Shia Islam in Lebanon

Lebanese Shia Muslims ( ar, المسلمون الشيعة اللبنانيين), historically known as ''matāwila'' ( ar, متاولة, plural of ''mutawālin'' ebanese pronounced as ''metouali'' refers to Lebanese people who are adherents of the Shia branch of Islam in Lebanon, which plays a major role along Lebanon's main Sunni, Maronite and Druze sects. Shia Islam in Lebanon has a history of more than a millennium. According to the ''CIA World Factbook'', Shia Muslims constituted an estimated 28% of Lebanon's population in 2018."Lebanon: people and society"
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Most of its adherents live in the northern and western area of the Beqaa Valley, Southern Lebanon and Beirut. The great majority of Shia Muslims in Lebanon are Twelvers. However, a small minority of them are Alawites and Ismaili.

Under the terms of an unwritten agreement known as the National Pact between the various political and religious leaders of Lebanon, Shias are the only sect eligible for the post of Speaker of Parliament.

History

Origins

The cultural and linguistic heritage of the Lebanese people is a blend of both indigenous elements and the foreign cultures that have come to rule the land and its people over the course of thousands of years. In a 2013 interview the lead investigator, Pierre Zalloua, pointed out that genetic variation preceded religious variation and divisions: "Lebanon already had well-differentiated communities with their own genetic peculiarities, but not significant differences, and religions came as layers of paint on top. There is no distinct pattern that shows that one community carries significantly more Phoenician than another."

Lebanon throughout its history was home of many historic peoples who inhabited the region. The Lebanese coast was mainly inhabited by Phoenician Canaanites throughout the Bronze and Iron ages, who built the cities of Tyre, Sidon, Byblos and Tripoli, which was founded as a center of a confederation between Aradians, Sidonians, and Tyrians. Further east, the Bekaa valley was known as '' Amqu'' in the Bronze Age, and was part of Amorite kingdom of Qatna and later Amurru kingdom, and had local city-states such as Enišasi. During the Iron Age, the Bekaa was dominated by the Aramaeans, who formed kingdoms nearby in Damascus and Hamath, and established the kingdom of Aram-Zobah where Hazael might have been born, and was later also settled by Itureans, who were likely Arabs themselves. These Itureans inhabited the hills above Tyre in Southern Lebanon, historically known as Jabal Amel, since at least the times of Alexander the Great, who fought them after they blocked his army's access to wood supply.

During Roman rule, Aramaic became the lingua franca of the entire Levant and Lebanon, replacing spoken Phoenician on the coast, while Greek was used as language of administration, education and trading. It is important to note that most villages and towns in Lebanon today have Aramaic names, reflecting this heritage. However, Beirut became the only fully Latin speaking city in the whole east. The Iturean Kingdom of Chalcis became vassal state of the Romans after they consolidated their rule over most of the Levant in 64 BC, and at their peak they managed to impose control on much of the Phoenician coast and Galilee including southern Lebanon, until the Romans fully incorporated them in 92 CE. On the coast, Tyre prospered under the Romans and was allowed to keep much of its independence as a "civitas foederata". On the other hand, Jabal Amel was inhabited by Banu Amilah, its namesake, who have particular importance for the Lebanese Shia for adopting and nurturing Shi'ism in the southern population. The Banu Amilah were part of the Nabataean Arab ''foederati'' of the Roman Empire, and they were connected to other pre-Islamic Arabs such as Judham and Balqayn, whose presence in the region likely dates back to Biblical times according to Irfan Shahîd. As the Muslim conquest of the Levant reached Lebanon, these Arab tribes received the most power which encouraged the non-Arabic-speaking population to adopt Arabic as the main language.

Early Islamic period

In historian Jaafar al-Muhajir's assessment, the spread of Shia Islam in Lebanon and the Levant was a complex, multi-layered process throughout history. Accordingly, the presence of pro-Alid tribes such as Hamdan and Madh'hij in the region, possibly after the Hasan–Muawiya treaty in 661 CE, likely acted as a vector that facilitated the spread of Shi'ism among segments of the local populations living among them in Jabal Amel, Galilee, Beqaa valley, Tyre and Tripoli, where anti-state sentiment was common due to the discrimination and ongoing marginalization of the region under the Abbasids. Among the locals were Banu Amilah, an Arab tribe that inhabited Jabal Amel in the 7th century CE. According to Husayn Muruwwa, Shiism was one option among many for the communities of Jabal Amel, but for them, a positive and inviting dialectical relationship between the theological construct of Imamism and its social milieu gave precedence to the Shiite possibility. Such a transformation may have been attested in Homs whereby according to Yaqut al-Hamawi, the people of the city were strong supporters of the Umayyads, but became adamant, ghulat Shiites after their demise in 750. Prominent Emesene Shiites figure in the late 8th century, including Abd al-Salam al-Homsi (777–850 CE), a notable Shia poet who never left his native Homs.
Millenialist expectations increased upon the deep crisis of the Abbasid dynasty during the decade-long Anarchy at Samarra (c. 861–870), the rise of breakaway and autonomous regimes in the provinces, the large-scale Zanj Rebellion (c. 869–883), all of which increased the appeal to Isma'ilism, and moreover the establishment of Qarmatian Isma'ilis in 899 in Syria, and the rise of the Twelver Shiite Hamdanids in 890 which further elevated Twelver prestige and following.

Historical Accounts

The territories of present-day Lebanon register less than neighboring regions in the historical accounts from the Abbasid and Fatimid eras. Persian traveler Nasir Khusraw's presents a unique account of Tyre and Tripoli during his visit in 1040s, describing them as being majority Shia Muslim with dedicated Shia shrines on the outskirts. Several Tyrian Shiite figures are mentioned more than a century earlier; these include Muhammad bin Ibrahim as-Souri (fl. 883 CE) and Abbasid-era poet Abdul Muhsin as-Souri (b. 950 CE), a student of Al-Shaykh Al-Mufid.
Some of the earlier accounts for inner Jabal Amel are given by Al-Maqdisi (c. 966–985), who mentions that half of Hunin and Qadas inhabitants were Shia Muslims. Al-Maqdisi also relays important accounts regarding the predominance of Shiite Muslims in Tiberias, which lay within historical Jabal Amel. Tiberias was the home of Alid families during the 10th century and also home to the Ash'ari tribe of Madh'hij who founded Qom, one of the holy cities of Shia Islam, in 703, as al-Ya'qubi notes during his travels in the 880s; Tiberias was also the home of a prominent Alid figure who was killed by al-Ikhshid on the charge of being sympathetic with the Qarmatians in 903. Shiites also reportedly formed half of the population of Nablus and most of Amman's population per al-Maqdisi.

On the other hand, further east in the Bekaa valley, sources regarding the area are scarce and generally uninformative. According to al-Muhajir, Yaman-affiliated tribes which lived in the surroundings of Baalbek before 872, such as Banu Kalb and Banu Hamdan that were aligned with Alid sentiments at the time, likely played a role in spreading Shia Islam in the Bekaa and anti-Lebanon mountains. Qarmatian influence may have played a role as well, after gaining foothold in neighboring Homs before the Abbasids kicked them out in 903. In 912, Ibn al-Rida, a descendant of the 10th Imam Ali al-Hadi, started a rebellion in the nearby Damascene countryside against the Abbasid governor of Damascus in an attempt to establish Hashemite authority in the area; Ibn al-Rida was subsequently defeated and killed in battle near Damascus and his head was paraded in Baghdad. According to al-Muhajir, Shiite presence in the Bekaa valley was further reinforced by migrants from Mount Lebanon in 1305 and Ottoman period, and migrants from the Shias villages in Anti-Lebanon Mountains.
Slightly later, the Hamdanids in Aleppo were the first dynasty of Twelver Shia Muslims to break away from the centralized rule of Baghdad. They emerged in Mosul and took control of Aleppo and most of northern Syria by 944, further expanding their territory into Anatolia, defeating the Byzantines on several occasions and further elevating Twelver prestige. Aleppo gradually became a hub of Shiite religious seminaries (hawzas), linking Aleppo to Shia-populated Tripoli and Tyre in Lebanon.

Fatimid Domination

In 970, the Isma'ili Shia Fatimids initiated their conquest of the Levant. The Fatimids patronized Isma'ili Shiism and set the ground for it to flourish in several regions and towns, including the Syrian coastal mountain region. While they embraced their Shia identity, The Fatimids quarrelled with local Shia dynasties. The Hamdanids initially refused to accept Fatimid hegemony, but were defeated by 1003. During these events, rebels in Tyre drove out the Fatimids for two years until the revolt was suppressed in 998. A decade later, the Twelver Shia Salih ibn Mirdas rose against the Fatimids and by 1025 managed to conquer most of Syria, western Iraq and parts of Lebanon. In similar action, the Shia dynasty of Banu Ammar declared the independence of Tripoli in 1070, expanding their borders to the land between Jableh in the north and Jbeil in the south. Banu Ammar were avid lovers of sciences, literature and poetry, and built the library of Dar al-'ilm, one of the significant libraries of the medieval Islamic world, in 1069.

Under Crusader rule and Mongol invasions

Upon the arrival of the First Crusade, Tripoli and Tyre resisted crusader attempts to seize the two cities. Tripoli was subject to a 4-year long siege which culminated with its fall in 1109. On the other hand, Tyre successfully broke a major siege in 1112 with the help of Toghtekin, but fell to the Venetian Crusade in 1124.
In social terms, Tripoli and Tyre experienced a drastic upheaval with the crusader conquests. Many Muslims, seemingly predominantly Shiites, were killed or departed for the interior, who were replaced by tens of thousands of Franks through several decades.
The years-long siege of Tripoli and the brutal aftermath of its fall caused an influx outside of Tripoli. Such influx either inaugurated the Shia community of Keserwan or inflated a previously established rural Shiite community there. According to al-Muhajir, a similar thing would have happened in Jabal Amel which received a population influx from the Shia-populated urban centers at the time, most notably Tyre and Tiberias, as well as Amman, Nablus and the surrounding countryside. Shias in the Bekaa valley remained under Muslim rule and were on good terms with Bahramshah (1182–1230), who welcomed a prominent Shia scholar from Homs in the city in 1210s, a gesture that "gave morale to the Shiites living in the nahiyah (of Baalbek)". In northern Syria, the Shia qadi of Aleppo Ibn al-Khashshab was one of the first to preach jihad against the crusaders, and personally commanded and lead Aleppian troops in Battle of Ager Sanguinis and Siege of Aleppo.

Most of Jabal Amel regained its autonomy under Husam ad-Din Bechara, a presumably local Shiite officer of Saladin who participated in the Battle of Hattin and the capture of Jabal Amel and became its lord from 1187 until 1200.
Between 1187 and 1291, the Shiites of Jabal Amel were divided between the newly autonomous hills and a coast still subject to the Franks. Shias from the newly autonomous areas of Jabal Amel soon became essential participants in blocking Frankish raids and sieges. During Saladin's siege of Beaufort castle, military units from Jabal Amel, likely those of Husam ad-Din Bishara, came to his aid and replaced his forces as he marched to repel a crusader invasion of Acre. Once again in 1195, Husam ad-Din and his forces fought off a Frankish siege of Toron.
In 1217, the local archers annihilated a Hungarian contingent attacking Jezzine in 1217. In 1240, the local appointees in Beaufort castle refused the orders of Ayyubid emir Al-Salih Ismail to surrender their castle to crusader forces, leading to their siege and execution.

When the Mongols took Baalbek in 1260, many local Shias refused to surrender to Mongol forces. Najmeddine ibn Malli al-Baalbeki (b. 1221), one of Baalbek's few Shia scholars at the time, took the initiative and retreated to the slopes of Mount Lebanon, where he was joined by thousands of volunteer guerilla fighters. According to contemporary chronicler al-Yunini, these guerillas would kidnap and ambush Mongols at night, and would often disguise and adopt pseudonyms to conceal their identities. For example, Najmeddine adopted the pseudonym "the bald king".

Mamluk period and 1305 campaign

By the early 14th century, Jabal Amel was becoming the Twelver Shia center of the Levant. With Shiism losing ground in Aleppo due to Ayyubid and now Mamluk takeover, a stream of scholars shifted to Jabal Amel, and the area probably received migrants from there as it provided refuge from Sunni rigor.

In Muharram 1305, the Mamluk army under the command of Aqqush al-Afram devastated the mountain-dwelling Shia community of Keserwan. The Mamluks had previously attempted to subjugate the community through several unsuccessful military campaigns in the 1290s, and launched the last campaign after a band of Keserwanis attacked their retreating army after the Battle of Wadi al-Khaznadar. Aqqush led an army of around 50,000 troops which advanced and encircled the Mountain through from four sides, against defending Shiite forces of an estimated 4,000 infantrymen. The region fell after 11 days of brutal fighting, driving an influx of Shiites toward the Beqaa valley and Jezzine, while a humbled minority stayed. In 1363, decades later, the Mamluks released an official decree prohibiting Shia rituals practiced among "some of the people of Beirut, Sidon and their surrounding villages", threatening punishment and military campaign. The Mamluks punished the town of Machghara in 1364 for disobedience and religious dissidence. In 1367, the Shias of Burj Beirut rose in armed rebellion against the Mamluks, but the conflict subsided through mediation between the two sides by the Buhturids. In 1384, the Mamluks also executed most notable Shia scholar and head of the community at the time, Muhammad Jamaluddin al-Makki al-Amili, known as "ash-shahid al-awwal" (the first martyr), on charges of being a ghulat and promoting Nusayri doctrines, falsely claimed by his enemies and former ex-Shia students.

Since 1385 much of Jabal Amel and Safed was ruled by the Bechara family, who occasionally also brought Wadi al-Taym under their control, until the advent of Ottomans. On the other hand, the Harfush dynasty of the Bekaa were first mentioned by Ibn Tawq as muqaddams in the Anti-Lebanon mountains to the east of Baalbek in 1483, and later as deputies (na'ib) of Baalbek. Two members of the two families, Ibn Bechara and Ibn Harfush, reportedly fought on each other's side during civil strife in Damascus between Mamluk governors in 1497. According to contemporary chronicler Ibn Tulun, many Shiites had come to join the battle in aid of one of the Mamluk governors. In the mid-1200s, al-Yunini mentions a few Tanukhid emirs in Mount Lebanon who reportedly followed the Shiite faith, whose domains had also covered Karak Nuh. Following the disastrous campain in 1305, the Hamada family were among the earliest mentioned families, and reportedly served as tax-collectors in the district of Mamluk Tripoli as early as 1471, in the region Dinniyeh. Bilad Beirut were similarly under the jurisdiction of a Shia muqaddam prior to 1407.

Under Ottoman rule

The Levant fell to the Ottomans in 1516, bringing about a new period in the region. Often times, Local Shias came into conflict with Ottoman-assigned governors of Beirut, Sidon and Damascus, who often derogatorily referred to them as Qizilbash in their documents as a means to delegitimize them or justify punitive campaigns against them. Nevertheless, although considered Heretics by the Ottomans, the latter confirmed tax-collectorship iltizam to the local Shia in Jabal Amel, Bekaa valley and northern Mount Lebanon as part of their efforts of relying on local intermediaries rather than forcibly imposing foreign ones. The Harfush and Hamade families received iltizam over the Bekaa valley and northern Mount Lebanon respectively, while Jabal Amel consisted of several nawahi governed by multiple families, until Ali al-Saghirs seized most of Jabal Amel by 1649.
These feudal families were often autonomous and frequently quarrelled with the Ottoman governors to maintain autonomy over their territories, often with mixed results. Comte de Volney, who visited Lebanon between 1783 and 1785, noted this.

"The ''Metoualis'' are almost annihilated due to their revolts; their name is soon to be extinct".

The three Shia principalities underwent different historical trajectories. The Harfush initially did not challenge the new Ottoman authority, but in 1518 the Ottomans executed an anonymous Ibn Harfush, governor of Baalbek, along with the Bedouin Emir Ibn al-Hanash for acting against the state. At their high-point, Harfush domains extended from the Beqaa valley into Palmyra far in the Syrian Desert and sanjak of Homs in 1568 during Musa Harfush's reign, who was even assigned a unit of 1,000 archers to lead int the Yemen campaign. In 1616, Yunus al-Harfush again asserted Harfush supremacy over Homs and the Bekaa, defeating his Sayfa opponents in battle, and earning iltizam for the Sanjak of Homs. Prior the Battle of Ain Dara, Haydar Shihab took refuge among the Harfushes, who provided him with 2,500 troops to carry out the battle, which resulted in Shihab's decisive victory.

Further South, the pinnacle of Jabal Amel was at the hands of Nassif al-Nassar (c. 1749–1781) of Ali al-Saghirs during his alliance with Zahir al-Umar. In 1767, the latter attempted to extend his authority to Shiite villages, but was defeated in battle and captured, eventually entering into an alliance with Nassif and the Shiites. The duo's first decisive battle took place in Lake Huleh in 1771, when the 10,000-strong Ottoman army of Uthman Pasha al-Kurji was virtually annihilated by the duo's forces; about 300-500 Ottoman soldiers survived the battle, and Uthman Pasha returned to Damascus with only 3 of his soldiers. Through his 10,000-strong cavalry army, specially noted by a French consul as "excellent fighters", Nassif imposed control on all territories between Sidon and Safed, notwithstanding Zahir's territories within Palestine and western Transjordan which Nassif's cavalry forces had an integral part in capturing. Zahir's military potential was significantly boosted by the backing of 10,000 Shiite fighters, who supported him against the sieges and assaults by the overnors of Damascus, reportedly participating in fifteen subsequent campaigns against his foes. Thus, Nassif and his allies managed to impose ''grande sécurité'' on the whole region, so much so that Ali Bey al-Kabir of Egypt requested Nassif's help to put down the rebellion at Cairo in 1773, and was sought by nomadic tribes in the Syro-Jordanian desert to help them against their foes.

The Hamada's of northern Mount Lebanon, spearheading a rather much smaller community, were virtually in a continuous state of conflict with the Ottomans between 1685 and 1711. In 1686, a joint Harfush-Hamade force managed to defeat and drive the forces of the Ottoman governors of Sidon and Tripoli out of Keserwan, leaving Tripoli susceptible to attack. As a result, they managed to re-affirm themselves as multezims for most of northern Lebanon and parts of Syria as far as Safita and Krak des Chevaliers. Upon meeting them in 1686, a French diplomat came acqainted with them as the "men of emir Sirhan", describing them as good hearted people and "iron men" who would not back out to the strongest of janissaries. By 1771, the Hamada's and the Shia community were greatly weakened by the Ottoman governors and Shihabis, and eventually completely fell out of grace, diminishing their political importance in Mount Lebanon. As a result, a second population influx overran the Beqaa valley where the Harfushes welcomed the displaced Shiites, and allotted them land in Hermel and other places.

In 1781, Shia autonomy diminished under Ahmad Pasha al-Jazzar (1776–1804), nicknamed the butcher. Al-Jazzar was initially on good terms with Nassif, but their alliance reached a bad point some time in 1781. Afterward, al-Jazzar defeated and killed Nassif and 470 of his men in battle, proceeding to conquer Shia-held fortress towns and eliminate all the leading Shia sheikhs of Jabal Amel, whose families were allowed to take refuge with the Harfushes in Baalbek. He proceeded to burn down Shia religious libraries, transport Shia religious books to the ovens in Acre, and paraded the heads of the fallen in Sidon. Following their crisis, insurgency commenced at the hands of local militias which attacked al-Jazzar's troops in the region. The period witnessed swift uprisings in Chehour in 1784 and Tyre in 1785, and the insurgents managed to temporarily conquer the citadel of Tebnine. Insurgency continued until the end of al-Jazzar's rule in 1804, and famously involved Faris al-Nassif, Nassif al-Nassar's son.

The period between 1781 and 1804 was marked as a period of decline and political defeat among the Shias of Jabal Amel, and persisted in their collective memory well into the early 20th century. Political involvement of Shiites of Jabal Amel recommenced upon the Egyptian invasion of the Levant in 1833, when Shiites resented the Shihabi-Egyptian alliance and assumed a central role in the efforts of expelling the Egyptians from Ottoman Syria. Led by Khanjar Harfush in Baalbek, and in Jabal Amel by Hasan al-Shabib and Hamad al-Beik, the Shiites engaged in various battles against the Egyptian army. Khanjar Harfush engaged an Egyptian force of 12,000 in Nabek and Keserwan and was joined by Maronite peasants in Zouk Mikael, while Hamad Beik singlehandedly drove out the Egyptians as far as Safed in northern Palestine. In 1841, during a period of brutal Christian-Druze fighting prior the 1860 civil war, the Harfushes gathered forces and came to the aid of Zahle, defeating the Druze forces besieging the city. The Harfush were eventually deported to Edirne in 1865 at the behest of Ottoman authority.

During World War I

Between 1914 and 1918, many Arab nationalists from Lebanon and Syria were arrested by Ottoman authorities and trialed, and some were executed. Two Shiites were among those executed in between August 1915 and May 1916: Abdul-Kareem Khalil from Chyah and Saleh Haidar from Baalbek. The day is commemorated in Lebanon and Syria as Martyrs' Day. Several others were arrested and imprisoned, including Muhammad Jaber Safa, Sheikh Ahmad Rida and Ahmed Aref El-Zein, the latter who participated in several underground Arab societies, and supported the Arab Congress of 1913.

Relations with Iranian Shias

During most of the Ottoman period, the Shia largely maintained themselves as 'a state apart'. Towards the end of the eighteenth century the Comte de Volmy described Lebanese Shia as a distinct society. When the Safavids began converting Iran to Shiism by coercion and persuasion, they compensated the lack of established Shia fiqh in Iran by asking Shia clergies from Jabal Amel, Bahrain and Al-Ahsa to immigrate to Iran. Chief among them was Muhaqqiq al-Karaki, from Karak Nuh in the Bekaa valley, who achieved limitless power during the reign of Shah Tahmasp I such that the Shah told him, “''You are the real king and I am just one of your agents''". These contacts greatly angered the Ottomans. In addition to their different narrative of Islam, the Ottomans suspected Shias of being a stalking horse for the Safavids, and often derogatorily referred to them as Qizilbash. Thus, the Shia oppression in Lebanon was a marriage of politics and religion.

During the 19th century, the Maronites were supported by the France, the Druze by the British, the Greek Orthodox by the Russians and the Sunnis by the Ottoman sultans. Despite nominal support by the weak Qajar kings, the Shia lacked any external state-patron, and were the least powerful community in Lebanon.
Shia Lebanon, when not subject to political repression, was generally neglected, sinking further and further into the economic background.

French mandate period

When the French entered Nabatieh in 1918, they barred the local populace from carrying out political activity. As a response, Sadiq Hamzeh hoisted the Arab flag in several villages as a symbol of rejecting French occupation. Following the Syrian National Congress in 2 July 1919 where Shiites restated their support for Syrian unity, Maronites increased their armed activities against the Shiites. The French supported several Maronite militia, especially those in Qlaiaa and Kfour by Nabatieh. Furthermore, Maronite newspapers had negatively depicted the Shiite groups, often as murderers and pillagers. Following the official declaration of the French Mandate of Greater Lebanon (''Le Grand Liban'') in September 1920, anti-French riots broke out in the predominantly Shia areas of Jabil 'Amil and the Beqaa Valley. In between 1920 and 1921, rebels from these areas, led by Adham Khanjar and Sadiq Hamzeh, attacked French military bases in Southern Lebanon. In one confrontation, Sadiq Hamzeh and his men engaged the French and caused them heavy casualties of fifty men and some weapons. During this period of chaos, also several predominantly Christian villages in the region were attacked due to the armed support they received from the French and their perceived acceptance of French mandatory rule, including Ain Ebel. This was the perfect moment for the French to strike, as they sent an expedition of 4,000 soldiers lead by Colonel Niger, attacking villages by their aeroplanes, and crushing the Shiite rebellion by June 1920. Despite resistance subsiding, Adham Khanjar and his men continued their sabotage missions until an unsuccessful assassination attempt on French High Commissioner Henri Gouraud, which led to his execution in 1923.

On the other hand, Shia cleric Abdul Husayn Sharafeddine had organized and lead nonviolent resistance against the French since 1919, and demanded US support for Syrian unity, angering the French who encouraged an unsuccessful assassination attempt against him. Sharafeddine understood that sectarian hostility only gave purpose for French military presence in the area, and thus called for the protection of the Christians in the conference of Wadi al-Hujayr on 24 April 1920.

The Christians (Nasara) are your brethren in the country and in destiny. Show to them the love you show to yourselves. Protect their lives and possessions as you do to your own. Only by this can you face the conspiracy and put an end to the civil strife.

Later in 1921, this period of unrest ended with a political amnesty offered by the French mandate authorities for all Shiites who had joined the riots, with the intention to bind the Shia community in the South of Lebanon to the new Mandate state. However, the French breakdown on Shiites left the latter resentful against them. The French had dispersed the Shiite leaders and thousands of peasants who feared reprisals, and the high fines imposed on them caused financial misery. When the Great Syrian Revolt broke out in 1925, rebellion once again broke out in Shia areas. Many Southerners went to Syria to participate, while in Beqaa Valley, battle spread to the Qalamoun Mountains, where 'Tawfiq Haidar' engaged the French in fierce battles, and also Akroum in Akkar where according to eye-witness accounts, Shiites took more than 400 rifles and 50 horses as booty from defeated French forces.
Many Christians who fled their villages during the revolt were accommodated by Shia notables from Nabatieh and Bint Jbeil, an act that was appreciated by Christian clergies in letters.

... what the Shi'ites did for the Christians in the south will be cherished in our hearts for as long as Lebanon and the Christians remain. What happened should be written in gold. Long live Lebanon, Long live Lebanese unity and long live the Shiites.

After the revolt, the region experienced a decade or so of political stability. The Shiites gradually grew more accepting of Greater Lebanon due to various reasons. For instance, they were disappointed and shocked at their fellow Arabs who organized a conference in 1926 discussing whether or not the Shiites of Jabal Amel were of Arab origin. Furthermore, Shiite zu'ama believed their fortune would best be achieved within the newly founded Lebanese state.

During the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine, Southerners had a key role in providing ammunition and assistance to the Palestinian rebels, and the revolt was in fact co-administered from Bint Jbeil. In 1938, the French even requested Royal Air Force support during their operations in Bint Jbeil and South. In addition, Abdul-Husayn Sharafeddine expressed solidarity with the Palestinian strike and demand for independence.

Education

In the 19th century, Lebanon saw dramatic changes when missionaries started establishing schools throughout the country. While the French and Russians mainly encouraged Maronite and Orthodox active learning respectively, along with American Protestant missions in Beirut, the British established educational institutions in Druze areas, and Sunnis mainly benefitted from Ottoman state institutions. However, Shiites were the only ones who did not benefit from such activities. This neglectance continued into the early days of the French mandate.

During the 1920s and 1930s, educational institutions became places for different religious communities to construct nationalist and sectarian modes of identification. Shia leaders and religious clergy supported educational reforms in order to improve the social and political marginalization of the Shia community and increase their involvement in the newly born nation-state of Lebanon. This led to the establishment of several private Shia schools in Lebanon, among them The Charitable Islamic ʿĀmili Society (''al-Jamʿiyya al-Khayriyya al-Islāmiyya al-ʿĀmiliyya'') in Beirut and The Charitable Jaʿfari Society (''al-Jamʿiyya al-Khayriyya al-Jaʿfariyya'') in Tyre. While several Shia educational institutions were established before and at the beginning of the mandate period, they often ran out of support and funding which resulted in their abolishment.

The primary outlet for discussions concerning educational reforms among Shia scholars was the monthly Shiite journal a''l-'Irfan'', founded in 1909. In order to bring their demands (''muṭālabiyya'') to the attention of the French authorities, petitions were signed and presented to the French High Commissioner and the Service de l'Instruction Publique. This institution – since 1920 headquartered in Beirut- oversaw every educational policy regarding public and private school in the mandate territories. According to historian Elizabeth Thompson, private schools were part of "constant negotiations" between citizen and the French authorities in Lebanon, specifically regarding the hierarchical distribution of social capital along religious communal lines. During these negotiations, petitions were often used by different sects to demand support for reforms. For example, the middle-class of predominantly urban Sunni areas expressed their demands for educational reforms through petitions directed towards the French High Commissioner and the League of Nations.

Sayyid Abdul-Husayn Sharafeddine believed that the only way to ward off foreign political influence was to establish modern schools while maintaining Islamic teachings. In 1938, he built two schools, one for girls and another for boys, at his own expense. However, the girls' school did not last long due to financial difficulties and traditional views, prompting Sayyid Sharafeddine to transfer the girls and teach them in his own home. The boys' school was known as ''al-Ja'fariyya'', and was able to continue despite financial difficulties.

Ja'fari shar'ia courts

In January 1926, the French High Commissioner officially recognized the Shia community as an "independent religious community," which was permitted to judge matters of personal status "according to the principles of the rite known by the name of Ja'fari." This meant that the Shiite Ja'fari jurisprudence or ''madhhab'' was legally recognized as an official ''madhhab'', and held judicial and political power on multiple levels. The institutionalization of Shia Islam during this period provoked discussions between Shiite scholars and clergy about how Shiite orthodoxy should be defined. For example, discussions about the mourning of the martyrdom of Imam Husain during Ashura, which was a clandestine affair before the 1920s and 1930s, led to its transformation into a public ceremony.

On the other hand, the official recognition of legal and religious Shiite institutions by the French authorities strengthened a sectarian awareness within the Shia community. Historian Max Weiss underlines how "sectarian claims were increasingly bound up with the institutionalization of Shi'i difference." With the Ja'fari shar'ia courts in practice, the Shia community was deliberately encouraged to "practice sectarianism" on a daily basis.

Post-Independence

Between 1943 until the send of the civil war in 1990, the status of Southern Lebanon and Beqaa Valley was characterized by negligence from the Lebanese state, which diverted away its main resources to the capital and center. The Shiites considered themselves the despised stepchildren of the Lebanese state, and their areas in Southern Lebanon and the Beqaa Valley were often disproportionally the poorest in the country. This had a crucial impact on Shias, as they mainly originated from these two peripheral regions of Lebanon. As such, Shias were sorely underrepresented in Lebanese politics, and had little say in the government. Despite forming one of Lebanon's three biggest communities, for instance, in 1946 40% and 27% of high-ranking civil posts were occupied by Maronites and Sunnis respectively; in contrast, Shias only occupied 3.2%. In late 1950s, Shia representation in senior posts was in the deficit, as only 4 out of 115 had been occupied by Shias, unlike their fellow Sunnis and Druze who held their own with the Maronites. Shia deficit similarly reflected the low proportion of Shia university graduates at the time. In 1962, Shiites only occupied 2 of every 70 senior civil service position. The first published book to describe life in the South was a manifesto of the Najaf-educated cleric Muhammad Jawad Mughniyya's published in 1947, which he aimed to depict "''the grim life of the peasants, filled with ignorance, labor from dawn to dusk and utter neglect''" in order to demand justice for them from the "wicked politicans and ruling clique". Mughniyya also wrote a newspaper editorial against capitalism and feudalism, and against the pro-Western Baghdad Pact in 1956.

In 1948, an important event occurred that would shape the region's geopolitics, the Nakba. Tens of thousands of Palestinians arrived in Tyre, where many were sheltered in Sayyid Sharafeddine's ''al-Ja'fariyya'' school until the authorities dealt with the situation. Sharafeddine also introduced a Palestinian curriculum known as "Matriculation", to allow Palestinian students to finish what they had started in Palestine. The Shia villages in Palestine, which the French had transferred to Mandatory Palestine in 1923, were depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War and many of the inhabitants massacred, as high as 94 victims in Salha, and subsequently most fled to Lebanon. On 31 October–1 November, Zionist forces entered the village of Hula, executing around 90 Lebanese civilians in a house which was later blown on top of them. These events stimulated Shia sympathy with what the Palestinians had been enduring.

From late 1940s onward, many Shias moved to the Beirut and its suburbs. This influx increased in the late 60s and 70s following the PLO's introduction into Lebanon, which transformed Southern Lebanon into a battleground, and where Shias civilians were caught in the midst of PLO-Israeli conflict. Israel regularly attacked the South by land and air, sometimes on a daily basis, causing massive civilian casualties among local Shias.Steadily, Shias kept flowing into Beirut. Prior 1975, approximately 319,000 Shias lived throughout Beirut, slightly less than half of Shia. Many Shias also lived in Palestinian refugee camps such as Tel el-Zaatar, where Shias formed 43% of a population of 30,000, and Karantina refugee slum where a similar population lived.
In the late 1960s and 1970s, Shiites were largely attracted to Leftist parties, particularly the Lebanese Communist Party and Communist Action Organization, so much so that many Lebanese interchanged the words Shi'i (Shiite) and Shuyu'i (Communist). Shiite Communist intellectuals included Hussein Mroue and Mahdi Amel.
The Ba'ath Party had also gained popularity among Shiites in both the Syrian-led and Iraqi-led branches of the original party which split in 1966. Furthermore, many Shiites also joined the Sunni-dominated Nasserist al-Mourabitoun party, and by the mid-70s formed roughly 45% of the following, as well as the Syrian Social Nationalist Party along with other minor parties. In addition, due to shared sympathies, many Shias also joined Palestinian factions such as Fatah and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Islamist parties had a minor presence, the most notable of which was the Islamic Dawa Party, originally founded in Iraq by Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr in the 1960s, which emphasized extreme secrecy and underground activity. Notable members of the party included the Najaf-educated clerics and students of al-Sadr, Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah and Abbas al-Musawi. The party would later have a "strong impact on the ideology, direction and organisational structure" of Hezbollah. While rare, some Shias even joined Kataeb and al-Ahrar.

During this time, Musa Sadr emerged as one of the leading Shiite figures. Sadr founded the Supreme Islamic Shia Council in 1967 on par with other established religious institutions at the time. Sadr's popularity reached great heights in the 70s such that in March 1974, his speech in Baalbek was witnessed by an audience of more than 75,000, who had come to see him. In May 1974, more than 80,000 rallied in support of Sadr in Tyre. Sadr's deeds had great bearing on the Shiites, whom he sought to bring together. Sadr also emphasized support of the Palestinian cause, while objecting to the actions of some Palestinian guerillas in the south, which had caused trouble to the locals. In early 1975, Sadr announced the establishment of Movement of the Deprived, which came to be known as "Amal Movement". Amal's ranks grew rapidly as it attracted the underrepresented people and the youth who had joined separate parties, and its armed ranks rapidly grew to ~1,500–3,000 in that year, while SAVAK estimated the manpower at 6,000. While the party's aim was giving Shias more say in the government, its armed wing was established with the purpose of thwarting Israeli attacks on southern villages, the first confrontation of which happened against an Israeli commando unit raid on Taybeh in 1975. Among the co-founders of Amal was Mostafa Chamran, who came to Lebanon with Sadr early on, and became Iran's National Defense Minister in 1979–1980. Amal once again confronted Israeli and SLA forces in 1977, but took little role in the infighting during the first phase of the civil war in 1975–1977.

Civil War and Israeli occupation

During the Civil War Beirut came to be divided along sectarian lines. An estimated 100,000 Shiites lived in East Beirut in early 1975, mostly in Naba'a, Bourj Hammoud and Karantina, a slum whose population consisted of mostly Lebanese Shia, Kurds, Palestinians and Bedouins. Additionally, Shias formed 43% of Tel el-Zaatar's population, a Palestinian refugee camp in East Beirut. Following the Karantina massacre, and siege of Tel al-Zaatar and Naba'a by the Lebanese Front in 1976, more than 100,000 Shiites were displaced from East Beirut, and most fled to Dahieh. Dahieh became the main hub of Shia migration in the late 1970s and early 1980s, with 250,000 and 400,000 Shiites refugees fleeing the Israeli invasions of Lebanon in 1978 and in 1982 respectively. In 1986, 800,000 Shiites lived in Dahieh comprising most of Shias in Lebanon. Their frequent displacement stimulated solidarity among the Shiites.

Following Nabih Berri's rise to Amal's leadership in 1980, Amal officially entered the civil war. Relations between Amal on one side, and the PLO- Lebanese National Movement alliance, which had many Shia members, on the other side worsened. In 1980-1981, Amal clashed with the LNM-aligned Iraqi-led Baath party, which had a large Shia following, after Saddam Hussein's execution of Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr. Also at that time, many clashes took place with PLO elements in the South's Tyre District, and some villages were also shelled by the PLO such as Hanaouay. In addition, when the Iran–Iraq War raged in September 1980, around 500 to 600 Amal fighters voluntarily moved to Iran to join Chamran in the fighting.
By the mid-1980s, Amal totalled 14,000–16,000 fighters.

After the 1982 Israeli invasion, many Shiite Islamist groups were formed, with the aim of kicking out Israel and bringing an end to western influence in Lebanon. This led to movements such as Islamic Amal, Islamic Jihad Organization, "Islamic Students Union", Organization of the Oppressed on Earth, "Jundallah", Imam Husayn Fedayeen, "Revolutionary Justice Organization", and eventually the formation Hezbollah as a conglomeration of various groups with support of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. In addition to Islamist factions, many Shias joined the Lebanese National Resistance Front upon its formation in September 16, 1982. These factions waged guerilla-style combat operations against Israeli forces and their South Lebanon Army proxy, mainly in the South. The South Lebanon Army was originally formed in 1978 by former members of the predominantly Christian faction of the Army of Free Lebanon, but grew to include a small number of Druze, Shia and Sunni collaborators. They were held responsible for carrying out many atrocities, detentions and assassinations against the local populace until Israeli withdrawal in 2000, including the assassination of Sheikh Ragheb Harb and Sohmor massacre. According to the observation of an Israeli Arab affairs adviser in south Lebanon in December 1982, the Shia members of SLA were looked upon as "the dregs of Shia society" by their own people.
Between 1982 and 1985, half of the male population in the South had been detained at one point in the infamous Ansar prison camp, and in 1985 alone the prison held around 15,000 prisoners. Other famous prisons included Khiam detention center. In 1985, Israel implemented the Iron Fist policy in Southern Lebanon, conducting dozens of raids on Shia villages, notably Zrarieh raid

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