File 756/1917 Pt 2-3 ‘ARAB BULLETIN Nos 66-114’ [‎80r] (168/834)

MISSION TO KING HUSEIN.
I saw King Husein for the first time on January 8 and
between that date and January 14, when I left Jeddah, I had ten
interviews with him, none lasting less than an hour and a half,
and some over three hours. My mission was occasioned by the
arrival of Mr. H. St. J. B. Philby, I.C.S., who had come overland
from Riyadh to Jeddah by way of Dhrumah, Wadi A seasonal or intermittent watercourse, or the valley in which it flows. Sbei,
Khurmah and Taif, a new route of which it is hoped he will give
a description in a later issue. With thirty-five Bedouins of Ibn
Sand’s following, drawn from various tribes, he accomplished his
remarkable journey in very fast time (twenty-one days riding)
and without mishap of any kind. I was to confer with him, and
between us we were to try to smooth over the difficulties which had
arisen from time to time between King Husein and ibn Sand,
whose confidence Mr. Philby had gained during his stay in
Riyadh, and to secure a working arrangement between them in
the interests of Arab Unity. I was commissioned further to
inform the King about the intentions of the Allies regarding
Palestine, and to arrange some minor matters about his
representation on the London Arab-Jew-Armenian Committee,
his Cairo Agency An office of the East India Company and, later, of the British Raj, headed by an agent. , etc.
On the subject of Ibn Saud I found the King very
impracticable. Mr. Philby’s unheralded appearance, out of the
blue,” had (not unnaturally) irritated his susceptibilities. Mr
Philby had come across under a mistaken belief that he would
meet Mr. Storrs at Taif. Cairo did not know he was intending
to come till he was well on his way and could, at the best, have
given King Husein only a short week’s notice of his probable
appearance at Taif. This was not, however, done, for fear he
miuht be turned back and a worse complication ensue. Added
to "reasonable annoyance at this was the King s uneasiness
about the impression which that arrival might make m view o
Jemal Pasha’s recent imputation of annexationist designs to the
Allies. What, he asked, would the people of the Holy Land think
of an Englishman having come at his pleasure to lail and down
to Jeddah ? Would not all say Hejaz was sold to the British
Everyone knew about Mr. Philby : “ he had become like the sun
in the sky !’ 7
Accordingly King Husein was in no mood to be conciliated
with Ibn Saud, whom he fears as leader of a Revival Movement
which is anti-Meccan, and hates for an irreconcileable obstacle to
his Kingship of the Arabs—in his view the sole possible
condition of Arab Unity. He brought up all Ins old charges of
treachery against Ibn Sand, to wit (1) Correspondence v^th
Fakhri Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. ; (2) Expedition of Turkish money to Yemen
(3) Failure to push the campaign against Ibn Rashi 1 ti
Oasim • and when confronted with Fakhri s own letters, entrusted
by Ibn Sand to Mr Philby, in one of which Fakhri complains ot
never receiving replies, thkKing refused to hear or read them.