Waxing poetic about the Ottomans

A year ago, Istanbul entered my thoughts, not the modern metropolis of 13 plus million people, rather the idea of Istanbul. I started searching for work there via the internet, checking out rental rates in and around the city, transport and food prices, but it was just an idea, something to consider, an option to have.

Istanbul it seemed would never leave my thoughts and its path and mine would cross on several occasions. As a young kid I went with my parents on a summer vacation to Istanbul back in the early 80s. 

Several events conspired to bring me closer to this city, maybe it was fate, maybe God was trying to tell me something, whatever the reasons were, events have brought me closer to this city and to exploring my Ottoman heritage.

Being a Levantine Christian, such an idea as considering the Ottomans a part of our common regional heritage is simply unacceptable. Discussion of the Ottomans is nearly always done in disparaging and unflattering terms and includes the listing of their numerous crimes against the people of the region. Any discussion of the positive aspects of our Ottoman past is discouraged if not outright forbidden by social convention.

As a Christian I was taught to despise the Ottomans. But, like it or not, if you are a citizen of one of the many troubled and discombobulated Middle Eastern countries, Ottoman is part of your heritage as an Arab and as a Muslim. The Ottomans were heirs to the Muslim Caliphate. In Lebanon and Palestine, in Syria and Egypt and the Hejaz, they were not occupiers, although some think of them in those terms, they were part of this complex eastern realm, this beautiful tapestry of diversity and cultural richness. It is true they were brutal and undemocratic, but they were the dominant elite and behaved as any dominant elite would, but they were not occupiers.

I found that I am not alone in thinking the way I do. Many of the older Palestinians share the view that life under the Ottomans was happier, people were more prosperous, farmers worked the land, they grew and sold their produce freely, businesses flourished and border checks did not exist. This maybe due to the fact that Palestinians have never known a really good day since the Ottoman’s were evicted from Palestine by the British in World War I. Since then it was one bad day after the next, each one worse than the day before. And that’s not all; Palestinians have to bear the guilt that because of their unique and apparently insoluble problem their neighbors have also suffered instability and war.

So, when a story appeared on Facebook of a 125-year-old Palestinian it was not surprising to note that he had nothing but good things to say about the Ottoman era, and he should know! This, of course, is in direct opposition to the general view held by most Lebanese Christians, for example, who never miss an opportunity to remind anyone who would listen of the many injustices committed by the Ottomans.


Link to the story from Al Arabiya.net: http://english.alarabiya.net/en/life-style/2013/11/17/125-year-old-Palestinian-man-tells-memories-from-peaceful-days.html

I sometimes wonder how different the modern story of our long suffering region would have changed had the Ottoman Sultan not been week and ineffectual, but instead had not allowed quasi-fascist elements within the empire to take that ill fated decision of entering WWI on the side of Germany and Austria. Would we still be citizens of an empire, would we still be Ottomans? I wonder.

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