In 1514, Sultan Selim captured Jerusalem and the surrounding area, and some 400 years of Ottoman rule in Palestine began. As in other Ottoman states, this period would enable Palestine to enjoy peace and stability despite the fact that adherents of three different faiths were living alongside each other.
The Ottoman Empire was administered by the "nation (millet) system," the fundamental feature of which was that people of different faiths were allowed to live according to their own beliefs and legal systems. Christians and Jews, which the Qur'an calls the People of the Book, found tolerance, security, and freedom in Ottoman lands.
The most important reason for this was that, although the Ottoman Empire was an Islamic state administered by Muslims, it had no desire to force its citizens to adopt Islam. On the contrary, it sought to provide peace and security for non-Muslims and to govern them in such a way that they would be pleased with Islamic rule and justice.
Other major states at the same time had far more cruder, oppressive, and intolerant systems of government. Spain could not tolerate the existence of Muslims and Jews on Spanish soil, two communities on which it inflicted great violence. In many other European countries, Jews were oppressed just for being Jews (e.g., they were forced to live in ghettoes), and were sometimes the victims of mass slaughter (pogroms). Christians could not even get along with each another: the fighting between Protestants and Catholics during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries turned Europe into a bloody battlefield. The Thirty Years War (1618-48) was one result of this conflict. As a result of that war, central Europe became a battleground, and in Germany alone, 5 million people (one-third of the population), perished.
In contrast to these brutalities, the Ottoman Empire and other Muslim states established their rule upon the Qur'anic commands of tolerant, just and humane administration. The reason for the justice and civilization displayed by Umar, Saladin, the Ottoman sultans, and many Muslim rulers, which is accepted by the West today, was due to their faithfulness to the Qur'anic commands, some of which are as follows:
God commands you to return to their owners the things you hold on trust and, when you judge between people, to judge with justice. How excellent is what God exhorts you to do. God is All-Hearing, All-Seeing. (Qur'an, 4:58)
O you who believe, be upholders of justice, bearing witness for God alone, even against yourselves or your parents and relatives. Whether they are rich or poor, God is well able to look after them. Do not follow your own desires and deviate from the truth. If you twist or turn away, God is aware of what you do. (Qur'an, 4:135)
God does not forbid you from being good to those who have not fought you in the religion or driven you from your homes, or from being just toward them. God loves those who are just. (Qur'an, 60:8)
If two parties of the believers fight, make peace between them. But if one of them attacks the other unjustly, fight the attackers until they revert to God's command. If they revert, make peace between them with justice and be even-handed. God loves those who are even-handed. (Qur'an, 49:9)
There is a phrase used in politics such that "power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." This means that everyone who acquires political power becomes somehow morally corrupted by the ensuing opportunities. This really applies to most people, because they shape their morality according to social pressure. In other words, they avoid immorality because they are afraid of society's disapproval or punishment. Authority grants them power, however, and decreases the importance of these social pressures upon them. As a result, they become corrupt or find it ever more easy to compromise their own morality. If they possess absolute power (and thereby become dictators), they may try to satisfy their own desires in any way.
The only human examples to which the law of corruption does not apply is people who sincerely believe in God, embrace religion out of fear and love of Him, and live according to that religion. Given that their morals are not defined by society, not even the most absolute form of power can affect them. God states in a verse:
Those who, if We establish them firmly in the land, will perform prayer and pay charity tax, and command what is right and forbid what is wrong. The end result of all affairs is with God. (Qur'an, 22:41)
In the Qur'an, God presents Dawud, peace be upon him, as an example of the ideal ruler, explains how he judged with justice between those who came to ask for his judgment and how he prayed with complete submission to God. (Qur'an, 38:24)
The history of Islam, which reflects the morality that God teaches Muslims in the Qur'an, is full of just, merciful, humble, and mature rulers. Since Muslim rulers fear God, they cannot behave in a corrupt, proud, or cruel manner. Of course there were Muslim rulers who became corrupt and departed from Islamic morality, but they were exceptions to and deviations from the norm. Thus Islam proved to be the only belief system that has produced a just, tolerant, and compassionate form of government for the last 1,400 years.
The land of Palestine is a testament to Islam's fair and tolerant governance, and bears the influence of many different faiths and ideas. As reported earlier, the governments of the Prophet Muhammad, may God bless him and grant him peace, Umar, Saladin, and the Ottoman sultans were such that even non-Muslims consented to them. This period of fair administration lasted until the twentieth century when, with the end of Muslim rule in 1917, the region was plunged into chaos, terror, bloodshed, and war.
Jerusalem, the center of three religions, experienced the longest period of stability in its history under the Ottomans, when peace, abundance, and prosperity reigned there and throughout the empire. Christians, Jews, and Muslims, and their various denominations, worshipped as they pleased, honored their own beliefs, and followed their own customs and traditions. This was possible because the Ottomans ruled with the belief that bringing order, justice, peace, prosperity, and tolerance to their lands was a sacred obligation.
Many historians and political scientists have drawn attention to this fact. One of them is Columbia University's world-famous Middle East expert Professor Edward Said. Originally from a Christian family of Jerusalem, he continues his research at American universities, far from his homeland. In an interview with the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz, he recommended resurrecting the "Ottoman nation system" if a permanent peace is to be built in the Middle East. In his own words,
A Jewish minority can survive the way other minorities in the Arab world survived… it worked rather well under the Ottoman Empire, with its millet system. What they had then seems a lot more humane than what we have now.14
Indeed, Palestine never witnessed another "humane" administration once Ottoman rule ended. Between the two world wars, the British crushed the Arabs with their divide-and-conquer strategy and simultaneously empowered the Zionists, who would later prove antagonistic even to them. Zionism incurred the Arabs' wrath, and, from the 1930s on, Palestine became the scene of clashes between the two groups. Zionists formed terrorist groups to fight the Palestinians, and, shortly thereafter, began attacking the British as well. Once Britain threw up its hands and abandoned its mandate over the region in 1947, the clashes turned into war and the Israeli occupation and massacres (which continue to this day) began in earnest.
In order for the region to enjoy "humane" rule once again, Jews must abandon Zionism and its goal of a "Palestine exclusively for the Jews," and accept the idea of sharing the land with Arabs on equal terms. Arabs, for that matter, must abandon such un-Islamic goals as "driving Israel into the sea" or "putting all Jews to the sword," and accept the idea of living together with them. According to Said, this means reviving the Ottoman system, which is the only solution that will allow the region's people to live in peace and harmony. This system may create an environment of regional peace and security, just as it did in the past.
Foot Notes:
14. An Interview with Edward Said by Ari Shavit, Ha’aretz, August 18, 2000.
[Source: Harunyahya: Palestine]
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