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Updated: June 14, 2025
In missionary parlance, Arabia generally is referred to as "a Gibraltar of fanaticism and pride which shuts out the messenger of Christ," and it must be admitted that the Hejaz has hitherto justified this description to a certain extent.
It has been asserted by some of the Ulema, and it is certainly a common opinion at the present day, that the sovereignty of Hejaz is in itself sufficient title to the Caliphate.
The missionary question should be left to the reigning house for decision; it is not fair to hamper the Hejaz with unnecessary complications, and to allow active missionary propaganda at a pilgrim-port like Jeddah is asking for trouble, apart from the flagrant violation of religious sentiment. Imagine Catholic feeling if an enterprising Moslem mission were established at Lourdes.
Although Jerusalem itself could still be supplied along the road connecting it with Nablus, or along the road across the Jordan to Ammam Station on the Hejaz Railway, yet "reports from the R.F.C. indicated that it was the probable intention of the enemy to evacuate Jerusalem and withdraw to organize on the line Tul Keram-Nablus.
A very painful impression was produced on the Jeddans while I was there by the news that this English captain had been sentenced for all punishment by an English court to two years' suspension of his certificate. Indian pilgrims have besides been very roughly treated in Hejaz by the authorities during the last year because they were British subjects, and this without obtaining any redress.
In the Hejaz district situated between fertile and more civilized Yemen, or Arabia Felix, in the south-west of the peninsula and the Sinaitic region, and in Nejd to the east of Hejaz, which were the two districts in which Islam and the Arabian Empire took their rise, dwelt tribes whose common sanctuary was the Kaaba at Mecca, in the wall of which was the quadrangular black stone kissed by all devotees, and supposed to have been received from the angel Gabriel.
The transmission of the Wakaf income, in which the Sultan constitutes himself, so to say, the Sherif's agent, is in fact the real bond which unites Hejaz with the Caliphate, and its distribution gives the Sultan patronage, and with it power in the country. The bond, however, is one of interest only.
The minarets therefore were everywhere thrown down, and when the holy places of Hejaz fell into the hands of his followers the tombs of saints which had for centuries been revered as objects of pilgrimage were levelled to the ground. Even the Prophet's tomb at Medina was laid waste and the treasures it contained distributed among the soldiers of Ibn Saoud.
Subsequently the seaport of Jeddah, formerly occupied by the Egyptians, received a Turkish contingent, but the interior of Hejaz was never subjugated, nor was any tax at any time levied. Only once a year an Ottoman army appeared before the walls of Medina, conducting the pilgrims from Damascus and convoying the surrah.
In all probability its northern districts with Lith will go to the Hejaz, and the southern ones with Loheia to the Idrisi; but Western diplomacy will be well advised to leave those two rulers to settle it between themselves and the local population, especially inland, as tribal boundaries between semi-nomadic and pastoral people are not for intelligent amateurs to trifle with.
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