History and Democracy of the Modern Middle East - HIST 235 Resource Guide

Provision in the covenant of the League of Nations, the predecessor agency to the United Nations (UN), passed on June 18, 1919. The League of Nations was a supranational organization formed in the aftermath of the Paris Peace Conference held at the end of World War I. Article 22 of the League of Nations Covenant called for the creation of a mandate system, which transferred the former colonies of Germany and the former territories of the Ottoman Empire to the custody of the League of Nations.

(born 1881, Salonika, Greece, Ottoman Empire-died Nov. 10, 1938, Istanbul, Tur.) Founder of modern Turkey. Dedicated by his father to military service, he graduated near the top of his class in military school. As a young officer, he was critical of the government of the Ottoman Empire and became involved with the Turkish nationalist Committee of Union and Progress. He nevertheless fought for the government during World War I (1914-18), achieving great success against Allied forces during the Dardanelles Campaign.

The Balfour Declaration was a promise by the British government to support the creation of a national homeland for the Jewish people. The British government issued the declaration in an effort to gain the support of Jews around the world for the Allied war effort. The promise apparently contradicted an earlier pledge by London to the Arabs to support the establishment of an independent Arab state after World War I. The Balfour Declaration helped encourage Jewish immigration to Palestine during the 1920s and 1930s, but it alienated Arabs from the British Mandate government. Indirectly, the Balfour Declaration led to the creation of the State of Israel and to ongoing conflict between Arabs and Jews in the Middle East that endures to the present day.

Palestine became part of the British Mandate during the conclusion of World War I. Looking to secure regional loyalty, British officials promised both Arabs and Jews a national home in Palestine. Although technically the agreements were not in direct conflict, both Arabs and Jews felt threatened and betrayed. As such, the British had set the stage for wide-scale conflict.

Between the two world wars, several forces - both internal and external - combined to produce unprecedented change in the societies, cultures, economies, and political systems of the Middle East and North Africa. The most disruptive of these forces was European imperialism, which reached its zenith during these decades. Britain and France (together with Italy in Libya and Spain in part of Morocco) possessed extensive colonial dominions and wielded considerable influence even in countries that they did not rule directly.

The Iranian Oral History Project (IOHP) is a unique resource for the study of modern Iranian history. The collection consists of the personal accounts of 134 individuals who played major roles in or were eyewitnesses to important political events in Iran from the 1920s to the 1980s. Of these, 118 narratives have been digitized and are available to researchers through this database. The collection provides scholars and practitioners the opportunity to listen to and read the personal accounts of many of Iran's former political leaders as they recall the times and events that shaped their lives and the life of their country.