'The Muntafik. Al Sa'dun, Bani Malik, Ajwad, Bani Sa'id, Bani Huchaim' [‎6r] (16/196)

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move and more his system of blackmail and extortion. Finally in ]910, Nazim
Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. , Wali of Baghdad, adopted the policy of governing the whole of the
Muntafik country through Sa’dun Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. , whom he practically appointed
Mutasarrif of h asiriyak. He supported him unreservedly and would listen to
no complaints against him. Great discontent against Sa’dun Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. , fomented
by the party of the sons of Falih Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. , developed among the tribesmen, who, in
March 1911, took advantage of his defeat in an expedition against the Dhafir
to rise against hiim The whole country was in an uproar and in June 19ll,
a Turkish Commission was appointed to enquire into the cause of the rising.
It appeared ^ that one of the main causes was that Sa’dun Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. , acting as^a
Turkish official, had attempted to carry out the Turkish policy of disarmament
among his own tribesmen. This had naturally made him intensely unpopular.
The commissioner, however, was understood to “ attribute the Muntafik troubles
to the fact that the arable lands of the tribe are in the hands of a few
powerful Shaikhs, who oppress their fellow-tribesmen and keep them at
variance, and that the proper remedy is a thorough-going partition of the lands.”
This was a rare instance of penetration on the part of a Turkish Committee of
Enquiry and there is little doubt that they had hit the right nail on the head.
At the bottom of all the Muntafik troubles is an agrarian difficulty such as has
stirred men’s minds from the time of Tiberius Gracchus to the time of the Irish
Land League.
Sa’dun Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. , with his son ‘Ajaimi, had been seeking to maintain himself
in the neighbourhood of Xasiriyah against his rebellious tribesmen. But on
the assembling of the Committee of Enquiry, the Turks withdrew all official
support from him and, entirely reversing their policy, sought to enter into
direct relations with the tribesmen and to jnepare the way for an individualistic
regime and for the last step in the smashing of the tribal system. Saiyid Talib,
Naqibzadah of Basrah, who had not yet appeared in open opposition to the
Committee of Union and Progress, nor openly espoused the side of the Falih
family against Sa’dun, was sent by the Turks to try and get hold of Sa’dun
Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. . He managed to decoy him on board the gunboat “ Marmaris ” near
Suq al Sukyukh and immediately took him off in confinement to Basrah and
handed him over to the Wali, leaving ‘Ajaimi and Sa’dun’s other sons at
large. This act of treachery on the part of Saiyid Talib was never forgiven by
* Ajaimi and threw him permanently on the side of the Committee of Union
and Progress and against the side of the Arab Party under Saiyid Talib, insihte
of the way in which Sa’dun Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. had been treated by Turkish officialdom.
xn July 1911 Sa’dun Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. was sent in confinement to Baghdad and was
thence removed in August 1911 to Aleppo where ho died suddenly on 25th
November 1911, as was officially reported of “ apoplexy and heait failure,” but,
as was generally believed, of poison. ’Ajaimi remained at large in the neigh
bourhood of Nasirlyah as an outlaw.
During the interval between Sa’dun Pasha’s capture and death the sympa
thies of the whole Muntafik trible (including even his enemies, the Falih
family) seem to have veered round in his favour, presumably because he was no
longer in the position of an Ottoman official but was obviously out of favour
with the Turks.
After the death of Sa’dun Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. the Muntafik country was administered
from January to November 1912 by a Military Mutasarrif, Farid Beg, who
was a staunch adherent of the Committee of Union and Progress and was
therefore on friendly terms with ’Ajaimi. ’Ajaimi, as already explained, was
on the side of the Committee out of hatred of Saiyid Talib, the betrayer of his
father, who was new drifting more and more into opposition to the Committee
and was intriguing with ’Ajaimi’s cousins and rivals, the members of the
Falih family, Mizyad Beg, ’Abdullah Beg and others. In October 1912, when
a reactionary movement against the Committee was^ threatened in Con
stantinople, a telegram was sent by one of ’Ajaimi’s relations to say that ’Ajaimi
was ready to march on Constantinople to frustrate any attempt at reaction,
In the same month ’Ajaimi attacked and robbed his cousin Mizyad Beg
(probably with the connivance of the Mutasarrif, Farid Beg) of a very large
sum and came into conflict with Mizyad’s brother, ‘Abdullah Beg,