The Hananu Revolt (also known as the Aleppo RevoltMoubayed 2006, p. 604. or the Northern revolts) was an insurgency against French military forces in northern Syria, mainly concentrated in the western countryside of Aleppo, in 1920–1921. Support for the revolt was driven by opposition to the establishment of the French Mandate of Syria. Named for its leading commander, Ibrahim Hananu, the revolt mainly consisted of four allied insurgencies in the areas of Jabal Harim, Jabal Qusayr, Jabal Zawiya and Jabal Sahyun. The rebels were led by rural leaders and mostly engaged in guerrilla attacks against French forces or the sabotage of key infrastructure.
The Hananu Revolt coincided with the Alawite Revolt in Syria's coastal mountains led by Saleh al-Ali, and both al-Ali and Hananu jointly referred to their revolts as part of the "general national movement of Western Aleppo". Despite early rebel victories, guerrilla operations ceased after the French occupation of Aleppo city in July 1920 and the dissolution of the Arab government in Damascus, the revolt's key backer. Hananu's forces renewed the revolt in November 1920 after securing substantial military aid from the Turkish forces of Mustafa Kemal, who were fighting the French for control of southern Anatolia.
At the revolt's peak in 1920, Hananu established a quasi-state in the region between Aleppo and the Mediterranean. The rebels were dealt major battlefield defeats in December 1920, and following agreements between the French and the Turks, Turkish military support for the rebels largely dissipated by the spring of 1921. French forces overran Hananu's last stronghold in Jabal Zawiya in July. Hananu was tried by the French Mandatory authorities and was ultimately acquitted. A low-level insurgency led by Yusuf al-Sa'dun persisted, with the last major military engagement with French forces occurring on 8 August 1926. The latter occurred during the countrywide Great Syrian Revolt, which began in the summer of 1925.
The collapse of the Hananu Revolt marked a significant turning point in Aleppo's political configurations. Whereas prior to the revolt, many in Aleppo's political elite were aligned with Turkish national politics, the betrayal that Aleppo's leaders felt at the withdrawal of Turkish support prompted most of them to embrace and pursue a shared destiny with the rest of Syria. Many were also influenced by Hananu's support for Syrian unity and strengthening ties with Damascus. In the aftermath of the Franco-Turkish accords, Aleppo's Anatolian hinterland, the major market for its goods and the supplier of its food and raw materials, was ceded to Turkey. This effectively severed commercial relations between Aleppo and Anatolia, harming the former's economy.
Background In October 1918, Allied Forces and the Sharifian army wrested control of Syria from the Ottoman Empire. With British military support, the Hashemite leader of the Sharifian army, Emir Faisal, formed a rudimentary government in Damascus which extended its control to the northern inland Syrian cities of Homs, Hama and Aleppo. Meanwhile, France claimed special interests in Syria, per the Sykes-Picot agreement made with the British, and sought to establish a French Mandate over the region. The prospect of French rule was opposed by Syria's inhabitants.Neep 2012, pp. 27–28. French forces landed in the northern coastal city of Latakia in November 1918 and began to push inland through the coastal mountains, where they faced a revolt led by Saleh al-Ali, an Alawite feudal sheikh.Fieldhouse 2006, p. 283.
Political and cultural sentiments in Aleppo
At the time of the Arab Revolt and its aftermath, Aleppo's political elite was divided between those who embraced the Arab nationalist movement led by Faisal and those who sought political autonomy for Aleppo and its hinterland within the Ottoman state. A number of factors distinguished the attitudes of Aleppo's elite and populace from those of Damascus. For one, the economic well-being of Aleppo's inhabitants was dependent on open, commercial access to Aleppo's Anatolian hinterland, which was predominantly populated by Turks; southwestern Anatolia was the principal market for Aleppo's goods and the principal supplier of its food and raw materials.Khoury 1987, p. 103.
Furthermore, the political elite of Aleppo, which was considerably more ethnically and religiously diverse than the almost entirely Arab Muslim-populated Damascus, was culturally closer to Turkish-Ottoman society, and numerous members of Aleppo's elite were of Turkic, Kurdish and Circassian descent. Because of these factors, many in Aleppo's political class did not support the 1916 Arab Revolt, and those who joined it felt that the revolt negatively exceeded their expectations because it ultimately ended Ottoman rule, thus breaking the bonds of Islamic unity and initiating the separation of Aleppo from its Anatolian hinterland.Khoury 1987, p. 104. There was also resentment in Aleppo, which under Ottoman rule had been the administrative center of the Aleppo Vilayet (Province of Aleppo) and was equal to Damascus in political stature, at the political dominance of Damascus under Faisal. While there were several Aleppines who held influential positions in Faisal's Damascus-based government, Faisal's leading political authorities in Aleppo were from Damascus or Iraq. However, French officials incorrectly believed that the rivalry between Aleppo and Damascus would make Aleppo's elite embrace French rule. Instead, according to historian Phillip S. Khoury, Aleppo "vigorously resisted [French] occupation in order that its voice be heard in the new political climate."
Several Aleppan dignitaries supported Emir Faisal and in late October 1918, following the Sharifian army's entry into Aleppo, a branch of the Arab Club was founded in the city.Gelvin 1999, p. 84. The Arab Club's ideology was a mix of Arab nationalism and Aleppine regionalism.Khoury 1987, p. 106. It promoted the concept of Syrian national unity, and served as a political support base for Emir Faisal. Among the Arab Club's founders were Ibrahim Hananu, the president of Aleppo Vilayet's presidential council, Rashid al-Tali'a, governor of Aleppo Vilayet, Najib Bani Zadih, a wealthy Aleppine merchant, Abd al-Rahman al-Kayyali, an Aleppine physician and Shaykh Mas'ud al-Kawakibi, one of the city's leading Muslim scholars.
Prelude and early rebel actions
In November 1918, soldiers from Emir Faisal's army entered Antioch and were welcomed by the city's Arab inhabitants. In late November, French troops landed on the coast of the Gulf of Alexandretta and entered the city of Alexandretta, prompting anti-French uprisings in Antioch, al-Hamammat and Qirqkhan and the al-Amuq area. In December, French troops occupied Antioch and replaced the Arab flag on its governmental headquarters with the French flag. The revolts continued in the city's countryside, namely in the vicinity of Harbiya and al-Qusayr. The local uprisings spread from the Antioch region to Aleppo's countryside as far as the Euphrates.Arsuzi, ed. Sluglett and Weber 2010, pp. 586–587. The rebels consisted of small, disorganized ′iṣābāt (bands) and launched guerrilla-style attacks against French targets, but they also engaged in banditry and highway robberies.Neep 2012, pp. 109–110. An early attempt to coordinate the various rebel groups took place when one of the leaders of the Antiochian uprising and Alawite notable, Najib al-Arsuzi, developed contacts with rebel leaders from Jisr al-Shughur and other areas.
British forces withdrew from Syria to Transjordan and Palestine in December 1919 as part of agreements with France over dividing control of the Ottomans' predominantly Arab territories (later, in April 1920, France was given a mandate over Syria at the San Remo conference).Arsuzi, Ed. Sluglett and Weber 2010, p. 582. This left Faisal's rudimentary state vulnerable to French occupation. The French demanded that Faisal rein in the ′iṣābāt,Arsuzi, ed. Sluglett and Weber 2010, p. 588. which were not under Faisal's control.Arsuzi, ed. Sluglett and Weber, p. 583. Instead, Faisal opted to support and organize the northern rebels to prevent French advances from the coastal areas to the Syrian interior. The Arab government entrusted two natives of northern Syria, Hananu, a former Ottoman military instructor and a municipal official,Watenpaugh 2014, p. 175. and Subhi Barakat, a notable from Alexandretta, with expanding and organizing the local uprisings into a full-blown revolt.
Initially, Hananu logistically supported the guerrilla operations of Barakat against the French in the Antioch region. He later decided to organize a rebellion in Aleppo and its countryside.Gelvin 1999, p. 133. Hananu was motivated to act by what he saw as the ineffectiveness of the Syrian National Congress, the legislative body of Faisal's state of which Hananu was a member, in preventing French rule. He may also have been encouraged by Rashid al-Tali'a, the Arab government's district governor of Hama, who had been supporting Saleh al-Ali and the Alawite-dominated revolt he was leading against the French in the Syrian coastal mountains.Gelvin 1999, p. 134. Meanwhile, the Syrian National Congress proclaimed the establishment of the Arab Kingdom of Syria in March 1920. France was wary that a popular nationalist movement emanating from Faisal's kingdom could spread to Lebanon and French territories in North Africa, and moved to put an end to Faisal's state. Anti-French resistance manifested at local level as the Committees of National Defense, which began springing up in Aleppo and its hinterland. The committees were founded by members of the local elite, many of whom were sympathetic to Ottoman rule, but the committees quickly became fueled by populist agitation against French colonialism.
Hananu gained the backing of Aleppo's Committee of National Defense, which consisted of numerous educated professionals, wealthy merchants and Muslim religious leaders.Khoury 1987, p. 105. The committee provided him with arms and funds, and helped promote his armed campaign among the city's Muslim scholars as well as put Hananu in touch with Ibrahim al-Shaghuri, head of the Arab Army's Second Division. On orders from the Arab government in Damascus, Hananu formed an ′iṣābā in Aleppo consisting of seven men from his native Kafr Takharim, who he armed with hand-held bombs and rifles.Arsuzi-Elamir, ed. Sluglett and Weber 2010, p. 588. With al-Shaghuri's assistance, Hananu later expanded his ′iṣābā to forty fighters, known as mujahidin (fighters of a holy struggle), from Kafr Takharim and organized them into four equal-sized units.Gelvin 1999, pp. 133–134. According to historian Dalal Arsuzi-Elamir, the small size of each unit made them highly mobile and "able to inflict chaos on French troops". Hananu used his family's farm in the regional administrative center of Harim as the headquarters of his branch of the Committee of National Defense.
Revolt
First phase
Battle of Harim Hananu's revolt coincided with Turkish revolts against the French military presence in the Anatolian cities of Urfa, Gaziantep and Mar'ash.Watenpaugh 2014, p. 176. It also was related to Barakat's revolt in Antioch, which was captured and held by Arab guerrillas for a week starting on 13 March 1920. The French Air Force bombarded Antioch for 17 days until the rebels withdrew to Narlija. On 18 April, taking advantage of the diversion of French forces to Gaziantep where a major battle between French and Turkish forces was taking place, Hananu decided to attack the French garrison at Harim. With fifty of his irregulars, Hananu stormed the town. As word of his attack spread to nearby villages, his forces subsequently swelled to 400.