MIDDLE EASTERN BORDERS NOW AND THEN By Christian Urice

Beginning of World War 1  The Allies of the Ottoman Empire were Britain and France  The British divided up the land depending on the Ottoman Empire  When the borders were being distributed they didn’t pay attention to Tribal groups and religious groups  The Ottomans expanded throughout southern and eastern Middle east.  Muslims ruled the Middle east since 1299

 The Allies won the war in 1918  They all argued about what the after war was going to be like  Talked about who would get the Ottoman’s land  The Ottoman’s land was made up of many religious groups such as Christian’s, Jews, Arabs  British kept asking the independent countries for their land

The Europeans  The British saved the land for further colonial empires  The Brits only got into the middle east’s business because they wanted oil and the they had a lot of it  When they were looking for oil they found a jackpot of it and the Europeans controlled what they did with it  They wanted to get the Islam's a hold on their religion  Promised the Arabians Independence

Europeans (Continued)  Balfour claimed that they would help the Jews with fighting for land  They agreed with the French that the Ottoman empire’s land would be evenly divided  Separated the land at the edge of the desert in Saudi Arabia  The British made more problems for themselves and the Middle east because of the oil

Ottoman Empire  Ruled the Arabian peninsula Fertile Crescent and Libya  They owned the entire Mediterranean coast  The Europeans controlled what they did with the land  During that time Afghanistan and Iran were completely independent owned by no one  Although Afghanistan and Iran were at war with Russia over oil

 Pakistan and India were in the war with Afghanistan and Iran against Russia  Britain stepped in and helped the Middle East fight against Russia  The Ottoman’s were ruled by the Turkish king  The ethnic and religious groups suffered discrimination  Ottomans were made up of Jews, Christians and Islam's

Taif Treaty  Yemen and Saudi Arabia were fighting over the oil in between the two countries  Three islands in the Mediterranean were fought over by Saudi Arabia and Yemen too  Came to and agreement over the red sea war called the Taif Treaty  The two countries couldn’t keep the agreement and ended it with lots of violence  Both countries came to a final agreement of the border lines (what they are today)

Taif Treaty (continued)  Even though the borders were already agreed on they still fought over them  There was an oil spill in the red sea that Saudi Arabia fought over with Egypt  1980’s the civil war in Yemen ended  Once it ended they became into one country  Again in 1992 they fought over the gulf of Aden with Saudi Arabia  Saudi Arabians attacked Yemen over a gulf

 They split the oil preserve among all the countries that wanted some  Back in 1995 the Tiaf treaty was renewed  Most of the countries didn’t have definite borders causing lots of wars due to countries “stealing” other countries oil  During the late 1900’s there were over 10 oil wars in that short time period

Independent countries  Israel beat Jordan and Syria into claiming the land  Once Israel settled into their land they thought of giving the land back  The Sinai peninsula was independent then Egypt took it over  Jordan and Israel formed a treaty to keep each other off one another’s land  Decided that the dead sea was the divider

Empires throughout WW1  The Ottoman Empire ruled from 1700 all the way up to 1912  In 1948 Israel was officially announced a country  The Europeans ruled Middle East for eight years  In 1997 all countries became independent\

Religions of the Middle East  For the first couple years of World War 1 Hinduism took over Middle East  Then Islam’s took over the Saudi Arabian portion  Christianity was the big religion in the later years of the war  In the end up till now they almost all countries are Islam

Bibliography  "Imperial History of the Middle East." Maps of War ::: Visual History of War, Religion, and Government. MMVI, 9 Sept Web. 20 Feb  Miller, John. "Maps of Religion." Maps of Religion. Web. 22 Feb  Jonston, Phill. "Middle East Borders." Middle East Facts. Web. 19 Feb  "BBC - History - World Wars: The Middle East during World War One." BBC - Homepage. Web. 16 Feb

Bibliography (continued)  Jason, Stacey. "World War 1 Borders." World War 1 Borders in Middle East. Web. 13 Feb  "Israel Border Conflict | Stand for Israel | The Truth Behind the Headlines." Stand for Israel Blog. Web. 12 Feb  Murphy, Chris. "Saudi Arabia - Yemen Border Dispute." Page Has Moved. Web. 12 Feb  "Global Connections. Liberia. Timeline | PBS." PBS: Public Broadcasting Service. Web. 23 Feb