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Arabs

Page 79

by Tim Mackintosh-Smith


  Ikhwan (‘the Brethren’): the Egyptian-based al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun, ‘the Muslim Brotherhood’, share a name and Wahhabi leanings with the Saudi Ikhwan, but usually not the latter’s mad-eyed scariness.

  Language is the ummah . . . class and politics: Suleiman, pp. 99–100.

  al-Yaziji’s great ode . . . and your fame: cf. p. 10, above.

  Turks like Bajkam . . . off the throne: pp. 305–6, above.

  a great historical experience . . . all Arabs: quoted in Albert Hourani, pp. 404–5.

  Sati’ al-Husri . . . theorists of Arab nationalism: Suleiman, pp. 127–32.

  With Arab nationalism we are back at our starting point: Dunlop, p. 25.

  that treasure . . . buried by the king of al-Hirah: pp. 84–5, above.

  the Arab Awakening . . . has yet to become a reality: Jabiri, p. 347.

  retreat from modernity: Adonis, Poetics, p. 77; cf. p. 375, above.

  returned the present to the past: Adonis, Thabit I, p. 41.

  Whoever today can read Nizar Qabbani . . . in other cultures: Kilito, p. 10.

  When Arabs write . . . non-native: Ibn Khaldun, Muqaddimah, pp. 439–41.

  The distance . . . to written Arabic: on the distance between dialects themselves, Versteegh says it ‘is as large as that between the Germanic languages and the Romance languages . . . if not larger.’ Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 98. I feel this is an exaggeration.

  the ‘ideal self’ . . . expressed in colloquial: Shouby, pp. 301–2.

  In the language . . . to my individual self: Adonis, Thabit III, pp. 220–1.

  dead language that refuses to die: Bowles, p. 294.

  We do not live in a land, but in a language: al-Marzuqi (aljazeera.net).

  the Arabic Adam . . . everything in creation: Qur’an, 2:31.

  the greatest literary product . . . finished in 1767: Jabarti II, pp. 105–8.

  Anything post-classical . . . excluded from the dictionary: cf. EI2 X, p. 240.

  Damascus to Baghdad . . . in the early twentieth century: Atiyah, p. 89.

  ‘Pendulum’ . . . in Syria: Chejne, p. 157.

  it ousted . . . irziz (‘tremor, thunder’): Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 181.

  jammaz . . . gave way to the loan taramway: Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 181; Chejne, p. 152.

  ‘Revolution’ began as fitnah: Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 174.

  ‘Republic’ . . . as mashyakhah (‘shaykhdom’): EI2 VI, pp. 725–6.

  ‘Citizens’ . . . ‘fellow-countrymen’: cf. Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 174.

  In practice, even ‘republics’ have subjects, not citizens: cf. Kassir, p. 26.

  When will we learn our rights and responsibilities?: quoted in Kilito, p. 68.

  the Syrian Garden of News: Abu-Absi, p. 347, n. 3.

  3,000 in the USA alone at the same time: Whitman, p. 355. The figure of 3,000 was for 1856.

  One newspaper . . . was written in verse: Suleiman, p. 89.

  No self-respecting writer . . . rhymed prose: Huart, pp. 444–5.

  expressions like ‘revolution’ . . . in the Arabic press: Cioeta, passim.

  Istanbul began to impose its language on its Arab domains: Carmichael, pp. 304–5; Rogan, pp. 182–3.

  Arabic was banned . . . except as a ‘foreign’ language: Suleiman, pp. 79 and 85–8.

  Abbasid Arabism . . . Turkish counterpart: cf. Suleiman, p. 91.

  several of them launched . . . direct Ottoman rule: cf. Ajami, Dream Palace, p. 297; Atiyah, p. 84.

  These new Arabic vocal organs . . . all political hues: EI2 II, pp. 466–7.

  they discouraged . . . new Qur’an schools: Haeri, p. 70.

  they attempted to ban . . . dialect instead: Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 132.

  they promoted the Berber . . . cultures of the region: Atiyah, pp. 137–8.

  rather as Persian . . . dominance in Arabic: cf. Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 198.

  the staff of the Moroccan bureaux . . . the office: Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 200.

  Algerian radio . . . was mostly in the colloquial: Atiyah, p. 204.

  Ben Bella . . . had to have an Arabic tutor: Chejne, p. 109.

  the Algerian National Assembly . . . in French: Versteegh, Arabic Language, pp. 200–1.

  banners and placards . . . freedom of speech: Suleiman, p. 83.

  Ahmad Shawqi . . . exiled to Barcelona: EI2 IX, p. 229.

  in the anti-British uprising . . . the roofs of cars: EI2 IX, p. 230.

  The nation-state . . . in Islamic theory and practice: Allawi, p. 46.

  Islamic constitutional theory . . . not with territory: EI2 X, p. 127.

  from the 1870s . . . holidays in France: Ajami, Dream Palace, pp. 35–6.

  ‘a virtual epidemic’ . . . particularly in Lebanon: EI2 V, p. 1253.

  perhaps one-quarter of the total population: Rogan, p. 265.

  Estimates of how many … ‘almost half’: EI2 V, p. 1253.

  the total of Lebanese migrants . . . by 1914: Albert Hourani, p. 294.

  a Syrian-Lebanese quarter sprouted in . . . ‘Nayy Yark’: Rawaa Talass, ‘Nayy Yark’ (unpublished dissertation), Dubai, 2014.

  ‘Egyptian’ (in fact Lebanese) . . . Manolo Saleh: Salman Rushdie, The Jaguar Smile: A Nicaraguan Journey, Picador, London, 1987, p. 75.

  Jubran Khalil Jubran: often spelled, including by himself, ‘Gibran Kahlil Gibran’.

  a founder of poetic modernism in Arabic: cf. Adonis, Thabit IV, pp. 140–2.

  You are neighbours . . . vault of space: quoted in Adonis, Thabit IV, p. 146.

  go from place to place . . . its grave: quoted in Adonis, Thabit IV, p. 187.

  today’s border-beset age . . . into ‘Nayy Yark’: almost the first of Donald Trump’s acts as president was to ban all visitors from seven Muslim-majority countries entering the United States.

  The traveller’s passport . . . equally well: Baedeker, Palestine and Syria, 1876, ‘Passports and Custom House’.

  A joint commission . . . of a divided Yemen: Dresch, History of Modern Yemen, pp. 10–11.

  Kaiser Wilhelm II . . . Berlin–Baghdad line: Carmichael, p. 302.

  post-Second World War . . . eventually withered: Searight, pp. 249–50.

  clandestine approaches . . . anti-Ottoman face: Atiyah, pp. 91–2.

  in AD 1916, Husayn . . . ‘King of the Arabs’: Carmichael, p. 319.

  he used the style, ‘King of the Arab Lands’: EI2 III, p. 263.

  Their responses to Husayn were . . . ambiguous: cf. Atiyah, pp. 92–4.

  H.M. Government view . . . in Palestine: quoted in Atiyah, pp. 102–3.

  a mischievous political creed . . . anti-Semitism: quoted in Gilmour, p. 481.

  the Yemeni island of Socotra: Doreen Ingrams IX, pp. 737–8; Mackintosh-Smith, Yemen, p. 239.

  Britain’s championing . . . commonly thought to have been: Karsh, p. 193.

  The agreement . . . having permanent influence: Albert Hourani, p. 318.

  the chaff of dreams: Qur’an, 12:44.

  to unite the Arabs . . . draw us into one people: quoted in Rogan, p. 195.

  his own ideal map . . . country south of this line: the map was shown at the exhibition, ‘Lawrence of Arabia: the Life, the Legend’, Imperial War Museum, London, 2005.

  the French arrived . . . and promptly expelled him: Rogan, p. 202.

  had converted Aden . . . the South Arabian mainland: Trevaskis, p. 94.

  If a man hates . . . he will hate his next neighbour: James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson, London, 1992, p. 238.

  Those who condemn us . . . in a spacious grave: quoted in Jarrah, p. 290.

  nothing reignited the rhetoric . . . Sykes–Picot: cf. Atiyah, p. 124.

  We divide and you rule: quoted in Keay, p. 464.

  the Dinshaway Incident . . . lashings: cf. Rogan, pp. 180–1.

  in Egypt today . . . a ‘No Torture’ T-shirt: BBC report, 25 January 2017.

  Bashshar al-Asad . . . of civil war:
Amnesty International quoted in BBC report, August 2016.

  his armed forces . . . during the same period: Guardian, 12 October 2016.

  the last real caliph: p. 347, above.

  no one recognized the sharif’s claim: Atiyah, p. 133.

  protests by Indian Muslims . . . in 1920: Keay, p. 479.

  In 1939 . . . 65 per cent to 30 per cent: Morris, p. 36.

  Ibn Sa’ud’s Wahhabi raiders . . . camel+horse combination: EI2 I, p. 885.

  the age of tribal raiding came to an end: EI2 III, p. 1068.

  the latter relationship . . . bedouin raiders: cf. pp. 4–5 and 166–7, above.

  in 1921 . . . on its way to Mecca: Arashi, p. 93. This source claims that the number killed was 3,000.

  he tried to collectivize . . . hijrahs: EI2 III, p. 361; Atiyah, p. 133.

  the earliest caliphs had failed . . . so too did Ibn Sa’ud: cf. EI2 III, p. 361.

  in 1929–30 . . . bloodily suppressed: EI2 III, pp. 1067–8.

  the worst in . . . hypocrisy: Qur’an, 9:97; cf. pp. 4 and 167, above.

  the nomad population . . . 5 per cent in 1998: EI2 XII, p. 465.

  Harold Ingrams . . . any higher authority: Harold Ingrams, Arabia, p. 25.

  Hadrami badw terms . . . ‘to work for one’s living’: Bujra, passim.

  They are dead: Abu Bakr ibn Shaykh al-Kaff quoted in Ingrams, Arabia, p. 36.

  Freya Stark’s cameleers . . . polish their daggers: Stark, p. ix.

  Abd Allah of Transjordan . . . stooge: Atiyah, pp. 135–6.

  his own imperial eye on a Greater Syria: Carmichael, p. 335.

  the French using troops . . . insurgents in the Mashriq: Rogan, p. 202.

  If you add . . . what sum will you get?: quoted in Karsh, p. 149.

  civilized peoples in the east and west: quoted in Albert Hourani, p. 341.

  mingled with [our] life . . . its personality: quoted in Albert Hourani p. 341.

  The overwhelming majority . . . appearance of Islam: Husayn, pp. 70–1.

  faked up wholesale in their poetry ‘factories’: Husayn, pp. 162–3.

  Cartesian detachment . . . mark of the modern age: Husayn, pp. 74–5.

  he did not apply . . . directly to scripture: Husayn, p. 79.

  accounts of the people of Ad . . . Arab Genesis: e.g. Husayn, p. 171.

  in 1927 he was summoned . . . on a charge of heresy: Husayn, pp. 254–5.

  he was accused of . . . Abrahamic monotheism: Husayn, pp. 257–8.

  the historicity and role . . . his son Ishmael/Isma’il: e.g. Husayn, pp. 89–91.

  so important in . . . Umayyad times onward: cf. pp. 233-6, above.

  as a Muslim . . . a fact of scholarly history: Husayn, pp. 289–90.

  al-Sijistani . . . the Qur’an was exempt from logic: Jabiri, p. 261.

  constitutes the essence of being Arab in all its domains: Jabiri, p. 52.

  jawn = black/white: Suyuti I, p. 305.

  jalal = great/small: Suyuti I, p. 306.

  sariq ’adil, ‘a just thief’: p. 63, above.

  country/city . . . creative movement: Adonis, Thabit IV, pp. 139–40.

  regional idiosyncrasies . . . conditional on that of the other: Jabiri, p. 52.

  Nizar Qabbani . . . longed for him to return: Qabbani, p. 808.

  Arab unity . . . is a madman’s notion: cf. p. 102, above.

  From 1936 onwards . . . with Iraq at its head: cf. EI2 VIII, p. 246.

  other than in the aftermath . . . has been an Egyptian: EI2 XII, pp. 240–1.

  the members always ‘agree to disagree’: EI2 VIII, p. 246.

  To strengthen the ties . . . of the Arab countries: quoted in Atiyah, p. 169.

  The criterion . . . as an official language: Kassir, p. 68.

  still-born from the inception: Pryce-Jones, p. 223.

  an institution of the dying age of tyranny: al-Marzuqi (aljazeera.net).

  CHAPTER 14 THE AGE OF HOPE

  Enclosed . . . small but gorgeous pavilion: cf. the illustrations in Chekhab-Abudaya and Bresc, pp. 104–19.

  it became a regular institution . . . Mamluks of Egypt: Hitti, pp. 135–6.

  Napoleon had a new mahmal made and sent to Mecca: Jabarti II, p. 203.

  a wonder of wonders . . . total contrast to tradition: Jabarti II, p. 259.

  He was mounted . . . the whole of the journey: Lane, Account of the Manners, p. 440.

  a scantily clad old woman . . . to Mecca and back: Lane, Account of the Manners, p. 441.

  the Turkish-Syrian one . . . the Great War: EI2 VI, pp. 44–6.

  In 1926 Ibn Sa’ud’s Wahhabi . . . clashed with its guard: EI2 III, p. 1067.

  uncontrollable Jewish immigration . . . violence: cf. Rogan, pp. 247–8.

  the Palestinians revolted . . . punishments: cf. Rogan, pp. 256–7.

  sweet, just, boyish master: quoted in Mackintosh-Smith, Yemen, p. 152.

  By using terror tactics . . . down to the present day: Rogan, p. 318.

  the 1946 bombing . . . killed nearly a hundred: Rogan, pp. 314–15.

  Abd Allah had already been . . . to this very end: cf. Rogan, pp. 332–3.

  the Arab states’ campaign . . . mutual distrust: Atiyah, p. 180.

  something false and rotten: Atiyah, p. 185; cf. p. xiii, above.

  The sultans were at loggerheads . . . occupy the country: Ibn al-Athir quoted in Karsh, p. 77; cf. p. 351, above.

  after the 1948 war . . . 750,000 Palestinian refugees: Rogan, p. 338.

  We continue to be bewildered . . . by it?: Shehadeh, Diaries, p. 74.

  they had already granted Iraq . . . useful air bases: Albert Hourani, p. 329.

  the officers’ anger . . . the ruling Wafd party: Atiyah, p. 190.

  a nickel-plated Colt revolver: cf. George Lyttelton and Rupert Hart-Davis, The Lyttelton Hart-Davis Letters 1955–62: A Selection, John Murray, London, 2001, p. 18.

  Of course the Americans . . . presence in the Canal Zone: Rogan, p. 364.

  another condition: stop buying Soviet arms: Rogan, p. 376.

  we are still those shattered, scattered tribes . . . Caesar: Qabbani, p. 782; cf. p. 416, above.

  never spoke of himself as anything but Egyptian: Carmichael, p. 351.

  The aim of the Revolution . . . common welfare: quoted in Karsh, p. 155.

  mucking out the Augean stable of corruption: cf. Atiyah, p. 193.

  a joint Anglo-French . . . Urabi revolution: Rogan, pp. 159–60.

  the thrill of an Arab victory . . . the back streets of Aden: Holden, p. 23.

  he worked up the defeat into his own triumph: cf. Rogan, pp. 382–3.

  demonstrating to students . . . apartment houses: Bowles, p. 375.

  Cairo’s radio transmitting . . . 663 hours at the same time: EI2 III, pp. 1014–15.

  In the Nasserist view . . . by language: Suleiman, p. 125.

  I will live for your sake . . . Jamal Abd al-Nasir: cf. Rogan, p. 363.

  on whose love we were drunk, like a Sufi drunk on God: Qabbani, p. 780.

  like the one that overthrew . . . Iraq in 1958: Rogan, p. 394.

  In his speeches . . . end in high Arabic: Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 196.

  local . . . nationalism versus pan-Arabism: Clive Holes cited in Owens, ‘Arabic Sociolinguistics’, p. 442.

  In his speeches . . . the high language alone: Versteegh, Arabic Language, p. 196.

  Taha Husayn had questioned . . . Egypt’s heritage: pp. 453–6, above.

  he launched in his book . . . Arabs and Arabic: Suleiman, p. 198.

  Shu’ubi literary attacks . . . heyday of their empire: pp. 310–15, above.

  wicked charlatan . . . errand boy: quoted in Suleiman, p. 248, n. 15.

  he himself wrote in that same high Arabic: Suleiman, p. 182.

  I’ll not forget you . . . walls of fantasy!: from the ode by Ibrahim Naji, ‘Al-Atlal’. http://lyrics.wikia.com/wiki/ accessed 14 November 2018.

  ‘You’re an Arab!’ . . . And I banged my book shut: Lei
la Ahmed, A Border Passage, quoted in Haeri, p. 79.

  for the Ba’th . . . defined above all by language: Suleiman, p. 125.

  Our language . . . which soldiers march: Ajlani quoted in Chejne, p. 21.

  On 12 January 1958 . . . they could lump it, in gaol: cf. Rogan, pp. 386–8.

  The Arab giant . . . at the imperialists: quoted in Dresch, History of Modern Yemen, p. 82.

  the two remaining . . . formed their own union: Albert Hourani, p. 368.

  Ba’thist officers considered taking Iraq into the UAR: Pryce-Jones, p. 246.

  Brigadier Abd al-Karim . . . quashed the idea: Pryce-Jones, p. 342; Rogan, p. 399.

  On 28 September 1961 . . . gave the Egyptians the boot: Rogan, pp. 402–3.

  To grab all property . . . against God’s holy law: adapted from the version quoted in Dresch, History of Modern Yemen, p. 86.

  a feature film . . . next to his throne: ‘Thawrat al-yaman’, c. late 1960s.

  Nothing was resurrected . . . but the age of the Mamluks: quoted in Ajami, Arab Predicament, p. 42.

  Unity, Freedom and Socialism: Ajami, Arab Predicament, p. 180.

  In 1958, rumour . . . offered $2 million for Nasser’s murder: Pryce-Jones, p. 278.

  a confusion between rhetoric and realpolitik: Rogan, p. 417.

  Fire’s kindled with two firesticks, war with words: Ibn Khallikan II, pp. 71–2; cf. p. 258, above.

  Jamilah among their bullets . . . country’s Jeanne d’Arc: Qabbani, p. 695.

  Jamilah . . . her French defence lawyer: Wikipedia, s.v. Djamila Bouhired.

  like thieves in the night: quoted in Mackintosh-Smith, Yemen, p. 158.

  of Zayid’s fifteen predecessors . . . five deposed: Morris, pp. 123–4.

  he had signed . . . with Syria and Jordan: Albert Hourani, p. 413.

  The Israelis . . . especially their air power: Albert Hourani, p. 413.

  In 1798 the Egyptians had opposed . . . sticks: cf. p. 414, above.

  If we lost the war . . . never killed a fly: Qabbani, p. 699.

  O my master . . . half our people have no tongue: Qabbani, p. 703.

  great enough, perhaps . . . Gaza region – with impunity: Atiyah, p. 235.

  a living corpse: quoted in Karsh, p. 171.

  Nasser was The Last Arab: the title of Said Aburish’s biography is Nasser: The Last Arab, St. Martin’s/Dunne Books, New York, 2004.

  But time dispelled the wine . . . dear night, our friend: from the ode by Ibrahim Naji, ‘Al-Atlal’. http://lyrics.wikia.com/wiki/ accessed 14 November 2018.

 

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