Sheikh Mahmud Barzanji (Kurdish: شێخ مهحموود بەرزنجی) or Mahmud Hafid Zadeh (1878 – October 9, 1956) was the leader of a series of Kurdish uprisings against the British Mandate of Iraq.
He was sheikh of a Qadiriyah Sufi family of the Barzanji clan from the city of Sulaymaniyah, which is now in Iraqi Kurdistan. He was styled King of Kurdistan during several of these uprisings.
After World War I, the British and other Western powers occupied parts of the Ottoman Empire. Plans made with the French in the Sykes – Picot Agreement got Britain designated as the mandate power.
The British were able to form their own borders to their pleasure to gain an advantage in this region.[citation needed] The British had firm control of Baghdad and Basra and the regions around these cities, mostly consisted of Shiite and Sunni Arabs.
In 1921, the British appointed Faisal I the King of Iraq. It was an interesting choice because Faisal had no local connections, as he was part of the Hashemite family in Western Arabia.
As events were unfolding in the southern part of Iraq, the British were also developing new policies in northern Iraq which was primarily inhabited by Kurds. The borders that the British formed had the Kurds between central Iraq (Baghdad) and the Ottoman lands of the north.
The Kurdish people of Iraq lived in the mountainous and terrain of the Mosul Vilayet.
It was a difficult region to control from the British perspective because of the terrain and tribal loyalties of the Kurds. There was much conflict after the Great War, between the Ottoman government and British on how the borders should be established.
The Ottomans were unhappy with the outcome of the Treaty of Sèvres, which allowed the Great War victors control over much of the former Ottoman lands, through the distribution of formerly Ottoman territory as League of Nations mandates.
In particular, the Turks felt that the Mosul Vilayet was theirs because the British had illegally conquered it after the Mudros Armistice, which had ended hostilities in the war.
With the discovery of oil in northern Iraq, the British were unwilling to relinquish the Mosul Vilayet.
Also, it was to the British advantage to have the Kurds play a buffer role between themselves and the Ottoman Empire. All that led to the importance of Sheikh Mahmud Barzanji.
With the Kurds in the north of the new Iraqi state and the Ottoman Empire, Britain could gain a protector shield for Iraq.
The British promised the Kurds during the Great War that they would receive their own land to form a Kurdish state.
However, the British did not keep their promise, which was the first of many instances the British manipulated the Kurds and lied to them.
There was mistrust on the part of the Kurds, who were left with a bad taste in their mouth. In 1919, uneasiness began to evolve in the Kurdish regions because they were unhappy with the situation the British forced upon them. The Kurds revolted a year later.
The British tried to establish a puppet government in the region and so appointed a popular leader of the region,which was how Mahmud became governor of southern Kurdistan.
Power and revolts
Mahmud Barzanji revolts
Mahmud was a very ambitious Kurdish national leader and promoted the idea of Kurds to control their own state and gain independence from the British.
As Charles Tripp relates, the British appointed him governor of Sulaimaniah in southern Kurdistan as a way of gaining an indirect rule in this region.
The British wanted this indirect rule with the popular Mahmud at the helm, which they believed would give them a face and a leader to control and calm the region.
However, with a little taste of power, Mahmud had ambitions for more for himself and for the Kurdish people. He was declared «King of Kurdistan» and claimed to be the ruler of all Kurds, but the opinion of Mahmud among Kurds was mixed because he was becoming too powerful and ambitious for some.
Mahmud hoped to create Kurdistan and initially, the British allowed Mahmud to pursue has ambitions because he was bringing the region and people together for the British to control.
However, by 1920, Mahmud, to British displeasure, was using his power against the British by capturing British officials in the Kurd region and starting uprisings against the British.
As historian Kevin McKierman writes, «The rebellion lasted until Mahmud was wounded in combat, which occurred on the road between Kirkuk and Sulaimaniah.
Captured by British forces, he was sentenced to death but later imprisoned in a British fort in India.» Sheikh remained in India until 1922.
Return and second revolt
Mahmud Barzanji
With the exile of Sheikh in India, Turkish nationalists in the crumbling Ottoman Empire were causing a great deal of trouble in the Kurdish regions of Iraq.
The Turkish nationalists, led by Mustafa Kemal, were riding high in the early 1920s after their victory against Greece and were looking to take that momentum into Iraq and take back Mosul.
With the British in direct control of northern Iraq after the exile of Sheikh Mahmud, the area was becoming increasingly hostile for the British officials due to the threat from Turkey.
The region was led by the Sheikh’s brother, Sheikh Qadir, who was not capable of handling the situation and was seen by the British as an unstable and unreliable leader.[1]