Ottoman Brothers: Muslims, Christians, and Jews in Early Twentieth-Century Palestine (76 page)

^51.
From Sélim Ayoub and Yéroham Elyachar to the Jerusalem governor, in “Réquête-soumission de la Banque-comerciale de Palestine,” published in the
Bulletin de la Chambre de commerce d'industrie et d'agriculture de Palestine
(year 1, nos. 3–4, September—October 1909). ISA 67, peh/456:473.

^52.
For an overview of the exchanges in
La Vérité
, see
Bulletin de la Chambre de commerce d'industrie et d'agriculture de Palestine
, August—September 1910, JMA 1779.

^53.
A contract was signed between the BCP and the APC in the fall of 1909, outlining the rate of return the APC expected. September 27, 1909. CZA L51/6. In a later memo, representatives of the BCP agreed to the APC's condition of raising the sale price of water to 1.50 francs or at least 1.25 francs, making it competitive with the Franck concession but also undermining the BCP's earlier commitment to low-cost water for the city's residents. CZA L51/6.

^54.
Letter to Jacobus Kann (the Hague), February 2, 1914. CZA L51/6.

^55.
Levontin and Ruppin to Wolffsohn, January 17, 1909; and Levontin and Ruppin to Wolfssohn, January 27, 1909. CZA L1/119. Wolfssohn to Ruppin, February 2, 1909. CZA Z2/633.

^56.
November 13, 1908. CZA L1/119.

^57.
Al-Karmil
, September 28, 1912; and October 5, 1912.

^58.
Ha-
vi
, March 2, 1909. A rift between Yitzhak Levi, officer of the Jerusalem branch of the APB, and Antébi led to a break between the APB and BCP on personal and political grounds. Antébi to AIU, July 18, 1909. AAIU, Israel-IX.E.27. In public the APB was rejected because of its nature as a Zionist institution, with the Bank of Salonica favored to back the BCP. Gueyrand to Pichon, July 22, 1909; MAEF, microfilm roll 132, Correspondence Politique et Commerciale/Nouvelle Série (Turquie).

^59.
From APC-Jerusalem to Kann, September 12, 1909. CZA L51/6;
Ha-
erut
, November 2, 1910. By April 1911 the ministry reversed itself and authorized the municipality to seek a tramways concession. April 1911; ISA 67, peh/456:474; CZA A153/143.

^60.
May 20, 1914. CZA L51/6. The Arabic announcement states “abnā' al-wa
an.” The French translation of the announcement describes the reserves for “our co-citizens and friends.” February 10, 1914. File 44/1,57/?/12, Institute for the Revival of Islamic Research and Heritage, Abu Dis (Jerusalem). Despite its inability to secure the water concession, the BCP remained busy pursuing concessions for building telephone lines, bringing running water from the Audja River to Jaffa, and mining phosphates from the Dead Sea. APC Memo, November 7, 1913. CZA L51/6.

^61.
Line 1: through Jaffa Gate to Souk et Allor, the bazaar of the Jewish quarter. Line 2: Jaffa Gate, Me'ah She‘arim, Ecole Schneller, Shaykh Badr, Municipal Hospital, Jaffa Gate. Line 3: Jaffa Gate east to Nicofarieh, New Palace. Line 4: Jaffa Gate to Bethlehem. Line 5: Jaffa Gate to the Mount of Olives. Line 6: Jaffa Gate to Saint Croix and Shaykh Badr. President of the city council, CZA, A153/143.

^62.
Copy of the Arabic conditions for the Jaffa concessions, CZA L51/6.

^63.
Chelouche,
Parshat
ayai.

^64.
Landau, “Farmasūniyya.” Landau dates the first Freemason lodges in the Middle East to the mid-eighteenth century (in Aleppo, Izmir, and Corfu in 1738, Alexandretta in the 1740s, and Armenian parts of Eastern Anatolia and Istanbul in the 1760s). However, these were small, uncentralized, and short-lived, and little is known about them beyond their existence. For a history of Ottoman Freemasonry, see also Dumont, “La franc-maçonnerie ottomane”; Zarcone,
Mystiques, philosophes et francs-macons
; and Hanioğlu, “Notes on the Young Turks and the Freemasons.”

^65.
See Wissa, “Freemasonry in Egypt from Bonaparte to Zaghloul”; Cole,
Colonialism and Revolution in the Middle East
; Anduze, “La franc-maçonnerie égyptienne”; and Kudsi-Zadeh, “Afghani and Freemasonry in Egypt.” Thierry Zarcone argues that Freemasonry and para-Masonic organizations that merged Sufism, politics, and Masonry played a critical role in the 1905–7 Iranian constitutional revolution as well. Zarcone, “Freemasonry and Related Trends.”

^66.
Quoted by Muhammad Pasha al-Makhzumi, author of
Utterances of Jamal al-Din al-Afghani al-Husayni
, cited in Khuri,
Modern Arab Thought
, 30.

^67.
Hanioğlu, “Notes on the Young Turks and the Freemasons”; and Dumont, “La franc-maçonnerie d'obedience française,” 73. In 1908, for example, the lodge Veritas appealed for protection to the GODF, stating that their lodge archives were under attack from the government, and they feared compromising some of their members. The lodge Macedonia Risorta, protected by the Italian consul, provided immunity from police scrutiny for its many Young Turk activists. See also Jessua,
Grand Orient (Gr: Loge) de Turquie.

^68.
Jessua,
Grand Orient (Gr: Loge) de Turquie.
For an extensive discussion of the Grand Orient Ottoman, see Anduze, “La franc-maçonnerie coloniale.”

^69.
Also Vefa orientale, Byzantio risorto. Kedourie, “Young Turks, Freemasons, and Jews”; Dumont, “La franc-maçonnerie d'obedience française,” 76.

^70.
I have found extensive evidence from three Masonic lodges in Palestine in the pre-World War I period: Barkai, Temple of Solomon, and Moriah. There was also an irregular (unrecognized) lodge established by Shim'on Moyal in Jaffa in 1910–11, but aside from a complaint issued by Barkai that Moyal was “initiating people right and left” we know little of this lodge. Letter from Barkai to GODF, February 10, 1911. CDGODF, boxes 1126–27. I have also found reference to a lodge in the north, but little evidence survives. Letter from the vice-consul of France in Haifa to the French foreign minister, February 20, 1912; MAEF, microfilm roll 134, Correspondence Politique et Commerciale/Nouvelle Série (Turquie).

^71.
Letter from Suleiman (Shlomo) Yellin (Beirut), no date. CZA, A412/13.

^72.
Grand Orient Ottoman,
Instruction pour le premier grade symbolique.
See also Grand Orient de France, Suprême conseil pour la France et les possessions françaises,
Instruction pour le premiere grade symbolique.

^73.
Isaac Rabeno de Botton, Venerable (president) of the Veritas lodge, to the GODF, October 10, 1910; quoted in Dumont, “La franc-maçonnerie d'obedience française,” 77.

^74.
Jessua,
Grand Orient (Gr: Loge) de Turquie
, 12.

^75.
Landau, “Farmasūniyya.”

^76.
Dumont, “La franc-maçonnerie ottomane et les “Idées Françaises'”; Dumont, “La franc-maçonnerie dans l'empire Ottoman”; and Hivert-Messeca, “France, laïcite et maçonnerie.”

^77.
In Lebanon, Syria, and Egypt, there was widespread participation of the notable classes in Freemasonry. See Safwat,
Freemasonry in the Arab World.
According to Robert Morris's travelogue from 1876, the then-governor of Syria, deputy-governor of Jaffa, and deputy-governor of Nablus were all Freemasons. Morris,
Freemasonry in the Holy Land.
On the middle-class membership of Egyptian lodges, see Cole,
Colonialism and Revolution in the Middle East.
The perceived elite economic networks of Freemasons also stirred up lower-class opposition, according to Landau, “Muslim Opposition to Freemasonry.”

^78.
On the socioeconomics of Masonry see Dumont, “La franc-maçonnerie d'obedience française”; Dumont, “La franc-maçonnerie dans l'empire Ottoman”; Hivert-Messeca, “France, laicite et maçonnerie”; and Cole,
Colonialism and Revolution in the Middle East.

^79.
Kemal al-Din ‘Arafat was the mayor of Nablus, and Rafiq and Suleiman Abu Ghazaleh were both civil judges. Sa'id Abu Khadra' served on the General Council of Gaza and he was also a failed candidate for the 1912 Ottoman parliament. ‘Umar al-Bitar was the mayor of Jaffa. Eight members of the Jaffan Dajani family were in the Ottoman legal, municipal, bureaucratic, and educational establishment in addition to being Masons. Among the most prominent of Jerusalem's notable families, four members of the al-Khalidi family were Freemasons. One of them, Jamil al-Khalidi, belonged to two lodges. Ragheb al-Nashashibi, elected to the Ottoman parliament in 1912, also belonged to two lodges.

^80.
The Amzaleks were a wealthy Jewish family. One of the most important Jerusalem Sephardi families, several Elyashars served as chief rabbi of Jerusalem. The Manis were the most important Jewish family in Hebron. David Moyal was an important lawyer dealing in land sales. Three members of the wealthy Valero banking family were Masons.

^81.
Nathans, “Habermas's Public Sphere in the Era of the French Revolution,” 633.

^82.
Freemasonry in the colonies and beyond was another face of “humanistic colonialism” which aimed to spread Western ideas of progress, public health, secular education, justice, social laws, solidarity, freedom of opinion, press, and association, and economic and technological development. Among other things, colonial Freemasonry created a social and cultural elite and sought to assimilate the “native” Freemasons to Francophone and European values and culture. See Odo, “Les reseaux coloniaux.” On the new middle class, see R. Khalidi, “Society and Ideology in Late Ottoman Syria,” 126.