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ject to Ottoman discrimination. Most of the government officials in
Baghdad and officers in the army were Arab Sunni Muslims, and
they were determined to maintain their control over the region by
resisting the British.
By mid-1920, central Iraq was in the hands of the Sunni Arabs;
however, by the end of October 1920 the British had brought the
revolt under control. But when Britain created a new government
for Iraq, most of the government officials and the officers of the new
Iraqi army were members of the Sunni Arab families that had held
power under the Ottoman Turks. The British, though, chose the
king of Iraq—36-year-old Prince Faisal, who assumed the throne on
August 23, 1921.
King Faisal did not have much support from the leading families
and tribes of Iraq, who saw the king as a foreigner (he was a mem-
ber of the Hashemite family of the western Arabian Peninsula) and
a puppet of the Western powers. Faisal’s goal was to develop Iraq
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Though he had never even visited Iraq, Faisal I, a
member of the Hashemite family, was the British
choice as Iraq’s king.