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File 756/1917 Pt 2-3 ‘ARAB BULLETIN Nos 66-114’ [‎34r] (76/834)

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The record is made up of 1 volume (411 folios). It was created in 1917-1920. It was written in English. The original is part of the British Library: India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors. Records and Private Papers Documents collected in a private capacity. .

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— 461 —
Padang to prepare the way for German penetration of western
Sumatra and the establishment of some controlled port, such as
Sabang, to compete with Singapore. They are said to number
40,000 in Java and Celebes alone. Many of them are rich
business men, wdio form a kind of informal Trades Union among
themselves, and advance their political power by effective and
enlightened means, e.g., the founding of schools or colleges, and
also religious associations, in which their exceptional knowledge
of Koranic literature gives them first place. The result is that
their social influence is far greater than their relative numbers
warrant. “ Singapore and Penang ” adds Mr. Warner, also “carry
an influential core of Arabs, closely related to the Java and
Celebes Arab settlers; but the Arabs of Java consider themselves—
and are considered by their Singapore brothers—as the leading
community. But this preponderating influence, due partly to
wealth, partly to larger numbers and partly to longer local
standing, wielded by the Arabs in the Dutch East Indies, is to
some extent balanced by the respect for British administration
and justice held by the British subjects, the Singapore and
Straits Arabs.”
The author says it is now to us, the British, and no longer
to the Germans that the East Indian Hadramis look. It was
not so three years ago. Then the “ German propaganda had
turned the Arabs judgment. German influence, subsidization
by the German Consulate-General with its monetary promises
and its Turkish alliance, moving on the steady well-calculated
German system, had supplanted all other influences, and the opening
phases of the war began to clinch the matter to our disadvantage. In
Batavia, the power of Mongus, the Arab 4 captain ’, was a most potent
influence for evil. Mongus had the Turkish Consul-General
entirely at his mercy ; he had the main part of the vernacular
press as his organ ; and he voiced in no uncertain fashion the
belief which he felt in the German propaganda with its specious
Islamic promises.
Even in Singapore, where they had amassed under British
protection such large fortunes, the Arabs were beginning to feel
the agitation. But Seyyid Omar Alsagoff, the head of the
community, in spite of the efforts which the Germans no doubt
made to influence him, stood firm in his loyalty. Though
decorated in the past by the Sultan of Turkey ; though holding-
large house property in Mecca and Arabia ; though wedded to
a Turkish lady—he nevertheless used all his undoubted power
in preaching loyalty to Britain, offering his house at Jiddah for
any purpose to which the British Government might desire to
put it. On Turkey joining the Germans, an active pro-German
campaign was energetically carried out
The vernacular press in Batavia, etc., published articles by the
Turkish Consul-General, written in Malay and Javanese,
decrying the British and emphasizing the German advance.
Vague but splendid promises were freely thrown out, and there

About this item

Content

The volume consists of individual copies of the Arab Bulletin produced by the Arab Bureau at the Savoy Hotel, Cairo numbers 66-114. These publications contain wartime, and post-war intelligence obtained by British sources. They deal with economic, military, and political matters in Turkey, the Middle East, Arabia, and elsewhere, which – in the opinion of British officials – affect the ‘Arab movement’; the bulletins cover a wide range of topics and key personalities.

The volume contains the following maps:

  • A map of Central Arabia showing St John Philby's route from Uqair to Jidda 17 November to 31 December 1917: folio 103.
  • Sketch map prepared from RNAS photographs and reconnaissance by HMS City of Oxford of Wadi A seasonal or intermittent watercourse, or the valley in which it flows. Mur February to March 1918 : folio 170.
  • Sketch map of Hejaz (1919): folio 317.
  • Tribal sketch map of the Hadhramaut ‘showing only tribes of fighting value’: folios 333v.

Towards the back of the volume is a small amount of correspondence respecting the distribution of Notes on the Middle East ; the Arab Bulletin was superseded by this publication. Copies of numbers 3-4 of this publication can also be found at the back of the volume.

Tables of content can be found at the front of each issue. A small amount of content is in French.

Extent and format
1 volume (411 folios)
Arrangement

The Arab Bulletins are arranged in numerical order from the front to the back of the file. The Notes on the Middle East follow on from the bulletins at the back of the file in reverse numerical order.

The subject 759 (Arab Bulletins) consists of two volumes. IOR/L/PS/10/657-658.

Physical characteristics

Condition: the edges of some of the folios towards the back of the volume have suffered damage to their edges due to general wear and tear. The affected folios are 389-390, 407-409, and 412.

Foliation: the foliation sequence for this description commences at the first folio with 1, and terminates at the inside back cover with 413; these numbers are written in pencil, are circled, and are located in the top right corner of the recto The front of a sheet of paper or leaf, often abbreviated to 'r'. side of each folio. The front cover and the leading flyleaf have not been foliated. A previous foliation sequence, which is present between ff 357-363 and ff 374-412 and is also circled, has been superseded and therefore crossed out.

Written in
English in Latin script
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File 756/1917 Pt 2-3 ‘ARAB BULLETIN Nos 66-114’ [‎34r] (76/834), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, IOR/L/PS/10/658, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100048056854.0x00004d> [accessed 28 March 2024]

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