File 705/1916 Pt 2 'Arab revolt: Arab reports; Sir M Sykes' reports' [‎104v] (206/450)

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to non-existence, and how they regret now what they have done. No matter how
much the Sherif Hussein contradicts our belief that Hejaz will be a field for Christian
troops, the fact is that the troops whom England will send him, whether Moslem or
Christian,'are but servants of England, fighters in the army of a Christian Government,
wearing her arms and obeying her orders, and thus there is really no difference in them, {"*
whether they are Moslems or Christians, so long as the consequences that are going to
fall upon Islam are the same. The head is the leader, and the other numbers follow.
There is no one who denies that if those Moslem troops (according to the Sherif)
conquer the Ottoman troops the result will be a victory for Christian England over
Moslem Turkey. In other words the result will be (God forbid it ) that Christianity
will have the upper hand over Islam, in the cradle of Islam and the house of Mohammed
(prayers of God on him). Whether those Moslem troops are in the service of the
Christians or of the Sherif Hussein himself who has joined them, they are officially
under the command of England. God said “ He who governs them is from
them.” His argument that because the Ottoman Government is allied with the
Germans, who are Christians, he has the riuht then to be allied with England,
does not hold water, for the reason that Turkey joined the Germans to fight
with them against Christian government, and to ’use them for revenging
Islam on its enemies taking the opportunity of their disunion to separate them more
and more. She has succeeded, and has seen them torturing each other, thus punishing
them for their oppressions of Islam. Further, the Germans, although Christians, have
not occupied a yard of territory in Moslem hands, neither did they reduce to poverty
and servitude 150 millions of Moslems like the English, who have enslaved the most
respectable Moslem countries and their inhabitants, and who earnestly endeavour to
destroy all political power in Islam, and to deprive it of all power of defence, so that the
Moslems may be able to revolt against them. The first thing they will do, if they
attain any success in Hejaz, will be to deprive the Arabs of their arms, first, by way of
purchase, as they have done with the tribes of Irak, Oman, and South Yemen, which
resulted in the revolution of Maskat ; and, second, by force, as they have done with the
tribes in Egypt and Sudan, so that if they wanted to enter the country the Arabs shall
be unable to resist them. Therefore there is no comparison with Germany and the
alliance with England, although both belong to one religion ; and God says “ God does
not forbid you from being friends with those who do not fight against your religion, and
who do not chase you from your country; you should treat them with justice,
fur God loves the just; but God forbids you from befriending those you fight your religion
and chase you from your country by using some of you to help them do so.” The English
have severed India, Egypt, the Sudan, Zanzibar, Somaliland, and a part of Arabia from
the body of Islam and occupied them. They turned the strength of their inhabitants
into weakness. They were not satisfied with that, but helped the French to occupy
Morocco and Central Africa ; helped the Russians to occupy Persia, and the Italians to
occupy Tripoli. They even came into agreement with their own enemies against the
Moslems. There remains nothing they have not done in order to destroy Islamism.
Hejaz only remained exempt from their aggression ; but now, unfortunately, it is no
more so. They have found a means for their aims in the person of a man who should
have been the first to defend Hejaz, putting at his disposal money and men, and because
our family is responsible for the safety of the House. All men know how our ancestor,
Ei Hussein Ibn Ali, relinquished the Caliphate in order to prevent Moslem bloodshed,
and out of sympathy for the religion ; therefore, he in whose days the Christian
Powers stretch their hand to Hejaz for the first time in history, is not one of us, and
this great trespass should not be recorded in our history after our glorious stand in the
past in support of the religion. For this reason and in conformity with the conduct
of our ancestors when the Emir of the Faithful,” our lord Sultan Mohd.
Fas had Y, has conferred upon me the Imarat of Mecca at a time when Hejaz is in
real danger, I accepted it with the help of God not because I desire authority and
power for this already pertains to us—but out of sympathy for the Holv Places lest
they should fall into the hands of the enemy 7 , who if he once interferes in its affairs
and is not opposed will shortly 7 enter it and tread on its sacred soil that has been sacred
for over 1,300 years. If God and His Prophet command a thing we must obey and
rise up to the Jihad. We must also explain to y 7 ou clearly how in joining the Christians
the Sherif Flussein has placed the Holy Places under their mercy, that the weak
among you may not be deceived by the falsehood that has affected the poor people of
the desert, and in order that the ignorant, who have been taken in by these falsehoods,
may not oblige us to unsheath our sword in their faces.
We cab you all to obedience, it being the call of the Koran, the call of the Sultan,