Joshua Landis

The new Syrian government has mandated that all reference to the Ottoman execution of the Syrian and Lebanese Muslim-Christian Arab nationalists be expunged from school textbooks. They were executed in Damascus and Beirut on 6 May 1916 by Jamal Pasha, the Ottoman wāli of Greater Syria. They were executed in both the Marjeh Square in Damascus and Burj Square in Beirut. Both plazas have since been renamed Martyrs' Square and the date is commemorated in both countries as a national holiday. This deletion can only be explained as an effort to avoid offending Turkish sensibilities.