THE TURKS AND THE ARABS.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR.'l SIR,—Having just returned from eight months' travelling under the Crescent and the Star in Turkish Arabia and Syria, perhaps the following remarks of mine on the above subject may be of some interest to students of Turkish affairs.
To put the matter shortly, the Arabs hate the Turks. This of course is nothing new, and has always been the case; but it might be thought that the new (so-called) Constitutional Government might have in some way changed this state of affairs for the better. But far from it ; and the enmity which the Arabs bear towards the present Government is just as Litter as that which they bore towards the old regime, if not more so. And the reasons for this are not far to seek. Both in Baghdad and Damascus I talked with .many Arabs of position and respectability—who had indeed actively helped to bring about the Constitution—and the tale was always the same : sooner or later we came round to their grievances against the Government. Of course many opinions were expressed of varying bitterness, and many complaints -were aired, but the chief grounds for discontent seemed to be the following i—(1) The Arabs are inadequately represented in the Parliament at Constantinople. (2) Almost all the local posts of any value and influence are filled by Turks, who do not understand a word of Arabic. (8) The Turks are making gnat-offal-to to kill the Arabic language by refusing to allow it being extensively taught in schools, and by making Turkish the official language of the Courts of Justice.
As far -as I could ascertain locally, these grievances were- perfectly well grounded. Both in the districts of Baghdad and Damascus, particularly the latter, almost all the posts' of any importance were held by Turks, who knew not a word of Arabic, and had absolutely no intention of trying to learn. All the business transacted in the Courts of these officials has; of course, to be conducted in Turkish, and as but an infini- tesimal fraction of . the lower classes of Arabs know Turkish.. the delays, confusions, and miscarriages of justice may be- imagined. Those who have business in the Courts, and do- not know Turkish, have, of course, to get their petitions. written and their causes pleaded by those who do, and these,. the half-educated hangers-on of the Courts, naturally make it their business to fleece their patrons to the best of their ability. Moreover, once the case is started the unfortunate ligitants have no means of following the proceedings, except through the medium of a third. party. As can be imagined,. the whole system lays itself open to the- encouragement of a. multitude of abuses great and small.
The attempt to kill -the Arabic language by substituting' Turkish for it in the primary schools is a particularly sore point among the Arabs. There is no people which has a more sensitive national feeling, or which is more justly proud of its. beautiful language, than the Arab ; and to see their children forced to substitute for it an inferior production like Turkish —which owes whatever merits it may possess to its parent Arabic—is gall and wormwood to the descendants of the Prophet. And this mention of the Prophet brings in the crux of the language question. Arabic is of course, as every one knows, the sacred language of Islam. It is the medium in which the Koran is written, the language chosen by God in which to communicate His will to Mohammed, the language- in which all prayers are offered up by good Mohammedans all over the world, whatever may be their mother-tongue. The greatest asset which the Turks themselves have as a means of binding their vast overgrown Empire together is the intense living belief which so many millions of their subjects. of whatever nationality, bare in -Islam. Yet here they are- endeavouring to stamp it out. Kill Arabic and you kill Mohammedanism. Already there is a large and growing party, headed by reactionaries religious and political, which says that the .present Constitution is against the Religion& law, and of course their hands will be materially strengthened by being able to point to the threatened destruction of the holy language. The Bedouin of the desert have always been inveterate foes of the Turkish Government, and if the new regime by its highhanded tactless military despotism is going to alienate in addition the Arabs of the towns, the outlook for Turkish Arabian Policy is not very bright, to say the least of
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