4.2: Indigenous Worlds

Learning Objectives

• Describe the significance of Mesopotamia as a cultural hearth.
• Describe the Otoman Empire and identify forces of expansion and contraction.
• Evaluate the oucomes of the mandate system.
• Indetify Indigenous populations of the region.

 

The Cradle of Civilization

The first humans to settle in SWANA, did so between 10-12,000 years ago. During this time, humans began to domesticate cereals like wheat and live in semi-permanent settlements. Significantly, there are an exceptional number of empires that once thrived in in this region. Innovations of writing, math, and culture emerged and spread throughout the world through global trade and exchange. The discovery of oil and European colonization has shaped SWANA’s geography as we will see throughout this chapter.

The Fertile Crescent is a region that arches in a crescent shape through the Syrian desert, the Nile Valley, and into the depression between the Tigris and Euphrates. The Fertile Crescent is a cultural hearth, an early center of agricultural innovations and subsequent population growth that led to urbanization and cultural development. Mesopotamia, the land between rivers, is named for the ancient river system. The Euphrates originates in Turkey eventually merging with the Tigris in the east and discharging into the Persian Gulf. These two rivers constitute a region of the world that was once controlled by many different empires, including Turkey, Iraq, Greece, and eventually Rome. Interactions between people and across empires led to cultural exchange and development on a global scale. Plant and animal domestication in the Fertile Crescent about 12,000 years ago allowed for these regional empires to develop. Plants such as wheat and chickpeas and animals such as sheep and camels were domesticated. With agriculture came permanent settlements and the shift from hunting and gathering to agriculture and pastoralism. New agricultural technologies were invented such as the plough and metallurgy with bronze and iron. Tools of cooking and harnessing fire were invented all of which led to larger permanent villages. The region became more urban as more people lived in closer relationships to one another. As a cultural hearth, we see the development of unique architecture, early urbanization, and the birth of three major religions.

 

The Ottoman Empire

Who were the Ottomans? They were Turkish Muslims that came into power in 1100 CE and ruled for 700 years. From 1299 to 1923, the Ottoman Empire was a multi-ethnic and multi-religious state. It was ruled by the Ottoman dynasty, which was made up of descendants of the empire's founder, Osman I. At its peak, the empire was centered in what is now Turkey and ruled over a vast territory that included parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa. The empire was known for its powerful military, complex government bureaucracy, and artistic, literary, and architectural achievements. After World War I, it was dissolved and replaced by the Republic of Turkey. The Ottoman Empire stretched from southeastern Europe from the Danube River-to North Africa,-and ended in the Mediterranean. The Persians, Central Arabs, and Morocco did not fall under the control of the Ottoman Empire. By World War I, the Ottoman Empire had already been reduced to just modern-day Turkey and parts of the Arabian Peninsula. By the mid 19th century, Europe was attacking the Ottoman Empire. Britain had occupied Egypt and Tunisia was occupied by France. These colonial interventions in the region sparked nationalist movements in countries that were ruled by the Ottoman Empire.

 

The Mandate System and its Aftermath

By the end of World War I the Ottoman Empire came to be made up of only Turkey and several Arab provinces. The Arab provinces came under European power through the mandate system. Following the end of World War I in 1918, the newly formed League of Nations, forerunner to today's United Nations, established the Mandate System. The League of Nations was founded on the principle of collective security, or the idea that by cooperating to ensure the security of all nations, each nation would, in turn, ensure its own security. The British and French appropriated the land of the defunct Ottoman Empire and German colonies.

The Sykes-Picot Agreement, also known as the Asia Minor Agreement, was a covert 1916 agreement between the United Kingdom and France to disintegrate the Ottoman Empire. Their proposed spheres of influence and control in the Middle East were defined in the agreement. The agreement resulted in the division of the region into French and British spheres of influence, with the latter controlling modern-day Iraq and Jordan and the former controlling modern-day Lebanon and Syria. The agreement also proposed the formation of an independent Arab state or a confederation of Arab states in the Mediterranean Sea-Persian Gulf region. The Sykes-Picot Agreement is widely regarded as a major contributor to the current conflicts in the Middle East, as it resulted in the establishment of arbitrary borders that ignored the region's ethnic and religious diversity.

According to the mandate system, there were three types of territories: those that were close to independence, those that were not too far from independence, and those that likely would not reach self-determination (see below map depicting the direct control zones and “influence” zones of the British and French). The first step was for the European powers that held mandates in the region to establish constitutional governments.

A larger, established state would guide these territories. However, countries like Egypt, Iraq, Syria, and Palestine deeply resented European interventions in the region and revolted. In practice, the Mandate System was a sort of state-sponsored colonialism. By the end of World War II all the states that were once European mandates had achieved independence.

The legacy of the Ottoman Empire and the European mandate system left behind many complex issues for the development of these regions. How to unite a diverse citizenry under a new national identity that is not French, British, or Spanish? How to promote fair and even development when European rule had privileged urban centers over rural areas?

These countries were entering the new global economy of the time as autonomous countries. Autonomy instantiated diverse economic strategies that often created divisions between the rich and the poor. There was an attempt by countries such as Iran, Turkey, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Tunisia, and Algeria to deprivatize or nationalize their key economic industries. In other words, to switch from private control to governmental control. Intergovernmental organizations began to pressure many of these countries to return to privatizing their economies. Institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank demanded privatization in exchange for aid money. This economic model is known as neoliberalism. The main characteristics of the neoliberal approach are the privatization of basic services and economic sectors, deregulation of markets, lowering trade barriers, and economic austerity which involves decreasing government spending amongst other cutbacks. Neoliberal policies prompted social and geographical change in these countries. The cost of living and basic necessities like food increased while important social services like health and education were divested. Rural dwellers moved into the city to find higher paying work but in those cities access to transportation, housing, clean water, and education were limited. These limitations set up the conditions for the growth of squatter settlements less formally known as slums poor sanitation, and working in informal economies, or doing work that is not regulated or taxed.

 

The Negev Bedouin of Israel and the Jahalin Bedouin of Palestine

The Negev Bedouin have lived for centuries as semi-nomads in the Negev (Naqab in Arabic) desert for centuries.They are herders and agriculturalists that determine land ownership through kinship systems. The Negev live in complex relation with the harsh and arid climate and landscapes of the region. 65,000-100,00 Bedouin lived in the Naqab prior to 1948 and the establishment of the state of Israel. Today, approximately 11,000 Bedouin remain in the Naqab. The state of Israel dispossessed the Bedouin of the Negev desert of their ancestral homelands. The majority of the Bedouin were forced to migrate. They had little choice and now live in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, and Egypt. The Bedouin that do remain in Israel have been forced into military administration zones called al-Siyāj. Their ancestral lands were diminished to a tenth of what they once were. Entire Bedouin villages from the Northern and western Naqab were forced into the al-Siyāj. The state of Israel strategically rendered the Bedouin as refugees by way of legal proclamations such as the Absentee Property Law (1950), the Land Acquisition Act (1953), and the Dead Negev Doctrine. Israel decided that Bedouin land was Mawat (“dead”, uncultivated agricultural lands) and reclaimed it as belonging to Israel. Scholars argue that the lack of state recognition of Bedouin land rights by Israel is illegal and that international law should protect the Bedouin. Currently, it is estimated that the Bedouin of the Negev desert numbering 200,000-300,000 people live in government planned townships, recognized villages, and unrecognized villages in Israel. Those who live in the unrecognized villages are considered to be trespassers by the state of Israel and they are about half of the Negev Bedouin population.^[1]

 

The Amazigh of Algeria

The Amazigh also known as Berbers are an ethnic group indigenous to North African countries like Algeria, Morocco, Libya, and Tunisia. However, there are pockets of Amazigh in Mauritania, Burkina Faso, northern Mali, and northern Niger. Amazigh or plural Imazeghen means “free people.” The term Berber comes from meaning "non-Greek-speaking" or "non-Greek peoples." Amazigh is an indigenous term to refer to the ethnicity, Berber is the term given to the Amazigh by westerners and Arabs, while Kabyle is one of the many tribal confederacies of Amazigh peoples in Kabylia.

In Algeria, the government does not recognize the Amazigh and therefore does not publish statistics on the number of Amazigh people in the country. It is estimated that there are at least 12 million Amazigh in Algeria. They live in at least five territories throughout Algeria, and there are large populations living in the northeast and in urban areas like Algiers. The majority of Amazigh living in urbanized populations have assimilated into the majority Arab ethnic group. Although Amazigh can be distinguished by belief systems, culture (like clothes, food, music) and language. Tamazight, the language the Amazigh speak, was recognized as a national and official language in Algeria’s constitution very recently in 2016. While officializing their language is a form of visibility, the Amazigh in practice is marginalized by the majority Arab population and state institutions. Algeria is understood to be an Arab country and there are anti-Amazigh laws that continue to be enforced (see 1992 Law on Arabization).

Algeria in recent years has begun to actively pursue groups that the government believes to be engaged in terrorist activities, including the Amazigh.

 

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References:

[1] Kedar, A., Amara, A., & Yiftachel, O. (2018). Emptied lands: a legal geography of Bedouin rights in the Negev. Stanford University Press.

International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA). (Mar 8, 2021). The Indigenous World 2021: Israel.