebrations of Zahle's fall because they contributed to local Muslim-Christian tensions, but were unsuccessful. Hamza also attempted to mediate between the Druze and Christians in Zahle itself. The Muslim notable who organized the most concerted effort to reduce tensions was Abd al-Qadir. Using his status as a hero of Muslim resistance against the French in Algeria, he commenced diplomatic efforts and met with nearly every leader of the Muslim community in Damascus and its environs, from ulema (scholars), aghas (local paramilitary commanders) and village mukhtars (headmen). He also met regularly with the French consul in Damascus, Michel Lanusse, and persuaded him to fund efforts to arm about 1,000 of his men, mostly Algerians, who he tasked with defending the local Christians. On 19 June he began efforts to set up the defense of the Christian quarter in case of attack, but while he attempted to secretly prepare the defenses, local residents were likely still aware of his activities.

Ahmad Pasha, the governor of Damascus, assigned more guards to the Christian quarter in early June and prohibited weapons sales to the Druze and Christian belligerents in Mount Lebanon. European consuls requested that he help bring Christian survivors of the massacres in Hasbaya and Rashaya to Damascus and to reinforce the Ottoman garrisons in the Beqaa Valley. The European consuls also tasked Yorgaki, the vice-consul of Greece and a Turkish speaker, with conveying their concerns to him about the danger posed to Christians amid the hostile environment in the city. The most alarmed European consul was Lanusse, who firmly believed there was a great danger posed to the Christians and "predicted the worst", according to Fawaz. His concerns were generally not shared by the other European consuls. In the opinion of the British consul, James Brant, while there were acts of hostility, verbal abuse and ill-treatment if Christians, there was "no fear" of Muslims harming Christians in the city particularly if the Ottoman authorities intervened. Brant and the other consuls were generally content with Ahmad Pasha's repeated reassurances that the situation in Damascus was under control. In early July, Ahmad Pasha had 14 cannons installed at the Citadel of Damascus and a cannon installed at the gate of the Umayyad Mosque and other mosques during Friday prayer as a means of deterrence.

Local Christian fears of attack increased during the celebrations of Zahle's fall, and the tension became more acute in late June as the four-day Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha approached. Many Christians stayed home during this time and avoided visits to public places, relinquished rights to monetary debts owed them by Muslims and did not attend their jobs during the Eid festivities, bringing the local government to a standstill as most government clerks in the city were Christians. Eid passed without incident, and Abd al-Qadir received assurances from all the local Muslim leaders that they would keep order in the city, and Muslim notables, such as Mustafa Bey al-Hawasili, personally guaranteed the safety of Christians in meetings with the notables of the Christian quarters, including Hanna Frayj, Antun Shami and Mitri Shalhub. As a result, a sense of calm was restored to the city for eight days and Christians returned to their shops, professions and schools by 9 July.

Prelude

On 8 July or 9 July, a group of Muslim boys, some the sons of Muslim notables, engaged in acts of vandalism against Christian property or otherwise targeted Christians, such as marking Christian houses and drawing crosses on the ground throughout the city's neighborhoods so that it would be inevitable that Christian pedestrians would step on their religions symbols. Frayj, Shami and Shalhub complained to Governor Ahmad Pasha about the incidents, prompting the latter to seek out the boys and publicly punish them. A few were arrested, shackled and sent to the Christian quarter with brooms to sweep the streets.

As the boys were led to the Christian quarter, Muslim onlookers inquired about the situation and Abd al-Karim al-Samman, a brother one of the arrested boys, yelled at the Ottoman guards to release the boys, and proceeded to chase after them with a stick. Al-Samman, who was thereafter known as al-sha'al (the fire starter), was joined by his kinsmen, neighbors, friends and passersby, who beat the guards and released the boys. Al-Samman then urged the crowd to revolt and mete out vengeance on the Christians.

Massacre

First day

Following al-Samman's speech, the occupants of the shops around the Umayyad Mosque formed a mob and headed for the Christian quarter yelling out anti-Christian slogans. A captain of local irregulars, Salim Agha al-Mahayani, may have led the initial crowds to the Christian quarter. News of the events spread throughout the city and its suburbs, and crowds from al-Midan, al-Salihiya, al-Shaghour, and Jaramana marched towards the Christian quarters. The crowds, estimated to at 20,000 to 50,000-strong (the figures were likely smaller than the crowds' actual size), were made up of Muslim and Druze peasants, Kurdish irregulars, and ruffians from the city quarters. They were largely armed with sticks and clubs, although a few carried axes, pistols or muskets. The overwhelming majority of Christians in the city were unarmed, with the exception of a few pistols.

The gates of the Aqsab Mosque leading to the Christian quarter were broken down by Kurdish irregulars from al-Salihiya and as the mob approached the quarter, its Ottoman guards were ordered to fire into the crowds and to fire cannon shells into the air by their commander, Salih Zaki Bey Miralay. Two rioters were killed or wounded and the crowds briefly desisted. However, some rioters set alight the roof of the Greek Orthodox church and the local bazaar, and the ensuing flames prompted others to follow and set alight homes in the quarter. By mid-day, Miralay and his soldiers were ordered to withdraw from their positions. Ottoman officers began to lose control of their soldiers, some of whom joined or led the rioters. An officer of Kurdish irregulars and son of Shamdin Agha, Muhammad Sa'id Bey, began to kill, rape and loot in the Christian quarter. Al-Hawasili attempted to intervene and hold back the crowds, but his own soldiers abandoned him and joined in the riots. Besides al-Hawasili's failed attempt, no Ottoman military or political official attempted a significant intervention in the first few days of the riots.

Although the mob targeted several different areas at the same, in general, the first homes to be targeted were those of the wealthier Christians, followed by the neighboring Christian homes. Typically, the rioters broke down the homes' doors, attacked the men with their various weapons, and looted anything of value, to the point where houses were stripped of windows, doors, paneling and floor tiles. Women and children were threatened if they would not inform the mob about the whereabouts of the household's adult men or hidden jewelry, and at times girls and young women were abducted. After a particular house was plundered, it would be set alight. Irregular troops took the lead and priority in the plunder and they were followed by others in the mob. After the homes were burned, Greek Orthodox, Melkite and Armenian churches were looted. At some point, a hospice for lepers was burned down with its residents still inside.

The foreign consulates were also assaulted, with Russian consulate plundered and burned and its dragoman, Khalil Shehadi, killed. Afterward, the French consulate, which the rioters held in particular disdain, was burned down, followed by the Dutch, Austrian and Belgian consulates. The only two foreign consulates not targeted during the massacre were the English and Prussian consulates.

Second day

As most property had been looted and several hundred homes burned down during the first day, there was little property left to plunder on the second day. However, the rioters proceeded to loot Christian shops throughout the city's major bazaars. The Christians who remained in the quarter were largely in hiding for fear of attack. A brief lull in the violence began to set in during the first night and the second day.

Third day

On 11 July, the violence was renewed after rumors had spread that Christians had shot at a group of Muslims attempting to put out a fire that threatened to spread to the home of a Muslim religious sheikh, Abdallah al-Halabi. The Christians were apparently hired and armed by al-Halabi to guard his home from rioters and shot at the group of Muslim fire extinguishers by mistake, believing they were rioters. Some of the Muslims were wounded and the Christian shooters were killed. The incident elevated the intensity of the riots, according to Brant, who wrote that any Christian who was encountered by the mob was killed. Kurdish irregulars and local Muslims attempted to storm the home of Abd al-Qadir, where numerous Christians were being sheltered, but Abd al-Qadir emerged from the home with his men and threatened to fire up on them. The crowds subsequently moved on to several other Muslim homes where Christians were being hidden and the homeowners were threatened to hand over the Christians, hundreds of whom were seized and executed.

Last five days

The intensity of the killing and looting began to slow down on 12 July and tapered off completely by the 17 July.

Bibliography

• Farah, Caesar E.; Centre for Lebanese Studies (Great Britain) (2000). Politics of Interventionism in Ottoman Lebanon, 1830-1861. I. B. Tauris. ISBN 9781860640568.
• Fawaz, L.T. (1994). An Occasion for War: Civil Conflict in Lebanon and Damascus in 1860. University of California Press. ISBN 9780520087828. Retrieved 2015-04-16.