The Origins of the Lebanese National Idea - Carol Hakim

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his government some months earlier about the eventual threat to its position in Lebanon if it chose to side unconditionally with Muhammad Ali.3 He thus gained the gratitude of the Maronites, who had received the news of his recall with concern. He was therefore considered the best choice to amend the tarnished image of France with them.

      Bourrée returned to Beirut in August 1841 and soon reached the conclusion that the Maronite Patriarch had emerged from the last crisis as the “real leader” of the Mountain: “Speaking of the Mountain, I should have first mentioned the patriarch, who is today its real leader. Over the past year, the patriarch has gathered into his hands all the powers and influence formerly held by the Emirs and shaykhs, who have either fallen or left with the old Emir Bashir.” Bourrée added, however, that Mgr Hubaysh, who had inherited these charges unexpectedly, was unprepared to shoulder these responsibilities without foreign assistance, and, since the Maronite prelate represented the “most powerful support for our influence in Lebanon,” the French consul henceforth endeavored to back him while relying on him to advance France's position in Lebanon.4 This approach was welcomed by the Maronite prelate, who was desperate for some assistance, especially in Istanbul, where lay his only chance of salvaging the situation and obtaining a political victory, through the restoration of Bashir II, which would compensate for the latest internal political and military setbacks. During a meeting with the French consul some days before the demise of the Shihabi dynasty, Mgr Hubaysh, in a desperate tone, implored the French diplomat to uphold the Maronite cause, stating, according to Bourrée: “Let France take our cause in hand, this cause is just, let her settle it in Constantinople, and we shall do whatever you instruct us.”5

      The foundations of a solid and lasting alliance based on mutual interest between France and the Maronite Patriarchate was thus laid. The Patriarch was hence accepted by France as the “real leader” of his community, and Paris promoted and supported his position and influence within his community and on the local political scene. In return, France could rely on a powerful ally within the Mountain. The close association of France with the Maronite Patriarchate remained, in spite of some vicissitudes, a central feature of French policy in the Levant until the end of the Ottoman period.6

      France's support of the Patriarch tallied with the new policy toward the Empire adopted by the new French foreign minister, François Guizot. The withdrawal of Muhammad Ali from Syria had delivered the Ottoman Empire of its most serious internal threat and allowed for the reestablishment of Ottoman rule in Syria. The Ottoman government had, however, to pay a heavy price for the Allied support then obtained. Ottoman officials had to endure henceforth continual intervention by the European powers, ostensibly anxious to assist and supervise the restoration of Ottoman rule in Syria on new and sound grounds and, indeed, to see a comprehensive reform of the Ottoman Empire. The Western powers had, however, serious misgivings about the Ottoman government's ability to regenerate the Empire and had opted for the preservation and reform of the Ottoman Sultanate for want of any better solution. Their main aim was to prevent a general scramble for the partition of the Ottoman Empire, which might lead to a generalized European conflict. It was hence European peace they first had in mind in seeking to uphold the integrity of the Empire and promote its reform. At the same time, in view of their misgivings about its fate, they began to prepare for an eventual collapse of the Empire and a consequent intervention.

      This undeclared scramble for the informal partition of the Ottoman Empire, fanned by a climate of acute rivalry and suspicion among the European powers, involved multifarious pressures on the Ottoman government in order to obtain economic or political benefits and enhance their future options and prospects. Syria was especially coveted by France and Britain, who engaged after 1840 in an intense competition to consolidate their current and prospective future positions. At that time, the best asset of the French government in Syria was the Maronite community, whose support loosely overlapped with France's protectorate of the Catholics in the Empire. Moreover, Mount Lebanon then represented a key strategic asset, and as the recent Egyptian crisis had revealed, whoever controlled this “impregnable citadel” could dominate the rest of Syria.7

      So, after Guizot took over the helm at the foreign ministry, he opted for a more cautious and conciliatory, but nevertheless ambiguous, policy than that followed by his predecessor. He moved to reintegrate France in the Concert of European powers, aligned France with the general European consensus aimed at upholding the integrity of the Ottoman Empire, and worked closely with the other European powers in Istanbul on the formulation of new arrangements for the administrative reorganization of Syria and Lebanon.8 At the same time, he emphasized more diligently the promotion of the protectorate of Catholics in the Empire and sponsored the extension of the educational activities of the Catholic missionaries, initiating a sustained cultural policy that greatly contributed to foster French influence in the Ottoman lands and more particularly in Mount Lebanon.9 Finally, Guizot endorsed the claim of the Maronite Patriarch for the restoration of the Shihabi dynasty and earnestly lobbied his peers to reestablish the 1840 status quo in the Lebanese Mountain.10 The ambiguity of Guizot's policy was well summarized in his instructions to his ambassador in Istanbul, just after the Egyptian rout:

      I draw your attention in particular to our religious interests in the Ottoman Empire. The glorious patronage that France has extended for centuries to the Catholics of the East, the missions which she has established there and which are successfully carrying on an honorable task of Christian civilization in those lands, are for her a matter of influence and illustration that it is imperative to keep intact, for that patronage and the salutary action of those missions, by accustoming the populations to look upon France as the source of the benefit and comfort that come from the West, can only plant seeds that will favor our political designs in future eventualities [my italics].

      At the same time the French minister was enjoining his diplomats on the ground to preserve “as much as possible” the integrity of the Ottoman Empire and to give to the Porte “advice in conformity with a provident and generous friendship.”11

      However, the latitude of the French government to pressure the Ottoman government on the Mount Lebanon issue was constrained by the often conflicting interests of the other European countries—especially Great Britain, who imposed itself as the patron of the Druzes in the Mountain—the net refusal of the Ottoman government to consider French proposals, as well as the limits of France's protectorate of the Catholics, which in no way entitled it to press for the adoption of a special political status for the Maronites in Mount Lebanon.12

      Guizot's cautious and ambiguous stance did not, moreover, satisfy the vocal Catholic and legitimist opposition in France who, along with some liberal and republican politicians and publicists, advocated a more forceful policy to support the Maronites in Mount Lebanon, while at the same time advancing French international position and interests.13 Their stances were inspired by a Romantic enthusiasm, fostered by a wave of religious revival and a fascination with the Middle Ages and the Crusades that followed the restoration of the monarchy in 1815. They were also animated by news of the conflict in the Lebanese Mountain that accompanied the reestablishment of Ottoman rule and by exaggerated and at times fanciful Maronite petitions emphasizing their trials at the hands of the Druzes and the Ottomans. Throughout the 1840s, the Catholic, legitimist, and liberal opposition mounted a sustained campaign in favor of the Maronites and repeatedly criticized the policy of the government in the press and in the Parliament, where they advocated stronger French support by diplomatic, and even military, means for the Maronites in Mount Lebanon.

      In one stormy parliamentary debate on the Lebanese question in 1847, for instance, sparked off by a set of Maronite petitions from the mixed districts presented by a Maronite priest, Father Jean ‘Azar, and which presented a dramatic account of the exaggerated misfortunes of Maronites, the Catholic opposition once more pressed the government for some firm French action in line with France's “secular right” to protect the Catholics of the Ottoman Empire, which they felt entitled, and indeed obligated, France to support the Maronites. “Would you renounce an ancient policy espoused by every French ruler from Charlemagne to Napoleon, including Saint Louis, Francis I, Henry IV and Louis XIV? . . . You are retreating from the protection of Lebanon's Christians, who might ask you for a single ship and a few hundred sailors!” asked the Catholic and legitimist deputy, Comte

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