MIDDLE EAST/

WESTERN ASIA

The Caucasus

Azerbaijan

• Fragmented state – southwestern portion is separated by

Armenia

• Ethnicity – 7 million Azeris in Azerbaijan (91%)

• Armenians are 1.35%

• 16 million Azeris in northern Iran (24%)

• Azeris have political responsibility in Iran, but Azeri language teaching is

restricted

• Internationally recognized for its religious tolerance!

• Any type of persecution is constitutionally outlawed

Azerbaijan capital: Baku

Armenia

• Political geography • Independent Armenia created after WWI, but soon split between Turkey and

the Soviet Union

• Gained independence in 1991

• Conflict with Azerbaijan over an Armenian dominant enclave

• Technically part of Azerbaijan, but acts as an independent republic, Artsakh

• Ethnicity • Late 19th and early 20th century massacres organized by the Turks

• Estimates as high as 1.5 million killed

• Turkey still won’t describe the event as genocide

• Others had to migrate to Russia when gained control of eastern Armenia in 1828

• Armenia is 98% Armenian = most ethnically homogenous in the Caucasus

• Religion - converted to Christianity in 303 • Lived as an isolated Christian enclave under the rule of Turkish Muslims

Georgia

• Ethnicity

• More diverse than Armenia and Azerbaijan

• Ethnic Georgians are 71% and the others are Armenian, Azeri, Russian,

Ossetian, and more

• Conflict

• 1990s – Abkhazians fought for independence

• 2008 – Ossetians fought for independence

• Most countries do not recognize them but they operate as if they

were independent

Iran

• Ethnicity

• Predominantly Persian with some Azeri and Baluchi

• Persians see themselves as descendant from Indo-European tribes

migrating from Central Asia

• Religion

• Persians are the largest ethnic group adherent to Shiite Islam

• Predominant language

• Indo-European family

• Indo-Iranian branch

• Iranian (Western) group

• Persian (Farsi)

Iran

• Conflict with the US

• 1979 – a revolution overthrows the pro-US dictator

• Iran proclaimed as an Islamic republic

• Militants seized the U.S. embassy in 1979 and held 62 Americans hostage

• Events that the movie Argo is based on

• 2005 – US accuses Iran of harboring al-Qaeda

• Also international resistance to Iran’s nuclear program

• Conflict with Iraq

• Fought between 1980-88 over the Shatt al-Arab waterway at the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers

• Iran gained control in 1975

• Iraq seized the waterway during the Iranian revolution

• 1.5 million died in the war

Iraq conflict with US

• US attacked in 2003 to depose Saddam Hussein because

of suspicions of chemical weapons

• Evidence didn’t materialize for weapons of mass

destruction

• US re-centered their campaign around the need to oust the violent

Hussein

• US became embroiled in conflict with various religious sects and tribes

• Little international support

Iraq

• Ethnicity

• 75% Arab ethnicity

• 2/3 Shiite

• Opposed US intervention due to shared hostility with Shiite Iran

• 1/3 Sunni

• Opposed US intervention because they had elevated privilege due to

Hussein’s Sunni ethnicity

• 17% Kurdish ethnicity

• Welcomed US intervention due to their mistreatment under Hussein

• Most Iraqis have stronger loyalty to tribe or clan than to state or

major ethnicity

Israel

• Religion – Judaism

• Religious Conflict

• Jewish immigration into the area was limited after WWI

• After WWII Israel was created and tensions escalated with

Palestinian neighbors (would become Jordan)

• Especially in the West Bank

• Conflict with neighbors off and on from 1948-1979

• Language

• Hebrew was an extinct language that has been completely revived

• Represented a shared connection between members of the returning

diaspora after WWII

• Arabic also an official language

Jordan

• Persistent conflicts with Israel

• Held the West Bank until the 1967 Six-Day War

• Participant in 1948-1949 War, 1967 Six-Day War, and the 1973

Yom Kippur War

Lebanon

• Ethnic conflict

• 40% Christians who view themselves as descendant from ancient

Phoenicians

• Largest denomination is Maronite

• Second largest is Greek Orthodox

• 60% Muslims who view themselves as ethnically Arab

• Gained independence in 1943

• Constitution held for proportional representation of each group as

of 1932 census

• Civil war between 1975 and 1990

• Treaty in 1990 made the legislature 50/50, Christian/Islam

Saudi Arabia

• Largest and most populous country in the Arabian Peninsula

• International trade path to development • Gained wealth extremely rapidly as oil prices rose during the 1970s

• Russia, Saudi Arabia, and US are the top three producers

• Reinvested petroleum revenue for infrastructure improvements • Housing, highways, hospitals, airports, universities,

telecommunications

• Steel, aluminum, and petrochemical factories compete internationally with the help of government subsidies

• Pastoral nomadism – the Bedouins • Saudi government contracts Bedouin territory to use the land for

agriculture or development

• Modern populations are increasingly sedentary in lifestyle

Syria

• Used to control the Golan Heights prior to the 1967 Six-

Day War

• 2 million Kurds live in Syria

• 9% of the population

Turkey

• Bostans – small gardens inside of Istanbul

• Labor intensive gardening

• Small plots of land

Kurds in Turkey

• 14 million in eastern Turkey

• 19% of population

• Turks tried to create homogeneity by suppressing Kurdish

culture

• Kurdish language was illegal until 1991

• Still illegal for broadcast or education

• Kurdish guerrillas have waged war against the Turkish military

since 1984

Turkey: Cyprus

• Cyprus – an island south of Turkey ethnically split between Greece and Turkey • 18% of population is Turkish

• 78% Greek

• Gained independence from Britain in 1960 • Turkish minority had substantial power over its own education, religion, and

culture in the constitution

• 1974 – Several Greek military officers seized control of the government • Defeated and restored the original government but the Turkish portion of the

island then declared independence • Only recognized by Turkey

• Originally the ethnicities mingled, but after the conflict a buffer zone was created and the ethnicities concentrated on either side • Improved relationship now

• Entered the UN as Cyprus in 2004, but still not unified