Reviving Phoenicia: The Search for Identity in Lebanon

286 Pages·2014·1.639 MB·English

by  Asher Kaufman

To Shimon,
“Yam Shel Ga‘agu‘a”

Table of Contents
Note on Transliteration vii
Acknowledgements ix
Introduction 1
Who Were the Phoenicians? 2
National Identities in the Arab Middle East 5
Theorizing Lebanese Nationalism? 8
The French Colonial Idea 13
SECTION I: ORIGINS
Chapter I: First Buds: 1860-1918 21
France in the Levant 21
Franco-Maronite Relations 26
The Jesuits in Syria and Lebanon 29
Maronite Clergy and the History of Syria and Lebanon 36
Lay Syro-Lebanese and the Ancient History of Syria 38
Chapter II: Before and After the War 55
The Syro-Lebanese Community in Egypt 57
Syro-Lebanese in America 70
Between Paris and Beirut: 1913-1919 79
Beirut 1919: Charles Corm and La Revue Phénicienne 87
SECTION II: THE MANDATE YEARS
Chapter III: The Mandate Years 109
The French Mandate and the Lebanese Educational System 110
Université Saint Joseph and Its Graduates 119
Archeology and National Museums 122
1936-1937: A Case Study of Phoenicianism and Its Adversaries 126
Towards Independence 129
Chapter IV: Three Phoenician Currents 141
Charles Corm, the Inspired Maronite Francophone 141
Michel Chiha, the Merchant Republic and the Lebanese Identity 159
Sa‘id Aql, Arabophones and Maronite Nationalism 169
Chapter V: The Adversaries 195
Arab-Muslims: Rashid Rida and Shekib Arslan 197
Christian Arab Nationalists:
Qonstantine Zurayq 200
Edmond Rabbath 205
Amin al-Rihani 209
Antun Sa‘adeh and the Syrian Social Nationalist Party 215
Muhammad Jamil Bayhum and Sunni Lebanese 220
SECTION III: AFTER INDEPENDENCE AND BEYOND
Chapter VI: Chronicle of a Dream and Disillusionment 230
Conclusion: Arabs, Phoenicians and What Lies Between 244
Bibliography 251
Index 269
Note on Transliteration
French spelling of names of people and places was used for the most part in
order to remain close to their common usages in Lebanon during the Mandate.
Otherwise, English transliteration of Arabic follows the rules of the
International Journal of Middle East Studies, but without diacritical marks.
Acknowledgements
The seeds of this book were planted during my military service as an Israeli
soldier in Lebanon. In June 1983 my unit was sent to take over a strategically
located villa in the predominantly Christian village of Kfar Falous, a beautiful
and picturesque area, 15 km east of Sidon. It was a year after the Israeli
invasion into Lebanon and the new political order Ariel Sharon was crafting
for Lebanon was already blowing up in his soldiers’ faces and in the faces of
tens of thousands of Lebanese civilians and militiamen. This operation was
targeted against the Christian Phalanges in the region, who, for a reason that
was not all clear to me — I was only a peon, straight after basic training —
acted too independently. We were told in the briefing that the operation was
meant to demonstrate to the Phalanges who was calling the shots. We were
not allowed to use our weapons since we operated within a friendly
environment and it was no more than a disagreement between allies. Within a
few moments after the beginning of the operation we were surrounded by
hundreds of these friendly civilians who showed up from all corners and
would not let us assume control of the villa. We played cat and mouse with
them for the entire day until an agreement was reached between senior Israeli
and Phalanges officers. The civilians eventually left and we spent a full week
in this villa, the most peaceful week I had spent in Lebanon throughout my
entire service. During this week I had the chance to get to know some of these
Phalanges. With my then broken Arabic and their broken English
(unfortunately, I did not know a word in French, a language they seemed to
have mastered), I learned from some of them that they were not Arabs, that
they were Phoenicians. Some told me they hated Muslims and Arabs, others
took pride in massacres of Palestinians in which they participated. I was
stunned and dismayed. They looked perfectly Arab to me, but what did I
know back then? I was barely nineteen years old with very little understanding
of Middle East issues, let alone identities. The conversations with them
remained imprinted in my mind because it was the only time during my entire
service in which I had the chance to actually speak to Lebanese.
Ten years later, I was an MA student at the Department of Islamic and
Middle Eastern Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, looking for a
topic for my thesis. By then I had started to be intrigued by the region’s
multiple layers of identities. The Canaanite movement in Israel fascinated
me and I was looking for similar phenomena in Arab society. The Phoenicians
from Kfar Falous suddenly resurfaced from the back drawers of my memory.
These “Phoenician” Phalanges ended up being the inspiration of my MA,
and later PhD theses, and finally this book. I am not sure that if they ever read
this book they would like my conclusions but, nevertheless, I suppose that in
the very long list of acknowledgements I should begin with them.
x REVIVING PHOENICIA
The majority of this study is based on my Ph.D. dissertation written at
Brandeis University. Words would not be enough to thank my advisor Avigdor
Levy for his assistance and encouragement. I am also indebted to the other
members of the committee, Yitzhak Nakash, Kanan Makiya and Sadik al-
Azm. I only wish that this remarkable Arab-Israeli cooperation could be
manifested in other fields of life as well. The final polish of the study was
completed during my post-doctorate at the Harry S. Truman Research Institute
for the Advancement of Peace at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. I am
particularly thankful for its director, Amnon Cohen, for his support upon my
arrival at the Institute and during the entire duration of my work on this study.
The Truman Institute also provided me with financial assistance for the editing
of the text for which I am most grateful. I am also very appreciative to the
Elie Kedourie Memorial Fund of the British Academy for financing the last
necessary stretch of the research. I have infinite gratitude to Lisa Perlman for
the editorial work and for her personal touch; and also to Ann Nichols for
crossing the t’s and dotting the i’s. I am also very indebted to Reuven Amitai,
who was the head of the Department of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies
when I returned home to Israel. I will always remember and cherish his
personal involvement in my professional advancement. Other members of
the Hebrew University community deserve my gratitude. Moshe Ma’oz who
accompanied my progress since I was his MA student; Elie Podeh who helped
with advice about publishing and editing; Miri Hoexter who wisely advised
me to change some of the headings; and Yusri Khaizaran who enriched this
study through material he freely shared with me from his own research. I am
also particularly grateful to Nadim Shehadi, the director of the Centre for
Lebanese Studies in Oxford, who was always there when I needed a key to
decipher the complex nature of the Lebanese society. The staff of many
archives and libraries, “the unknown soldiers” of scholarly works, made this
project possible. Among them are the Archives of the French Ministry of
Foreign Affairs in Nantes and Paris, the Archives of the Jesuit Order in Vanves,
the Zionist Archives in Jerusalem, the National Libraries in France and Israel
and the library of the University of Arizona in Tucson, where I sat and wrote
the majority of the text, having access to the abundant wealth of American
libraries through the free use of the interlibrary loan system. Personal friends
were always helpful, some with information and advice, others with moral
support. Many thanks to Ginan Rauf, Franck Salameh, Nien-Hê Hsieh, Amy
Karpinski, Kay Ellett, Ron Spark, Alan Paris, Kushi Gavrieli, Meira Stern-
Glick, the Nichols family — my other home, and the Carlet family.
And finally those who made me who I am. My parents Aviva and Shimon,
and my beloved sister and brother Rama and Amir. And finally finally, my
son El’ad who was born a few months before the book came out and brought
a whole new perspective to my life. Last in order, first in importance, the
woman of my life, Cathy, may there be forever spring for you at no less than
28 degrees Celsius.
Introduction
There is much more to the concept of the “nation” than myths and
memories. But they constitute a sine qua non: there can be no identity
without memory (albeit selective), no collective purpose without myth,
and identity and purpose or destiny are necessary elements of the very
concept of a nation.
Anthony Smith1
The historical narrative of Lebanon almost invariably begins with the ancient
Phoenician seafarers. History textbooks, government publications and full
genres of literature and research resolutely follow this path. Lebanon has a
history of 6,000 years, they affirm. It begins with the Phoenicians in pre-
Biblical times, then proceeds into other eras — Persian, Greek, Roman,
Byzantine, Arab, Crusader, Turkish, French — concluding in modern times
when Lebanon regains its independence. One of the official websites of Prime
Minister Rafiq al-Hariri well reflects this conviction: “We are heirs to a history
which spans thousands of years and whose beginnings are lost in the mists of
time itself,” Hariri writes in his address to his fellow Lebanese, “The alphabet
was born in our land. It was from the shores of Sidon and Tyre that sailors
ventured to establish the first Mediterranean empire.”2 The assertion that
Lebanon’s history, even as an Arab country, begins with the ancient
Phoenicians has almost become conventional wisdom. Even historians who
oppose this narrative fall into its description. As‘ad AbuKhalil, for example,
in his Historical Dictionary of Lebanon, writes in the introduction: “Lebanese
ultra-nationalists, who have dominated the official historiography of the
country, claim that Lebanon has been in continued existence for over 5000
years and that the present-day country is no more than an extension of the
ancient Phoenician kingdom(s). In reality Lebanon is a modern phenomenon;
[...].”3 The book, however, unfolds with a chronological list, beginning with
the Canaanite occupation of Sidon and Tyre in 2800 BC and continuing to the
Egyptian occupation of the Phoenician coast, the Phoenician expansion
towards the sea, the founding of Carthage, the most famous Phoenician colony,
and so forth, demonstrating the power of the Phoenician narrative that
infiltrated even studies that defy it as a figment of the Lebanese ultra-nationalist
imagination.
The present study is an attempt to uncover the social, political and
intellectual origins and the development of the phenomenon of Phoenicianism