File 1707/1924 ‘Arabia:- Jeddah Situation Reports. (1924-1930)’ [‎232r] (468/898)

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Prophet in the Haram at Medina, and demolished the brass and iron screen round
the rumoim i^Xp ^ 1 am n °^ ^ that the re P ort 18 unt ™e, and that the source of
he inmour is the Kings order that a wooden shelter or pavilion, erected some
six y or seventy years ago only by Fakhry Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. over the well, has been removed^s
restricting the space available within the Haram. This measure, an ordmary
.administrative proceeding which would have passed unnoticed under another
spensation, with Ibn baud is called iconoclasm, and may travel to the far ends of
the Islamic world as an example of his intolerance. Only the lapse of time will
gne Ibn baud a fair hearing on these matters of Islamic practice, and in that same
aMe^daptability a m ° St certam that Ibn Saud will himself give proof of a consider-
q i- ^ was - note< ^ i n the Jeddah report for August, paragraph 13, that the
bovmt diplomatic agency An office of the East India Company and, later, of the British Raj, headed by an agent. m Jeddah had become simply a consulate-general. Such
indeed was the general impression in Jeddah for some time, though it was difficult
to see the political utility of the change from the Soviet point of view. However
the Pussian representative has now reaffirmed himself as agent and consul-general’
Perhaps theie was something financial or personal in the temporary eclipse.
M. Khakimoft has even gone to the extent lately of showing an interest in the place
assigned to him in our local order of precedence, encouraged, presumably, by the
Tuikish Ministei. He is a keen little man and a convinced Communist. I should
say that his energies are chiefly devoted to making friends for himself (and his
political system) in the Hejaz; to conversing with the various agitators who come
to Mecca; and to studying organised Islam as a vehicle for propaganda against
Western Europe and its empires,
14. Little has been heard lately of the new nationality law controversy. A
corollary has been published warning persons, who are improperly, from the point
of view of the law, in possession of foreign passports, that it will not be possible to
make any exception in their favour. The authorities in Jeddah have been applying
the new provisions with vigour. A number of Plejaz passports presented at this
agency An office of the East India Company and, later, of the British Raj, headed by an agent. for visas for India were found to have been given to Indian-born subjects
on the strength of their stay in, or family connections with, the Hejaz. It was
pointed out to the Governor of Jeddah that it was impossible to accept these
documents, and that a young man born in India of Indian parents had a right to a
British passport even although his uncle was a pilgrims’ agent in Mecca and has
accepted Hejaz papers. The Governor is very jealous of his duties under the new
law, but he saw the reasonableness of the objection. He, however, brought back
recently from Yambo, under arrest, an Egyptian travelling by steamer with an
Egyptian passport duly issued to him in Egypt, whom he claimed, perhaps rightly,
to be a local subject of two generations’ standing.
15. Mr. Philby has arrived and settled down to spend another winter in
Jeddah. In view of his opinions it is difficult to ask him what his purpose is in the
Hejaz, though conceivably it is not so Machiavellian as might be supposed. He knows
most of the personalities in Jeddah, and honestly appears to find pleasure in their
company. Besides that, Mr. Philby is under the necessity, I imagine, of making
a living for himself like other people, and he can hardly be blamed if he tries to
capitalise, now that he has no longer any official connection, his knowledge of the
Arab world. At present he does very little in the way of business, and says that he
is adding a third volume to his £ ' Heart of Arabia.” As he does not appear to
command much capital, he cannot enter into the ordinary commercial traffic of
Jeddah. It can only be inferred that he is interested in concessions.
16 The most obvious concession at the moment is the proposed Jeddah-Mecca-
Arafat-Muna Railway. It will be remembered that at the recent Islamic Conference
at Mecca, it was decided that this railway should have serious consideration, and
that it should be built as a Moslem wakf with funds collected iu all^ the Islamic
countries. But more enterprising spirits in Jeddah consider that the Greek calends
are as near as a railway built on those lines, and two important persons in the town
have, quite gratuitously, impressed on me their own conviction that the concession
should be put into British hands. The trading community in Jeddah, who practically
alone count financially in the Hejaz, would be the first to benefit by such a railway,
and therefore care little who undertakes its construction, provided it is there to
facilitate and increase trade and pilgrim traffic. The railway is therefore the
concession which occurs most readily to the imagination as an undertaking in which
Mr. Philby may interest himself. The future will show if this is the line he will take,
nr if he has other projects in view. He has something to work on in his knowledge