Talk:Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon

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French mandate of Syria and Lebanon?[edit]

There's a thing which is rather unclear in these articles, when France obtained control over Syria, wasn't the entire thing called the French mandate of Syria, including Lebanon? I doubt Lebanon was considered separate back then, until Syria was split into five parts anyway, so mentioning Lebanon as separate from the rest of the Syrian mini states is kind of nationalist POV (Lebanese have a tendency to claim the country always existed), Lebanon was pretty much as important as the other, more ill-fated countries.

Or am I wrong, was it called the French mandate of Lebanon and Syria right from the beginning, or was Lebanon simply a region within Syria? Funkynusayri (talk) 07:59, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This wikipedia article is correctly named verbatum after the League of Nations' document, whose cover page is the main photo of the article. It's "Mandate of Syria and the Lebanon".
And from a political perspective the reason why the title of the mandate makes a distinction of "the Lebanon" is because the maronite Patriarch Howayek successfully in 1919 convinced the French of carving out a Lebanon State despite this breaking a promise made to Faisal, but Faisal got every single promise made to him broken in the end so. 142.116.160.42 (talk) 03:34, 17 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Mount Lebanon was a separate entity. Some parts of Lebanon were considered part of Syria, mainly the Bekaa and Beirut, and the far edge of the North. But the rest was Mount Lebanon (70% of modern Lebanon). So it should be French Mandate of Lebanon and Syria. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.133.137.120 (talk) 20:02, 15 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • I think you're misunderstanding it, the parts you mentioned would belong to the other states, like Aleppo and Damascus, whereas all of the countries combined were Syria. FunkMonk (talk) 20:14, 15 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Incorrect Presentation[edit]

During the Ottoman period (before 1918) there was no such thing as the independent state of Lebanon. Lebanon had been always part of Syria since the Roman period and maybe earlier.

Why isn't this fact shown in this article? and why is Lebanon treated in a different manner than the rest of the "Syrian new states" during the French mandate over Syria?? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.86.12.39 (talk) 21:46, 29 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • I think it's because people just don't know about it. It should be changed, and Lebanon should be included in the map. Funkynusayri (talk) 19:09, 9 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can I do some changes?[edit]

Hello, I can add some information to the article to make it clearer. I can also add some missing flags (like the flag of Damascus). Can I rewrite some parts of this article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by HD1986 (talk • contribs) 19:34, 9 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Of course, the article is a mess as it is. Could you also clarify the Lebanon thing discussed above? Funkynusayri (talk) 19:36, 9 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Map Change[edit]

I agree that the map should be changed. Hatay & Lebanon at that time were part of French mandate of "Syria." All the agreaments and the League of nation's papers refered only to a mandate of "Syria" but never to Lebanon or Hatay. France sought to break Syria into six states, but it succeded only in making three (although Hatay is not really a state today).HD1986 (talk) 17:44, 11 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Great, I agree.

The article should be changed to "French mandate of Syria and Lebanon." They can't be treated separately because they started out as a single thing (the mandates of Syria and Lebanon).HD1986 (talk) 17:19, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Why should the name be changed? If so, it should be called "French mandate of Syria, Lebanon, Jabal Druze, Alaouites, Aleppo, Damascus, and Alexandreatta". Funkynusayri (talk) 23:34, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]


True, but I think that some people may get confused between the term "Syria" in its modern sense and what "Syria" meant at that time.HD1986 (talk) 10:49, 14 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Well, then we should explain it in the article... The concept of the greater/historical region of Syria should probably be mentioned somewhere. Anyway, I think it's explained well by this line: "while the French controlled the rest of Ottoman Syria (modern Syria , Lebanon, and Hatay province of Turkey)." Funkynusayri (talk) 10:54, 14 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]


I don't think that modern Lebanese would like the article that way.HD1986 (talk) 13:38, 14 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Heh, well, this is about historical facts, not about what modern Lebanese would like. Funkynusayri (talk) 13:51, 14 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]


By the way, the borders between Damascus and Aleppo are not very accurate in our map. Compare with the map you referred to, Palmyra was within Aleppo, the Aleppo borders should be drawn further south in the Wiki map. HD1986 (talk) 14:09, 14 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A new map, what do you think?[edit]

Hey, this is a new map: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Mandate_of_Syria.png

This is more comprehensive and the borders are more accurate, what do you think?

I have a question about the flag in the info box, does the flag have to be the last flag used during the mandate? why shouldn't it be the first flag? HD1986 (talk) 15:54, 17 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Yeah, I like that map better, though someone should make a SVG version of it. But remember to choose what license you release it under, otherwise it will get deleted by someone. I'll fix that one for you, but notice what I do. As for the flags, well, I'm not sure. Funkynusayri (talk) 16:26, 17 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Actually the flags usually associated with the mandate are ones carrying the French canton. See this page: http://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/sy-his1.html and this one: http://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/lb_his.html

I suggest going with the flag that included both Syria and Lebanon (the ugly one with the crescent), or the flag of the Syrian federation (better looking)... but the flag of the Syrian Republic, the current one, is not really representative of the mandate. HD1986 (talk) 17:50, 17 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Sykes-Picot and the LoN Mandates did not preclude a Confederation of Arab States[edit]

The articles on the San Remo conference, Sykes–Picot Agreement, and McMahon-Hussein Correspondence cite declassified British and US documents which prove that the Sykes-Picot Agreement did not include Damascus, Homs, Hama, and Aleppo in the French zone of direct influence, and that the other Allies denied that the LoN mandates could be used as a justification to violate the treaty agreement with Hussein. harlan (talk) 12:10, 12 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Name of mandate[edit]

I am changing the name to "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon" because that was its official name. League of Nations Official Journal, Vol 3, August 1922, p1013. That place has the text too (English version), but can anyone find the text in a freely-accessible place? Zerotalk 05:31, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

What was it called in 1920? FunkMonk (talk) 07:42, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The wording was only fixed in 1922 and it didn't become legal until Sep 1923. During debate in the LoN assembly in 1921, people called it either "Syria" or "Syria and the Lebanon". This is to be expected since Lebanon was considered a part of Syria. Zerotalk 09:31, 25 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please return the article to its former name. This guy does not know what he's talking about. The text of the mandate charter does not have the word Lebanon in it at all, and so is the text of San Remo and all other texts. The texts are available online and you look them up yourself. Actually, even the wikipedia article on the mandate does not have the word Lebanon in the mandate's name. The name "Lebanon" was never known as a country name before the 1940's. Anybody with the slightest background on the subject knows this, this guy does not know anything. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.178.224.175 (talk • contribs)

The most official version of the mandate document is referenced above. The text can be read here. The title and first page can be seen here. Zerotalk 12:36, 1 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
If this article is to stay with this name, then the French mandate of Lebanon needs to be moved to State of Greater Lebanon. Yazan (talk) 14:01, 1 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The IP, 213.178.224.175, has got it wrong. By no later than 1925, Lebanon had been declared to be a country and a State with its own constitution and nationality distinct from Syria. That determination was made by an Arbiter appointed by the Council of the LoN to settle, among other things, a dispute over that particular matter. All of that is explained in the Rules of establishment subsection of the League of Nations mandate article. harlan (talk) 17:16, 1 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To harlan; and so were the Alwaite State, the Druze State, etc. Where are these now? LOL. You apparently do not know that each one of these states had its own constitution and was regarded as a separate nation from Syria. Actually something you should know is that Lebanon was the least stable among these states since it contained a large Muslim population that did not recognize Lebanon until the 1940's.

The "Arbiter's" decision was probably made after Aleppo and Damascus merged into one state, but that does not mean anything. A LOT of things were changed dramatically after the establishment of the mandates (e.g. a Jewish country was made out of a land that had only 7% Jews in 1920). All these changes are irrelevant here. What is relevant is that this mandate was established in 1920 under the name of "the French Mandate of Syria" (this page has the exact original text: San Remo conference) and it remained known so officially until at least 1925. Perhaps they later added the word Lebanon, and they also separated Jordan from Palestine etc. All these later changes can be mentioned in the article, but you can't change the name of the article because the name was modified five years after the mandate was established. Jordan was no longer part of the Mandate of Palestine by 1922, why don't you go to that article and change the map?!

IP, "Jordan" didn't exist until 1949. Wikipedia has an article on Transjordan. The boundaries of the Alawite and Druze states were not established by the Allies. Neither the Mandatory, nor the League of Nations could unilaterally alter the terms of the Mandates. The Arbiter's decisions were binding on the Allies and the League of Nations, because they were made in accordance with the Treaty of Lausanne. harlan (talk) 08:09, 2 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

So why don't you go to the Transjordan article and change its name to Jordan?!

I don't want to keep repeating myself: the name of the Mandate was changed later. The Mandate charter, San Remo, Lausanne, and all texts prior to at least 1926 did not have the word Lebanon at all. They only had the word Syria. So unless you are willing to change the map in the Mandate of Palestine article and the name of Transjordan to Jordan, you must restore the original name of this article for at least the sake of consistency.

Also, for your own information, Lebanon was not any different from the Alawite and Druze states until 1936. The Alwaite State was only briefly part of the Syrian Federation before 1925, but after that it became as independent as Lebanon. (BTW, France wanted Lebanon to join the Syrian Federation as well but the Maronites refused, read about that). Lebanon was never thought of as a definitely separate country until 1936. Before that it was just one Syrian state like the other states. Read about that period. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.178.224.175 (talk • contribs)

Please sign your posts using four tidles like this: ~~~~. And please start to read what other people write. I gave you two authoritative sources published in 1922 and 1923 that show the word Lebanon so how can your claim about 1926 possibly be correct? You are proved wrong, accept it. Zerotalk 14:38, 2 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Do you know why I ignored your links? Because it is not so smart to bring me citations from the League of Nations JOURNAL dated two years after the establishment of the mandate while I am giving you the literal texts of San Remo, Lausanne, and the mandate charter. The original Mandate name was not established in the journal but it was established in San Remo. San Remo does not have the word Lebanon. And if you really have taken the effort to understand that period, you would have known that by 1922 the Syrian Federation had been established (without Lebanon and the Druze State because both rejected to join after being asked to), and the Mandate flag with the crescent had been abolished among other things.

So after 1922 not only the name had changed (if it really had), but also the flag and the states involved (e.g. Hatay was annexed to Aleppo during the federation; Aleppo and Damascus were united after 1925, etc.). AGAIN I REPEAT: a LOT of things changed during the mandate period, these include the flag of the mandate, the number of the states involved, their borders, and their flags, the borders of the mandate as a whole (the borders given in Sevres (1920) are different from those in Lausanne (1923)), etc.

So please let's not repeat again: the mandate in 1920 had the blue flag with the crescent, the name was Syria without Lebanon, and the states were as shown in the colorful map. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.44.255.12 (talk) 03:55, 3 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've seen this same problem many times in this "popular" encyclopedia. Someone with some background starts an article, and then other intruders start to mess with it. The name of this article was changed based on this statement:

"The wording was only fixed in 1922 and it didn't become legal until Sep 1923."

This is a totally false and deceptive statement. The three "class A" mandates already had fixed and legal names by 1920-- they were called Syria, Palestine, and Mesopotamia. These names are found in San Remo and other texts. If the names were changed later (e.g. Mesopotamia was changed to Iraq, etc.) this does not mean that the mandates did not have names before that! This guy was trying to make a case for himself by blatantly lying. This is not constructive at all in an encyclopedia, and this is why Wikipedia should never be taken seriously.

The words Syria, Palestine, and Mesopotamia had been known in Europe for centuries. The words "Lebanon" and "Transjordan" were never known as country names before the mandate period. Lebanon is the name of a mountain, it was never a country name before. It is ignorant and deceptive to argue that calling Lebanon as part of Syria in 1920 was dubious and that the name "was only fixed" two years later. Lebanon was naturally part of Syria and it only began having a separate name DURING the mandate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.44.255.10 (talk) 04:31, 3 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If calling Lebanon part of Syria in 1920 was just a mistake, how come that France had initially a single flag for the whole of Syria and Lebanon? And how come it established the Bank of Syria and the Syrian custom authority in Lebanon? It is bothersome to argue with somebody who simply does not know what they are talking about. Please READ about that period. There are plenty of books. Lebanon was not any different from any other Syrian State until 1936. When France returned the Allawite State to Syria in 1936, many Allawites sent petitions to France protesting how the fate of an independent nation may be determined against its wishes; and after that an armed insurgency broke out in the Allawite territories and it lasted until WW2. When the treaty of 1936 was announced, the Maronites panicked and didn't calm down until France signed a similar treaty with them. I don't want to talk more, but please READ about that period from detailed sources.

IP, please consider looking at Zeros links. Those are good links. Frederico1234 (talk) 04:57, 3 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
IP, please read WP:CIVIL. The San Remo conference agreed to establish mandates for Syria, Palestine, and Mesopotamia. The details were left to the Allied Powers to determine, and what they did was to establish the League of Nations to administer the mandate system. The League of Nations argued for a few years and agreed to establish mandates more or less exactly as Britain and France wished. The mandate for Syria was called the "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon" and its form was agreed to in mid-1922. That was its official name, I can't help it. It came into legal effect in 1923 after a disagreement with Italy was resolved. France treated Lebanon differently from the rest of Syria right from the start, and even earlier (see the French declaration of "État du Grand Liban" in 1920), just as Britain treated Transjordan differently right from the start. In both cases they approximately adopted their secret agreement of 1916. IP, perhaps if you make a more specific claim and give a checkable citation for it you can be taken more seriously. Zerotalk 08:34, 3 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The resolution of the San Remo Conference was an attempt to ratify the territorial allocations that had been proposed at the London Conference in January of 1920. There were no written mandates for Syria or Mesopotamia, just a draft mandate for Palestine. There never was a written mandate for Mesopotamia, just a bilateral treaty between Great Britain and Iraq.
The concluding resolution of the San Remo Conference was legally moot due to the circular nature of its dependent clauses. It stipulated that any mandate would require the approval of the Council of the League of Nations - and it contained a notice from a permanent member of the Council saying that: "The Italian Delegation, considering the great economic interests which Italy as an exclusively Mediterranean power possessed in Asia Minor, reserves its approval of the present resolution until there is a settlement of Italian interests in Asiatic Turkey."[2]
Resolutions of the Council could only be adopted on the basis of unanimity, and Italy was still refusing to approve the terms of any of the "A" Mandates in early July of 1922. See The NY Times article "Italy Holds Up Class A Mandates, 10 July 1922.[3] Prof. Marie-Joëlle Zahar writes that "On September 1, 1920, the French High Commissioner, General Henri Gouraud, proclaimed the creation of Greater Lebanon (Grand Liban), which would include the territory of Mount Lebanon, the towns of Beirut, Tripoli, Sur (Tyre), and Saida (Sidon), the regions of Ba`albak and the Biqa`, and the districts of Rashayya and Hasbayya. The Eastern Committee of the British War Cabinet said that, until the mandate was approved by the League, France was still under an obligation to the Allies to comply with the Reglement Organique Agreements of June 1861 and September of 1864. harlan (talk) 11:30, 3 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This article treats Syria and Lebanon starting from 1920 (not 1923). If you think that the period from 1920 to 1923 does not count because the mandate was still not official, then the article needs to be changed. It should not include the period between 1920 and 1923 because you guys think this period was not officially mandate. Or am I still getting it wrong?

This is what San Remo says:

The High Contracting Parties agree that Syria and Mesopotamia shall, in accordance with the fourth paragraph of Article 22, Part I (Covenant of the League of Nations), be provisionally recognized as independent States, subject to the rendering of administrative advice and assistance by a mandatory until such time as they are able to stand alone. The boundaries of the said States will be determined, and the selection of the Mandatories made, by the Principal Allied Powers.

As far as I understand English, this means that in 1920 there was something called Syria and it was a mandate (in accordance with Article 22). If you think this was still unofficial, then why is it only the name of the mandate that you are so careful about keeping official in this article?? What about the flag and the states? These were different in 1923 from 1920.

So please make up your mind: what was the first year of the mandate?? was it 1920 or 1923? and what was the name of the mandate in that year? What was the flag? What were the states? And finally, why is there a separate article for the French Mandate of Lebanon??

According to the FRUS, the 10 areas proposed for mandate in January of 1920 were originally administered under 15 mandates. The San Remo resolution was not accepted by either Turkey or Italy in 1920. The terms of the mandates were not finalized until 1922. The territories were detached from Turkey by article 16 of the Treaty of Lausanne (1923) which was retroactive in some of its effects to 1 March 1920 (see article 52). In 1925, the League of Nations Arbiter did not take notice of the San Remo conference, the flags, the Alwaite State, and etc. But, he did make a binding legal determination that - according to Article 46 of the Treaty of Lausanne - the French Mandate contained two States - Syria and Lebanon that had acquired territory from Turkey. harlan (talk) 06:04, 4 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

So..??! What about what I said?

What was the first year of the mandate? was it 1920 or 1923? and what was the name of the mandate in that year? What was the flag? What were the states? And finally, why is there a separate article for the French Mandate of Lebanon? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.44.255.10 (talk) 09:07, 4 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You are mistaken when you say "The High Contracting Parties agree ...& etc.", because you are not reading the entire resolution. The High Contracting Parties included Italy, and it refused to agree.
Wikipedia has lots of articles and they constantly get split, merged, renamed, and deleted. There used to be a British Mandate of Transjordan article. At the moment there are only British Mandate of Palestine, Transjordan, and Jordan articles. On the French Wikipedia, there is a State of Greater Lebanon article.
There was a distinction between the Mandate territories and the States that were established in them under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles and Lausanne (not to mention "nations" and "communities"). Many of the provisions took the form of "The States that acquire territory detached from Turkey by the present treaty... & etc. Another example is article 434 of the Treaty of Versailles which said

Germany undertakes to recognise the full force of the Treaties of Peace and Additional Conventions which may be concluded by the Allied and Associated Powers with the Powers who fought on the side of Germany and to recognise whatever dispositions may be made concerning the territories of the former Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, of the Kingdom of Bulgaria and of the Ottoman Empire, and to recognise the new States within their frontiers as there laid down.[4]

The establishment of the State of Greater Lebanon occurred subsequent to the Armistice of Mudros, during an armistice occupation. There was no regime of mandates in place at that time, and there were no "A" mandates until 1922. Recognition of statehood is customarily retroactive to the first "Act of State". The Treaty of Lausanne contained a retroactive charge for a share of the Ottoman Public Debt payable by the government of the States that acquired territory from Turkey. The LoN Arbiter said that Lebanon already had its own nationality and constitution in 1925, although the latter may only have consisted of a body of fundamental laws or statutes. harlan (talk) 13:20, 4 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

So you still refuse to answer the question directly and prefer to talk about meaningless details (it does not matter what Italy thought of the mandate). Let me answer for you: what you're trying to say is that the mandate started in 1922, but the two states of Lebanon and Syria (which should include all the states but Lebanon?) started "retroactively" in 1920. This still does not resolve the problem and does not change the historical fact that France administered Syria and Lebanon as a single entity (which it called "the mandate of Syria") with a single flag between 1920 and 1922. I don't know if an encyclopedic article should cover historical events based on their mere factuality or their legal factuality. What I've been seeing usually is the former--we're not in a courthouse, this is an article covering history.
It is a historical fact that there was something called "the French mandate of Syria" between 1920 and 1922/1923, and this covered both Syria and Lebanon, and had a single flag.
Anyway, I'm really tired arguing. In any case, the article on the French mandate of Lebanon is obviously redundant.

It isn't for us to take positions, we should only report on what reliable sources state. So in fact we do not have to make up our minds about when the mandate started. The article should just lay out the facts has given in good sources, and to a limited extent the opinions of learned commentators. That's our job here. Zerotalk 14:02, 4 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

OK... I don't want to use offensive words with you, but your "source" (which is crap not a source) says that the mandate started in 1922... so the article has a problem... if you can understand what I've been saying...? Did you even read what I wrote?
BTW, the phrase "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon" is rare when searching on Google compared to "French mandate of Syria". This article is vague-- does it intend to cover a historical period of Syria or both Syria and Lebanon? If it is basically concerned with the history of Syria (as it seems to be, based on the tags, links, context, etc.), then the title must be changed on the ground that the current title is rare and weird. If the article is concerned with the history of both Syria and Lebanon, the article on Lebanon must be deleted for redundancy. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.44.255.10 (talk) 16:06, 4 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

(outdent) Article I of the Mandate Act of July 24th, 1922 required France to prepare and promulgate organic laws for Syria and Lebanon within three years after the coming into force of the Mandate.

Several sources indicate the process verbal of the San Remo Conference described the mandate as being for Syria and the Lebanon from the outset, based upon promises and declarations made before the San Remo Conference. As for names and dates: according to Stephen Longrigg, "the award of a Mandate to France for 'Syria and the Lebanon' [quotation marks in the original], made by the Principal Allied Powers on 28 April 1920, was accompanied by no detailed provisions; these remained to be drafted to the satisfaction of the Council of the League, by whom the award itself must be confirmed." ..."Draft Mandates for Syria-Lebanon, Palestine with Transjordan, and 'Iraq were published in August 1921, but were not resubmitted to the League Council until July 1922. The final text, which did not differ significantly as between territories save for the provisions covering Zionism in Palestine, was approved by the Council on 24 July 1922. But further discussions were still to be held between France and Italy, regarding the latter's rights in the territory, before the Mandate could be declared, on 29 February 1923, to have become effective: by which date all Turkish rights to Syria had been renounced under the Treaty of Lausanne, which was signed on 24 July. The last American scruples were removed by further Franco-American exchanges, ending with a Convention signed on 4 April 1924, and ratified on 13 July, covering American rights and the Open Door. Germany, Austria, and Belgium having undertaken to recognize whatever régime in Syria should be established, 13 July 1924 became the date upon which vanished the last diplomatic obstacle to the full exercise of the Mandate." Longrigg adds that "The principal Italian demand was for foreign judges in cases involving Italians, in the absence of the Capitulations. The French-Italian agreement was signed on 23 September 1923." Stephen Hemsley Longrigg, Syria and Lebanon under French Mandate (London: Oxford University Press, 1958) pages 109-110. See also Michael Graham Fry, Erik Goldstein, Richard Langhorne, "Guide to International Relations and Diplomacy", Continuum International, 2004, ISBN: 0826473016, page 199 [5]


Longrigg explains there were several Lebanese delegations at the Versailles Peace Conference and Clememceau gave them guarantees of Lebanese independence from Syria in October 1919. The subsequent provisional agreement between Clemenceau and Faisal provided for separate French Mandates for Syria and Lebanon in late 1919. When the Syrian Congress rejected the arrangement and declared natural Syria's independence (including Palestine), the Lebanese Christians repudiated all 'Sharifian' claims. On March 22 1920 representatives of the various communities in the Lebanon met at Ba'abda. With French endorsement, they proclaimed their own independence from Syria (before the San Remo Conference was convened). The Conference awarded single mandates to Great Britain for Iraq and Palestine and a single mandate to France for Syria and the Lebanon. "In mid-May Millerand reassured the Lebanese Delegation, then in Paris, that the creation of a separate Lebanon formed part of French policy." But on 10 July part of the Council of the Lebanon met and resolved to demand or proclaim its own complete sovereign independence, without French tutelage but with Syrian fraternal co-operation. The French arrested and deported them all. See Stephen Hemsley Longrigg, Syria and Lebanon under French Mandate (London: Oxford University Press, 1958) page 89-99. In the meantime, the mandates were only provisional and the details and boundaries were left up to the Allied Powers to decide as they saw fit. According to Mary Wilson, when the French overthrew Faisal the British suddenly wanted to know 'what is the "Syria" for which the French received a mandate at San Remo?' and 'does it include Transjordania?. Hubert Young to Ambassador Hardinge (Paris), 27 July 1920, FO 371/5254, cited in King Abdullah, Britain and the Making of Jordan, Mary Christina Wilson, Cambridge,1988, ISBN 0-521-32421-1, page 44.

The Mandate system did not preclude the establishment of inland kingdoms, Arab states or confederations of Arab states. Great Britain quickly entered into treaty agreements with the Sharifians in Transjordan and Iraq. Only Syria and Lebanon had international personality as States. Archival documents from the French Foreign office reveal France had plans to enter into treaty relations with Syria and Lebanon similar to the British Hashemite arrangements. Syria considered the Alawaite and Druze enclaves to be an integral part of Syria, and France planned to reattach them prior to Syrian independence. [6] harlan (talk) 05:10, 13 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I need a document from before 1922 using the term "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.178.224.178 (talk) 08:39, 13 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The document that Zero is citing is from 1921. The published sources above say (i) there was no document for the French mandate in 1920; (ii) there was a draft which was proposed in 1921; and (iii) it was re-submitted and approved in 1922. The only mandate that was revised was the Mandate for Palestine. Article 25 was added in March of 1921 nearly a year after the San Remo Conference approved the first draft. harlan (talk) 03:33, 14 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Here is a very clear example from 1920. The full title of the Franco-British boundary agreement (1920), signed on December 23, 1920, was "Franco-British Convention on Certain Points Connected with the Mandates for Syria and the Lebanon, Palestine and Mesopotamia". The text contains the phrase "mandate xxx Syria and the Lebanon" three times, amusingly with "xxx" being different on each occasion: over, of, for. It also says once "mandates for Palestine and Syria". Given the importance of this agreement, the first attempt to define the extents of the mandates properly, it is clear that already by the end of 1920 "Syria and the Lebanon" was the preferred formal name. Zerotalk 04:28, 14 May 2010 (UTC) American Journal of International Law (278 (1921)) lists the following in its chronicle of international events: "FRANCE. Decree issued creating body of controlling counsellors to administer the mandate in Syria and Lebanon" (published Journal Officiel, Dec 16, 1920). Zerotalk 07:09, 14 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Longrigg quoted the contents of the minutes of the 1920 San Remo Conference regarding the mandate. That would also be a pre-1922 document, but I haven't located a copy. The UN Treaty organization says: "Information about the 205 volumes of the League of Nations Treaty Series (LoNTS) has been made available in the United Nations Treaty Collection website. During migration of the database, the full text of the League of Nations material was lost." [7] I've poked around there and the Collections in the Archives Department at the Quai d'Orsay, [8] but haven't found any of the San Remo materials.
The UK National Archives assigned a Cabinet Paper file number CAB 24/117 (Former Reference: CP 2358) to a report authored by the Council of the League of Nations on 16 December 1920 and addressed to the Assembly of the League of Nations. It is entitled "RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE LEAGUE ARISING OUT OF ARTICLE 22 (MANDATES)" and discusses the steps that were being contemplated to implement Article 22. Annex 6 (page 40) is a letter, dated October 16th, 1920, addressed to Mr. Leon Bourgeois, President of the Council of the League of Nations from the French Prime Minister:
"On August 5th, 1920, H.E. M. Quinones de Leon, acting (by virtue of his position) as President of the Council of the League of Nations, addressed to my predecessor a letter requesting information on the measures taken by the Allied Powers for the execution of Article 22 of the Covenant (territories and colonies which, in consequence of the war, have ceased to be under the rule of States which formerly governed them). With respect to certain territories of the former Ottoman Empire, the Supreme Council at its Meeting at San Remo decided to give the mandate for Syria and Lebanon to France, and the mandates for Mesopotamia and for Palestine to the United Kingdom of Great Britain. Declarations establishing these mandates have been drawn up as a result of an exchange of views between these two countries, and the French Government is ready to submit the Declaration concerning Syria and Lebanon to the Council of the League as soon as the British Government, on its side, shall be ready to submit its declarations. I understand that the British Government is awaiting the observations of the present administration of Mesopotamia, to whom the text of its declaration has been sent.
It may therefore be expected that the Council will shortly receive the declarations concerning these mandates. ... No doubt you will agree with me in thinking that it would be preferable that the question of mandates should not be finally dealt with in its essentials by the Council of the League, as long as conversations are being carried on between the interested Powers. On the other hand, it is desirable that the Council should organise at once the Commission provided for by Article 22 of the Covenant, so that this Commission may be able to proceed without delay to the examination of the drafts which will be submitted to it, some of which, such as those referring to Mandate A, will no doubt be communicated to it very shortly.
(Signed). G. LEYGUES.
harlan (talk) 22:52, 14 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The UK National Archives has a Cabinet Memorandum available for download titled: The Settlement of Turkey and the Arabian Peninsula. CAB 24/72, dated November 9, 1918, Former reference: GT 6506, Author: Political Intelligence Department, Foreign Office. It explains the commitment of the Allies under the "Reglement organique" of the Lebanon vilayet, dated June 9, 1861 and "Reglement organique" of the Lebanon vilayet, dated September 6, 1864. Those were multilateral treaty agreements that could not be considered to have lapsed with the war. Those agreements defined the boundaries of the Lebanon vilayet, provided that it shall be administered by a Christian Governor, called into being an Administrative Council, and laid down details of local government, justice, finance, and etc. that were not superseded by the Sykes-Picot agreement. The government of Great Britain felt that the specific rights of autonomy secured to the inhabitants under the Reglement ought not to suffer detriment through the abolition of Ottoman suzerainty, but ought to be secured to them, if they so desire, under whatever regime may be established in this and other adjoining territories which Turkey will have to cede at the peace (page 9).
The paper explains that the inhabitants of the Lebanon vilayet, who as Ottoman subjects enjoyed administrative autonomy under guarantee of the Powers, ought not to be forced into any relation with the rest of Syria of which they do not approve (page 14) and stated that "It will be advisable to draw a distinction between the Lebanon (within the old boundaries of the autonomous vilayet, with the inclusion of the Beirut enclave) and the remainer of the Syrian area. It is understood that Sherif Feisal and the non-Lebanese Syrian Arabs are willing that the Lebanon should maintain its separate existence, unless, or until, it desires to merge itself in the larger Syrian body politic, and that it should receive assistance from France, so long as it is clearly established that the French are invited by the free choice of the Lebanese (page 23). harlan (talk) 18:10, 10 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Arab Kingdom of Syria [edit]

Note to talk page watchers - a new article has been created at Arab Kingdom of Syria , and I'm no expert on the subject but it appears to be a topic which is partly covered in this article. I don't know if a merge is appropriate so I am hoping some experts can take a look. If the article should exist as a separate article then perhaps some contents can be moved out of here and linked over to Arab Kingdom of Syria .  7  08:22, 16 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the subjects are separate, so the articles should remain separate. FunkMonk (talk) 22:50, 16 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Non constructive edits[edit]

It looks like nobody added any information to what I wrote in this page (which was very brief and insufficient IMO; there is lots to talk about), but as usual, the article has been 'politically' edited and the title changed. This is the worst thing about Wikipedia-- people jumping around and politically editing articles without adding anything to them. I don't think this is constructive editing. If you want to make a political point in an article, why you don't you at least have the decency and write something yourself instead of editing what other people write?

Anyway I don't mind moving the article. Actually I remember that I suggested that from the beginning but it was rejected. I don't know what happened now. But the current title is obviously lame. I suggest moving the article to 'French Mandate of Syria and Lebanon.'HD86 (talk) 13:12, 10 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Actually I think the reason for why we kept the name "French mandate of Syria" was the fear that merging the two articles on Syria and Lebanon would touch on political sensitivities on part of the Lebanese. It looks like the articles were merged by Israeli guys. I can't see exactly why they did that, since it is not at their political interest to have the article on Lebanon redirecting here. It seems to me one of those moments when a shock makes you do something stupid. Anyways guys thanks for letting me know that this is a hot topic in Israel. I am going to add information to this article soon that is going to make it even more interesting for you. Keep coming please.HD86 (talk) 16:49, 10 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The system of mandates evolved over several years. The territorial extent of the mandates was not defined from the outset. The original subjects of the draft mandates were the "communities" living in undefined territorial areas. The ten areas addressed by the Paris Peace Conference were subsequently divided into 15 mandated states whose boundaries were established by the Allied powers. See "The Paris Peace Conference, 1919, Volume XII Treaty Of Versailles, Annotations Of the Text", page 94, "Note to I, 22" [9] Published sources tend to blur the differences between the communities, the legal instruments, and the resulting mandated states. harlan (talk) 16:02, 12 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know who you are talking to, but all what you've been saying on this page is worthless. This is not a courtroom. We work here only by citations from secondary references. Original research from primary sources is not allowed here. All your nonsensical talk is worthless because it is all original research. The article needs to be moved to an acceptable name, and it also needs to be expanded like I said. There is much to talk about that is not mentioned, and most of it contradicts your idiosyncratic opinions BTW. Maps and scondary references continued to call the mandate the Mandate of Syria up to the 1930's or even later, so the name of French Mandate of Syria and Lebanon cannot be sustained with your worthless primary-source arguments. However, the name can be sustained on different grounds. Sadly I don't have the time to reform this article now, but perhaps I will do so after few months.--HD86 (talk) 01:12, 30 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm obviously talking to you. The text of the "French Draft Mandate for Syria and Lebanon" was published in a reliable secondary source: "The Yearbook of the League of Nations", Volume 1, Charles Herbert Levermore (editor), The Brooklyn Daily Eagle (publisher), 1921. [10]
In the "Name of mandate" section above, I cited and quoted other secondary sources including Stephen Hemsley Longrigg, Syria and Lebanon under French Mandate (London: Oxford University Press, 1958) pages 109-110; and Michael Graham Fry, Erik Goldstein, Richard Langhorne, "Guide to International Relations and Diplomacy", Continuum International, 2004, ISBN: 0826473016, page 199.
The name of the article was changed by another editor in order to reflect the official name that has always appeared in the Journal of the League of Nations. FYI, citing and directly quoting primary sources, including the official Journal of the League of Nations, or the US Government official documentary record of the Paris Peace Conference is not original research. WP:PSTS has always said that primary sources that have been reliably published may be used in Wikipedia. For example, the article already cites the "Statement of General de Gaulle of November 29, 1941, concerning the Mandate for Syria and Lebanon", Marjorie M. Whiteman, Digest of International Law, vol. 1 (Washington, DC: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1963) 680-681. harlan (talk) 05:48, 30 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have time to talk now, but the article has to be moved and reformed. I'll be back in a few months and we'll talk then. Citing whatever secondary sources you find is not good. I would hardly think of "The Yearbook of the League of Nations" published in 1921 as a secondary source; and even if you consider it so, this is not a good citation at all in this case.--HD86 (talk) 09:59, 30 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I told you already this is not a courtroom. Your way of argument does not work here. It is true "The Yearbook of the League of Nations" is "legally" a secondary source, but this is not the kind of secondary source we want.--HD86 (talk) 10:08, 30 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The fact is that the official primary sources from France, the UK, and US governments all agree and they contradict your position. They have been reliably published and have been cited in the article and external links. They are also supported by ample analysis contained in reliable secondary sources.
Frederico1234, and I looked at Zero's sources and supported the steps he took to rename the article. You haven't actually cited any sources in your posts here that substantiate the claim that editors have been making non-constructive edits to the article. So, you appear to be ignoring WP:AGF and giving undue weight to erratum that you've encountered in some of the published literature. If you don't have time to discuss those sources, then by all means stop using the talk page as a general forum or chatroom. harlan (talk) 22:32, 30 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

ambiguity[edit]

What does "...and the issue is still disputed until the present time" mean? Does that mean it's no longer disputed? Or is this an exercise in redundancy?

24.208.224.73 (talk) 19:27, 23 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Good references for readers[edit]

I said before I was going to add information, but I am not going to do that because this website is infected with vandals and as soon as I write something Israelis and whatever other politically motivated editors start distorting it.

Here are some references for those interested:

  • M. Andrew & Sydney Kanya-Forstner (1981) The climax of French imperial expansion, 1914-1924
  • Fieldhouse, David Kenneth (2006) Western imperialism in the Middle East 1914-1958
  • LaMaziere, Pierre (1926) Partant pour la Syrie (I don't know if there is English translation. This book contains good information about political life in Syria-Lebanon in the early 1920's).
  • Salibi, Kamal (1990) A House of Many Mansions: The History of Lebanon Reconsidered (also a good and famous book, I recommend it.)

--HD86 (talk) 19:59, 23 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Moving[edit]

I do NOT want to argue about the name anymore, especially not with those Israelis. I just want to point out for those who would take care of the article in the future (which obviously do not exist now since that several false edits have been made to the article; those Israeli users are not here to guard the article, they are here to ruin it) I want to point out that the current article name must be changed because it is not a common name and is not used in secondary sources. The Israeli guys got this name from a League of Nations official journal from the 1920's. This article also cannot substitute for the two countries of Syria and Lebanon because the phrase "the Lebanon" in "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon" does not mean Lebanon the country but it means Lebanon the mountain (c.f. Lebanon and Mount Lebanon). Therefore, the current article name is actually just a lame and extremely uncommon variant of "French Mandate of Syria". Thus, this article cannot cover the two countires of Syria and Lebanon. The article must be immediately moved back to "French Mandate of Syria", and after that a new discussion must be opened to decide whether it is better to have two articles for the "French Mandate of Syria" and the "French Mandate of Lebanon" or to have a single article for both. Farewell.--HD86 (talk) 05:16, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think yo should stay and work on, I for one do not have enough knowledge on the issue to give a valid opinion, so I guess you are needed. FunkMonk (talk) 08:18, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
It is very exhausting to argue with those politically-motivated Israelis, and it is even more exhausting to keep reverting vandalism and POV edits. Although I have explained to Harlan that what we care about here is what the common name in secondary sources is, he still dogmatically repeates the same nonsense. The secondary sources use the name "French Manadate of Syria." No body uses "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon." Whether we should have one article for Syria and Lebanon or seperate articles for both is a different discussion, because "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon" is not equal to "French Mandate of Syria and Lebanon" as I explained above. The phrase "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon" means the "French Mandate of Syria" in Syria's pre-Lebanon borders which included Mount Lebanon as it is obvious from the San Remo text and LaMaziere's book ("Partant pour la Syrie", not "Partant pour la Syrie et Liban"). Also if you read Gouraud's correspondences as well as all French and British correpondeces and agreements that lead to Syces-Picot you will clearly see that no distinction between Syria and Lebanon was made. Actually the French were always calling for "la Syrie intégral" which also included Palestine, and they based their calim on the fact that the "Syrians" of Mount Lebanon were supportive of French rule over Syria. The distinction between a Syrian and a Lebanese nation in the 1920's as Harlan is hopelessly trying to draw is a myth. The French were making no distinction what so ever between Lebanon and any other Syrian State. You can read in the references I provided to you that when Gouraud was forming the Syrian Federation in 1923 he actually asked Greater Lebanon to join the federation, but he didn't ask the Druze State (which was part of the supposedly "Syrian nation" vs. the "Lebanese nation" as per Harlan's mythical account). When the Syrian Federation decided to merge the three states of the federation in a single state, France dismantled the federation. The crisis of 1925 was because France wanted to write a seperate constitution for each of the Syrian states, and it actually did that. Until 1936, the Alawite and Druze states had seperate constitution's from Syria's. The negotiation process that led to the unification of these states lasted for 15 years wihout result since France was obstinately refusing to merge the states, and the unification only happened in 1936 when a socialist government took power in France and allowed the unificiation of all Syrian states except Lebanon.

The point is that the image Harlan trying to paint that there was distinctly "two" nations in the mandate area is absolute bullshit. There was no nations at that time. There was different religious identities, different regional identities (e.g. Aleppo vs. Damascus), and different social idenities (sedentary vs. nomads of the Syrian Desert, who never accepted the Syrian idenitiy until the late 1940's). The independence of Lebanon was always in question and always on the negotians table just like the independence of the Alawite state. Harlan does not understand that this article should explain the history regradless of what the official documents say. The Maronites obviously weren't considering themselves Syrian, but the Maronite were NOT a Lebanese nation, they were a religious sect in the Mandate of Syria. Lebanon does not equate to Matonites. The Marnoites in the 1920's were only about 50% of the so-called Lebanses nation. 50% of the "Leabnese nation" were calling themselves Syrians, and many of the "Syrian nation" were NOT calling themselves Syrian.

I don't want to talk anymore. Just read the books.--HD86 (talk) 18:53, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Your argument about Lebanon vs Mount Lebanon is somewhat strained. The Règlement Organique Agreements of 1861 and 1864 had permanently detached Mount Lebanon from the local vilayets and given it an autonomous government that was directly accountable to the Sublime Porte. It was completely independent from Beirut and Damascus by international agreement, e.g. [11]
Wikipedia has an article on the United States, even though its borders today include areas that belonged to France, Russia, and Spain - and states that did not exist when it was established in 1776. In any event, your argument would apply with equal force to the borders of the other entity mentioned in the title of this article - "Syria". The mandates were allocated years before the boundaries of the newly created states were ever established. In fact, the Allied powers were given complete discretion to lay down the boundaries of new states inside the territory that was to be detached from the German and Ottoman Empires. That authority was part of the explicit terms imposed by the treaties of peace and was mentioned in the texts of the mandates.
Article 434 of the Treaty of Versailles stipulated that Germany was required to recognize the dispositions made concerning the territories of the former Ottoman Empire, "and to recognize the new States within their frontiers as there laid down." The text of the treaty is available online [12] The other Central powers and the treaty articles that required them to recognize the new states were:
  • Bulgaria [13] Article 60 of the Treaty of Neuilly;
  • Hungary [14] Article 74(2) of The Treaty of Trianon
  • Austria [15] Article 90 of The Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye
  • Turkey: Article 241 of the Treaty of Sèvres and Article 46 and 47 of the Treaty of Lausanne provided that the newly-created States in Asia in favor of whom territory had been detached from Turkey would participate in the repayment of the Ottoman Public Debt, and provided that the League of Nations was responsible for establishing an arbital court to make a final determination and resolve any disputes. The text of the treaties is available online here [16] and here [17]
The Franco-British boundary agreement (1920) established a boundary commission to address the problem. It submitted a plan that was revised and adopted on 7 March 1923. In 1925, a Court of Arbitration established by the Council of the League of Nations in accordance with the terms of the Treaty of Lausanne ruled that:
"The difficulty arises here how one is to regard the Asiatic countries under the British and French mandates. Iraq is a Kingdom in regard to which Great Britain has undertaken responsibilities equivalent to those of a Mandatory Power. Under the British mandate, Palestine and Transjordan have each an entirely separate organisation. We are, therefore, in the presence of three States sufficiently separate to be considered as distinct Parties. France has received a single mandate from the Council of the League of Nations, but in the countries subject to that mandate, one can distinguish two distinct States: Syria and the Lebanon, each State possessing its own constitution and a nationality clearly different from the other." See Marjorie M. Whiteman, Digest of International Law, vol. 1 (Washington, DC: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1963) pp 650-652, Questia, Web, 21 Apr. 2010
There were never two mandates, just one that included two states. I'd suggest you stop using the article talk page to discuss other editors. harlan (talk) 12:25, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

How is all this related to what I've been saying? Did you read what I said? What do you want exactly? You keep repeating the same exact irrelevant talk. What you are saying has been said many times before. Why do you keep repeating the same long and worthless dissertation? Are you trying to filibuster the discussion? This does not work, OK?

I am going to list the points one last time. You should answer briefly and adress the points I am telling you exactly. Otherwise I am going to ignore what you write because it is filibustering. I hope you understand that.

  • The League of Nations Court of Arbitration's rule is worthless because it is not a valid secondary source. You have to bring me books in the field of history written by normal people when you cite references. Is that clear or not?? If you really care about international law then why do not you go to the Golan Heights page and try to conform it with UN resolutions?? The UN (and all world countries other than Israel) describes the Golan Heights as Israeli-occupied Syrian territory and it issues yearly resolutions condemning Israel for its occupation and inhumane violations of international law in the Golan. Why don't you go to that article and put these sentences there first and then come back???
  • What the League of Nations, France, and Britain say is irrelevant. This is a history article, we write historical facts. France calimed that the Syrians wanted the French mandate, whereas in fact only the Maronites wanted the mandate. Do you want us to write in the article that the Syrians wanted the mandate?? The League of Nations calimed that there were two nations in the Mandate of Syria, but this is worthless because the League of Nations is not an authority in the field of history; the League of Nations was a political body controled by the colonialist powers. Do you understand that? We don't get our historical information from the League of Nations. We get it from history books written by academic people. The Palestinians, Transjordanians, Iraqis, Syrians, and non-Maronite Lebanese were all calling themselves a single nation. This is a historical fact. What your League of Nations said and decided is worthless.
  • The issue here is the article's name, which you never adressed in your long off-topic dissertation. You seem to agree that the "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon" means the "French Mandate for Syria and Mount Lebanon." This means that this title cannot replace the two countries of Syria and Leabanon, because it refers to Syria (including much of modern Lebanon) and Mount Lebanon. Therefore, we cannot automatically move this article to "French Mandate of Syria and Lebanon" but rather we have to decide whether we want a separate article for each of the two modern countries of Syria and Lebanon or whether we should have a single article for both. Since that you haven't given an opinion on this point and since that User:FunkMonk seems to agree with my decision, I am going to move this article to "French Mandate of Syria and Lebanon" since the two articles of "French Mandate of Syria" and "French Mandate of Lebanon" have already been merged.--HD86 (talk) 03:44, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This is the story of Lebanon's creation [18], unfortunatly it is incomplete preview. Reading this book will help the reader understand how the "two nations" were formed by France. These were not real nations but rather political etities arbitrarily carved out from a jungle of different religious communities. Lebanon more than any of the other states was arbitrary and heterogeneous in nature. To say that in the Mandate of Syria there existed "two distinct nations" is real absurdity.--HD86 (talk) 05:23, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Flags and dates[edit]

The mandate officially started in 1920, but in reality Syria was already occupied by the Birtish in 1918, and a year after the Syrian coast was ceded to France. The Arab kingdom in Damascus (which claimed sovereignty over all of Greater Syria, but in reality only held the inner Syrian track from southern Transjordan to Aleppo) was never recognized as an official state as far as I know. So I believe the mandate's first year was actually 1918, despite the fact that it only became official in 1920. By 1919, France had already established a headquarters in Beirut and started printing Syrian currency.

As for the end of the mandate, it certainly was after 1939, so the Hatay flag can't be put in the info box because by 1943 Hatay had been part of Turkey proper.--HD86 (talk) 04:32, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

File:King Faisal Of Syria 1920.jpg Nominated for Deletion[edit]

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Problems with the statement about Syria's Independence in 1941.[edit]

The statement that has been written for the section has stated: "On September 27, 1941, France proclaimed, by virtue of, and within the framework of the Mandate, the independence and sovereignty of the Syrian State."

The actually statement made in accordance to the legal document is as follows: "the independence and sovereignty of Syria and Lebanon will not affect the juridical situation as it results from the Mandate Act. Indeed, this situation could be changed only with the agreement of the Council of the League of Nations, with the consent of the Government of the United States, a signatory of the Franco-American Convention of April 4, 1924, and only after the conclusion between the French Government and the Syrian and Lebanese Governments of treaties duly ratified in accordance with the laws of the French Republic."

There is no actual admission made in that whole part that situates France's actual proclamation of the independence of Syria and it also goes against the current lay work of events that took place, since France had fallen to Germany in 1940 with the subsequent establishment of the Vichy regime. Meanwhile, the Free French, at least also noted in the same article on wikipedia, were occupying the Syrian Mandate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.160.76.52 (talk) 05:29, 22 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Cleanup tag[edit]

I added the tag because the article does a poor job at explaining clearly what exactly happened during a very complex period. I suggest it is split into an article about the mandate and another about the states. Oncenawhile (talk) 22:25, 15 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Suggestion to demerge Syrian Federation[edit]

An article Syrian Federation would help clear up the mess this article is in by pulling the complex history from 1922-30 out into a separate article, followed then by Syrian Republic (1930–1958). Comments welcome. Oncenawhile (talk) 23:57, 15 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Article about the mandate, not the administration[edit]

As per comments above, detail about the history of the administration in Syria has been demerged to two main articles -> Modern history of Syria and State of Syria (1922-30). Oncenawhile (talk) 08:30, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Factual inaccuracy[edit]

User:Minorities observer has created subsections for Al jazira and Golan in the States created during the French Mandate section. Though these two areas were never states. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 22:10, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Agree. And personally I think those paragraphs would fit better in the Syrian Republic (1930-1958) article. Oncenawhile (talk) 22:13, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
These two sections have their place here as they were the last attempts to create autonomous entities during the Mandate period. The aim of the autonomists was to force France to grant them the same level of autonomy as the existing Djebel Druze and Alawi territories, or the Sanjak of Alexandretta. --Minorities observer (talk) 22:19, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Moreover, the Syrian Republic (1930–1958) article has only a few paragraphs on the 1936-38 period, it is totally unsourced and hard to read (no sections and chronological incoherences). The addition of sourced paragraphs on Al-Jazira and Golan would unbalance it. --Minorities observer (talk) 22:28, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Someone wanting autonomy does not make it a state created during the French Mandate, so it can not stay as it is now. I support Oncenawhile that this info should be moved to the Syrian Republic (1930-1958) article, as the info is related to that one, and not this article. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 23:00, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I still do not agree, anyway the banner you added is insulting: you deny the factual accuracy of two sections that are fully sourced by scientific articles, while the rest of the article and the Syrian Republic one are nearly unsourced. I moved the two subsections into a new one, "Autonomy revendications not satisfied by the French Mandate authorities", and I move the article into "unwatched" in my list. --Minorities observer (talk) 06:46, 29 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Mandate document or country?[edit]

I disagree with the recent edits which have turned this from an article about the mandate document to an article about a "country". The structure for similar situations we have now is (1) an article about a mandate document and (2) articles about the "countries" or "territories":

Greyshark, if you feel strongly about this change, please could you justify it here and then let's discuss. Although I disagree with what the article now looks like, I don't intend to revert before we've had a chance to discuss. Oncenawhile (talk) 11:08, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Greyshark, i waited one week for response (also re my post on your talk) - have now reverted. Oncenawhile (talk) 09:14, 1 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move[edit]

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: moved per request. Favonian (talk) 16:13, 15 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

French Mandate of Syria and the Lebanon → French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon – Correct title "of"-->"for" to match the official document (shown at the lead image on top right of page). Oncenawhile (talk) 22:51, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment - I'm all for correctness, but literal translations are not always in line with the whole meaning. In French "le" is often in front of a country's name (Le Canada est un pays en Amérique du Nord. = (literal) The Canada is a/one country in America of North.), English has it's own grammar and word order (Canada is a North American country.), and archaic literal translations should not be blindly followed. If you look at the "cover" it reads "Mandat pour La Syrie et Le Lyban". So where did we get "Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon"? Why not "Mandate of Syria and Lebanon"? "Of" is also a valid translation of the French word "Pour". --Education does not equal common sense. 我不在乎 22:36, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi UnQuebecois, if you look closely at the document image on the page it has the official English translation (at the bottom, albeit a bit blurry). Oncenawhile (talk) 10:56, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Agree. The name of the document used in English by the League of Nations was "French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon" (LofN Official Journal, Aug 1922, p1013), so it isn't a matter of making our own translation. "Mandate of" is actually bad English, equivalent to writing "permission of" as a mistake for "permission for". The problem, of course, that the new title is the name of the document (and the legal agreement described by the document) and not really the name of the place. But this problem doesn't have any perfect solution, as we found by discussing the Palestine case ad nauseum. The reason for "the Lebanon" is that it was the common English name of the place in that time period. Zerotalk 01:33, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

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Requested move 16 February 2019[edit]

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Move as agreed. Consensus to move all is clear, with slight preference (preferred by Srnec, others are neutral on this) for not including "legal instrument" in the latter two. (non-admin closure) В²C ☎ 04:50, 4 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

– Removing the country of the mandate-holder per WP:CONCISE (there is no confusion possible, since only one of each of these mandates ever existed) and WP:PRECISE (the new names are the exact official names of the mandates - see the document images at the top of each of the articles). These are our only three articles on League of Nations mandate documents, so all titles need the same structure to remain consistent. Onceinawhile (talk) 17:03, 16 February 2019 (UTC)--Relisting. B dash (talk) 02:44, 24 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

  • OK. And why is "(legal instrument)" there in only two of three? Srnec (talk) 01:23, 17 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
It’s for disambiguation vs two other articles with similar names, and was discussed last year at Talk:British_Mandate for Palestine (legal instrument)#Requested move 22 May 2018. Onceinawhile (talk) 09:56, 18 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, but it cuts against your arguments that "there is no confusion possible, since only one of each of these mandates ever existed", "the new names are the exact official names" and "all titles need the same structure to remain consistent". I proposed a similar move back in 2012. I think "(legal instrument)" should be dropped. I'd support that. Srnec (talk) 15:19, 18 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Also from 2012. And also including you, Zero and I. Srnec (talk) 15:21, 18 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Srnec. Interesting to see that from all those years ago. I see I supported the parentheses back then – it was in the context of having only just achieved the solution to years of confusion within what was previously a single article combining the document and the territorial history. Anyway, I agree with you that now the parentheses can go (per my proposal last year linked above). But I feel strongly that we should not pollute these debates with multiple questions. If we are going to progress, we must take one issue at a time. Onceinawhile (talk) 21:52, 18 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Srnec: would you mind clarifying whether or not you support the specific moves being proposed? I am happy to propose a separate discussion of the bracketed text thereafter. Onceinawhile (talk) 10:11, 20 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I'm okay with "Mandate for Mesopotamia (legal instrument)" and "Mandate for Palestine (legal instrument)" (but would prefer dropping the parenthetical). For those we have corresponding articles on the territories, Mandatory Palestine and Mandatory Iraq. I'm a little less sure about moving this article (French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon) because we have no corresponding article to function as an overview of French rule in these parts. We have articles on the various states they created, but not an overarching article on the mandate territory. Srnec (talk) 01:02, 28 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Not sure about the official status of these names. The two British images are British documents, not LofN documents. In both cases the LofN Official Journal presents them as "British Mandate for..." . I don't have access to the French edition of the official journal (do you?), but the English edition calls the first one "French Mandate for..." . I suspect the difference was considered insignificant, in which case including the name of the mandatory seems to give more information to our readers. But I don't feel strongly about it. Zerotalk 04:03, 17 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Zero0000, thank you – you had me stumped there for a while. Having dug further into it, I am convinced the OJ does not represent the final reference version of the mandate. In the following years the LoN (1939 en, 1936 fr) and the UN (1947) referenced these publications:
  • Palestine => C.P.M.466. / C.529.M.314.1922.VI. [19]
  • Syria => C. 528. M. 313, 1922. VI. [20]
Rather than the British/French publications, or the OJ, I believe it is these documents which have precedence.
What do you think? Onceinawhile (talk) 09:56, 18 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, in all likelihood these are the official "deposit copies" of the mandates. Good discovery. Zerotalk 11:25, 18 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Hi @Zero0000: please could you clarify whether or not you support the moved being proposed? Onceinawhile (talk) 10:11, 20 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Do I have to choose? I'd be content with either. The "official name" argument is balanced by the "more informative" argument. Zerotalk 12:05, 20 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.
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