European Challenges

to the Muslim

WorldRachel

Cornish

Ferment in the Muslim World

By the 1500s, there were three huge Muslim empires that ruled a majority oh the world.

* The Ottomans in the Middle East,

* The Mughals in India, and

* The Safavids in Iran.

Then 200 years later, the empires were in a decline.

The declining empires caused central government to lose control, corruption was widespread, and Muslim scholars and religious leaders allied with the state.

Reform movements started in the 1700s and the 1800s.

Challenges to the Ottoman Empire

Ottomans empire stretched across the Middle East, North Africa, and parts of Europe.

By the 1800s, provincial rulers had increased their power.

Economic problems and corruption also contributed to Ottoman’s decay.

Ideas of nationalism spread from Western Europe.

The idea made many threaten to break away from the Ottoman empire, including the Middle East, and North Africa.

Some like the Greeks and Romanians gained their independence.

Effort to Reform

Since the 1700s, the Ottoman rulers wanted reform. They improved education, built railroads, and made a modern military.

The reforms improved medical care, farming, and living conditions.

A group of liberals formed a movement in the 1890s called the Young Turks.

The Young Turks believed the only way to save the empire was to reform.

The Young Turks overthrew the sultan in 1908.

Massacre of Armenians

The Ottomans had let the minority nationalities live in their own communities and practice their own religions.

In the 1890s, nationalism started a new tension between the Turks and the minority peoples who wanted their own states.

The tension between the two caused a brutal genocide of the Armenians.

Genocide is a deliberate attempt to destroy an entire religious or ethnic group.

The Christen Armenians were distrusted by the Muslim Turks and the Turks accused them of supporting Russian plans against the Ottoman empire.

The sultan had thousands of Armenians killed because the Armenians protested repressive Ottoman polices. Some fled to the United States.

The Suez Canal

100-mile canal that links the Mediterranean and the Red seas.

Opened in 1869.

Greatly shortened the sea route from Europe to South and East Asia.

In 1875, the ruler of Egypt was put in debt because he was unable to pay off the loans from the canal and other modernization projects.

He was forced to sell his shares of the canal to pay the debts.

British prime minister Disraeli bought the parts of canals, giving them a controlling interest in the canal.

Iran and the Western Powers

Iran’s government improved finances and railroads, and even tried a liberal constitution.

Reforms did not save Iran from western imperialism.

Russia want Iran to expand and protect their frontier.

Britain was concerned about protecting its interest in India.

The discovery of oil upset the balance in the early 1900s.

Russia toke the north, while Britain had the south.

Russia ended up in control by sending troops in to the southern parts.