A Land of Aching Hearts: The Middle East in the Great War by Leila Tarazi Fawaz (review)

Leila Tarazi Fawaz’s new book, A Land of Aching Hearts, focuses on the diverse experiences of civilians and soldiers, Ottoman as well as foreign, who lived and fought in Greater Syria in WWI—a “rupturing moment” in the region’s history—with occasional forays into Anatolia, Gallipoli, and Iraq. A narrative social history, the book seeks to “excavate[s] the foundational experience” of the modern Middle East in the Great War by examining the smaller and more personal wars and acts of resistance of “regular folks.”

The book is comprised of seven chapters, an introduction, and an epilogue. In chapters one and two, Fawaz sets the local and international contexts of her narrative. Chapter one, “A Changing Middle East,” focuses on the closing decades of Ottoman history and the political and socioeconomic transformations that took place in the context of (unequal) economic integration, European colonialism, and Hamidian centralization and repression. Chapter two, “The Empire at War,” offers a compelling section on the Eastern Question and an excellent overview of the political and military events of the war in its Ottoman theaters. The author reminds us that, despite decades of intermittent wars, WWI was the first big war fought inside the territories of the empire.

Chapter three, “Living the Great War,” provides a well-rounded description of the “living hell” that the civilians endured during the war. The suffering was widespread and deep: famine took the lives of hundreds of thousands of people and led to waves of internal migration and immigration. Disease, including typhus, typhoid, cholera, and the plague, took its toll as well. In assessing the political causes of these crises, Fawaz is careful to apportion equal responsibility to Ottoman wartime requisitioning polices as she is to the Entente blockade of the Eastern Mediterranean. Not surprisingly, the suffering had a huge impact on social life. Fawaz discusses, with empathy, the rising rates of suicide, crime (particularly “petty food crimes”), begging, and prostitution—even cannibalism.

In chapter four, “Entrepreneurs and Profiteers,” Fawaz provides an informative description of the impact of the war on the local economy, where the combination of absent credit, stopped remittances from abroad, and currency devaluation led to widespread bankruptcies and work stoppages. The same conditions allowed “entrepreneurs [to] flourish.” The rich, local state officials, and the connected exploited wartime “opportunities” for smuggling and profiteering to amass huge fortunes. Others used their entrepreneurial talents elsewhere, resorting to espionage and collaboration.

Chapter five provides a well-crafted exploration of the great diversity of “The Soldiering Experience.” It opens with a strong overview of the structural problems in the Ottoman mobilization effort and discusses the difficult conditions on the fronts. Ottoman soldiers and the mostly Christian labor battalions manning the “the bare-foot” war effort often fought and worked without adequate clothing, shoes, food, or medical services. The front did allow for a positive measure of ethnic mixing, and Fawaz insists that Ottoman soldiers were often impressive and “dogged” on the battlefield. Still, they suffered from malnutrition, exhaustion, extremes of weather, and hopelessness leading to widespread draft evasions (through self-mutilation) and/or outright desertion and surrender.

In chapter six, “South Asians in the War,” the author provides an interesting digression into the experiences of and casualties among Indian and other colonial soldiers (Egyptian and ANZAC) fighting for Britain in the Middle East. Particularly interesting are the author’s sensitive snapshots of Indian soldiers fighting in Mesopotamia and Egypt, where she also describes the ways in which both the Ottomans and the Europeans attempted to exploit their religious and ethnic sensibilities to different political ends.

The final chapter, “Cooperation and Disaffection,” traces the impact of the war on political identity. Fawaz astutely reminds us that the war was “experienced more as a series of local regional engagements” in which hardship and dislocation “reshuffled the decks of political identity.” Although she stresses the transformative effect...