The Crusades of Palestine

A year after the capture of Jerusalem by the Crusaders, the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem was established (Christmas Day, 1100). Thereafter there was no effective check to the expansion of the Crusaders’ power until the capture of their stronghold at Edessa (modern Şanlıurfa, Turkey) by the atabeg (governor) of Mosul, ʿImād al-Dīn Zangī ibn Aq Sonqur, in 1144. Zangī’s anti-Crusader campaign was carried on after his death by his son Nūr al-Dīn Maḥmūd (Nureddin) and, more effectively, by the sultan Ṣalāh al-Dīn Yūsuf ibn Ayyūb (commonly known in the West as Saladin), a protégé of the atabeg’s family. After consolidating his position in Egypt and Syria, Saladin waged relentless war against the “infidel” Franks (Western Christians). On July 4, 1187, six days after the capture of Tiberias, he dealt the Crusaders a crushing blow at the decisive Battle of Ḥaṭṭīn (Ḥiṭṭīn). Most of Palestine was once again Muslim. Further attempts by the Crusaders to regain control of Palestine proved ineffective, primarily because of incessant quarrels among the Crusaders themselves. Ironically, it was left to an emperor of dubious Christian standing, Frederick II, to negotiate in 1229, while under excommunication, a 10-year treaty that temporarily restored Jerusalem, Nazareth, and Bethlehem to the Christians. In 1244, however, the Ayyūbid sultan al-Ṣāliḥ Ayyūb definitively restored Jerusalem to Islam.

While the Ayyūbids of Saladin’s house were losing ground to the Turkish-speaking Mamlūks in Egypt, the Mongol sweep westward continued, placing the Crusaders, as it were, between two fires. To make matters worse, the Crusaders themselves were hopelessly riddled with dissension. In 1260 the Mamlūk leader Baybars I emerged as a champion of Muslim resurgence. After taking part in the defeat of the Mongols at the Battle of ʿAyn Jālūt in Palestine, he murdered the incumbent sultan and seized the throne; in the years 1263 to 1271 he carried out annual raids against the harassed Franks. His efforts were continued by the sultan al-Ashraf Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn Khalīl, during whose reign the last of the Crusaders were driven out of Acre (May 18, 1291). A chapter in the history of Palestine thus came to an end. The Mamlūks and subsequent Muslim regimes ruled the area with only brief interruptions for the next 600 years.

Palestine under the Mamlūks in the 14th century saw a period of prosperity for some; this was especially notable in Jerusalem, where the government sponsored an elaborate program to construct schools, establish lodgings for travelers and Muslim pilgrims, and renovate mosques. Tax revenues, collected mainly from the villages, were spent largely on support of religious institutions. Palestine formed a part of the district of Damascus, second only to Egypt in the Mamlūk domains. The region suffered the ravages of several epidemics, including the great pestilence, the same Black Death that in 1347–51 devastated Europe. The fall of the Baḥrī Mamlūks and the rise of the Burjī Mamlūks (1382–1517) contributed to a gradual economic deterioration and a decrease in security. During the reigns of the second Burjī sultan, Faraj (1399–1405 and 1405–12), the last onslaught of the Mongols, which made the name of Timur (Tamerlane) a synonym of destruction and plunder, took place. Although Palestine was spared the pillage of his hordes, it could not escape its disastrous repercussions as the Mamlūks moved through in a vain attempt to defend Damascus against the invader. The death of Timur in 1405, and the weakness of Iran in the ensuing century, pitted the Mamlūks against the rising power of the Ottoman Empire for the control of western Asia. Hostilities broke out in 1486 when Sultan Qāʾit Bāy contested with Bayezid II the possession of some border towns. The climax came three decades later on August 24, 1516, when the Ottoman sultan, Selim I, routed the Mamlūk armies at the Battle of Marj Dābiq. Palestine began its four centuries under Ottoman domination.

Ottoman rule

Under the Ottoman Turks, Palestine continued to be linked administratively to Damascus until 1830, when it was placed under Sidon, then under Acre, then once again under Damascus until 1887–88, at which time the administrative divisions of the Ottoman Empire were settled for the last time. Palestine was divided into the districts of Nablus and Acre, both of which were linked with the province of Beirut and the autonomous district of Jerusalem, which dealt directly with Istanbul. With varying fortunes often accompanied by revolts, massacres, and wars, the first three centuries of Ottoman rule isolated Palestine from most outside influences. The prosperity of 16th-century Ottoman Palestine was followed by an economic and political decline in the 17th century. Ottoman control in the 18th century was indirect. Ḍāhir al-ʿUmar (c. 1737–75) dominated the political life of northern Palestine for nearly 40 years. Aḥmad al-Jazzār, the Ottoman governor of Acre, had control of most of Palestine, and in 1799, with English and Ottoman help, he successfully defended Acre against Napoleon I.

Both Ḍāhir and al-Jazzār presided over a tightly controlled Palestine, where trade with Europe as well as taxation were growing. They used their new wealth from these sources to gain influence in Istanbul, which allowed them to gain local autonomy and even intermittent control of many areas outside Palestine.

This period came to an end with Napoleon’s abortive attempt (1798–1801) to carve for himself a Middle Eastern empire. Egypt, always a determining factor in the fortunes of Palestine, was placed, after the French withdrawal, under the rule of the viceroy Muḥammad (Meḥmet) ʿAlī, who soon embarked on a program of expansion at the expense of his Ottoman overlord. In 1831 his armies occupied Palestine, and for nine years he and his son Ibrāhīm gave it a centralizing and modernizing administration. Their rule increasingly opened the country to Western influences and enabled Christian missionaries to establish many schools; at the same time, however, taxes were increased, and urban rebellions broke out against the harshness of the regime. When in 1840 the British, the Austrians, and the Russians came to the aid of the Ottomans, the Egyptians were forced to withdraw, and Palestine reverted to the Ottoman Empire. Increased European interest, however, led the powers to establish consulates in Jerusalem and in Palestine’s port cities.

After 1840 the reforms the sultan promulgated gradually took effect in Palestine. Increased security in the countryside and the Ottoman Land Law of 1858 encouraged the development of private property, agricultural production for the world market, the decline of tribal social organization, growth of the population, and the enrichment of the notable families. As the Ottomans extended the central government’s new military, municipal, judicial, and educational systems to Palestine, the country also witnessed a marked increase in foreign settlements and colonies—French, Russian, and German. By far the most important, in spite of their initial numerical insignificance, were the Jewish agricultural settlements, which foreshadowed later Zionist endeavours to establish a Jewish national home and still later a Jewish state (Israel) in Palestine. The earliest of these settlements was founded by Russian Jews in 1882. In 1896 Theodor Herzl issued a pamphlet entitled Der Judenstaat (The Jewish State) and advocated an autonomous Jewish state, preferably in Palestine. Two years later he himself went to Palestine to investigate its possibilities and, possibly, to seek the help of the German emperor William II, who was then making a spectacular pilgrimage to the Holy Land.