Word: druses
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Dates: during 1920-1929
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French resistance to Pan-Arab Druse attacks while the French offensive in Palestine is being prepared, were again picturesquely envisioned by Correspondent George Seldes* (Time, Sept...
...There was a battle of cavalry against barbed wire, of riflemen against machine guns, of 2,000 pagan tribesmen against a mere 10 French. . . Ignorant and heedless the Druse horsemen charged the barbed wire . . . pennons and war flags flying . . . Their horses were caught, slashed ... a hellish scene of carnage . . . men and blood mingling amide stones and barbed wire...
Despatches from Syria spoke of preparations by General Sarrail (TIME, Aug. 17) to launch a great French offensive against the Druse tribes, which have been fighting valliantly to oust the French Mandate and set up a pan-Arab Government at Damascus...
After describing the concentration of French troops, planes and armored cars at Suedia, (on the seacoast due west of Aleppo) and the raking of Druse villages by French 75's, Correspondent Seldes added specific details. He spoke of "pagan tribesmen riding horses like mountain goats" and of "a Druse gendarme who welcomes Americans because he had relatives who rode in Barnum's circus." Beside a Greek ikon in a native stone hut, he found "a faded lithograph of Lillian Russell† in tights...
...presenting a story of native unrest and guerrilla warfare. Some 1,500 Bedouins were reported to have assaulted Damascus, been repulsed by French cavalry, to have prepared for another onslaught, to have captured an outpost. The French fort of Sueida with a garrison of 200 was besieged by the Druse tribe . . . An airplane endeavoring to drop provisions was shot down. Another dropped a bomb on a group of natives, reported 40 killed and wounded. . . A French General was wounded while riding out in his automobile . . . Two caravans of 40 camels each were reported carrying Bedouin dead and wounded...