126 A Short History of the Middle East
Empire, that Britain should recognize an independent Arab king-
dom comprising Arabia (except Aden), Palestine, Syria and Iraq.
In July, after Britain had announced her intention of recognizing
an independent Arab state in the Arabian Peninsula, the Sharif sent
to Sir Henry McMahon, the British High Commissioner in Egypt,
a note which repeated the requirements of the Damascus Protocol
brought back by Faisal. The British Arab Bureau in Cairo had still
only vague knowledge of the existence of the two secret societies,
and the notion consequently became established in British minds
that the Sharif's demands for a Greater Arab Kingdom were solely
the product of his own personal ambition, whereas in fact they
faithfully represented the views of the nationalist movement, (ex-
cept that its Syrian exponents did not necessarily regard Husain
as a suitable King of the "whole Arab world). Husain's note in-
augurated the famous Husain-McMahon Correspondence, the
interchange of which continued till January 1916. In the course of
it the British negotiators made reservations on" behalf of French
Interests in those parts of the Levant Vest of the districts of
Damascus, Horns, Hatna, and Aleppo', as not being wholly Arab;
another reservation was made for British interests in Lower Iraq.
The Sharif, who insisted that he was waiting only for an oppor-
tunity to revolt ,suggested that the solution of both these problems
should be left till the end of the War. The British agreed, but
warned him that 'when victory is attained, the friendship of
Britain and France will be stronger and closer than ever'.
Meanwhile the policy of the Turkish governor and Commander-
in-chief under martial law in Syria, Jamal Pasha, had hardened
against the Arabs since the failure of the first Turco-German
attack on the Suez Canal in February 1915. Before that he had
seized French consular documents incriminating various Syrian
and Palestinian personalities with treasonable conspiracy with
France before the War: the French Consul-General Picot had failed
to destroy these highly secret documents, but had left them in the
charge of the American Consul, who innocently supposed that the
Turkish police would respect the inviolability of the consular
seals.1 During 1915 and the early part of 1916 Jamal Pasha held a
series of treason trials: thirty-four nationalists, of whom twenty-
seven were Muslim, were executed and hundreds of prominent
1 In view of French designs on Syria, which were not compatible with Arab
nationalism, Picot's negligence may not have been entirely unmotivated,