title: 1905 Russian Revolution

text: On , Russian artillerymen and military engineers rose in revolt in the fortress of Sveaborg (later called Suomenlinna), Helsinki. The Finnish Red Guards supported the Sveaborg Rebellion with a general strike, but the mutiny was quelled within 60 hours by loyal troops and ships of the Baltic Fleet.


title: 1905 Russian Revolution

text: In the Governorate of Estonia, Estonians called for freedom of the press and assembly, for universal suffrage, and for national autonomy. On , the Russian army opened fire in a meeting on a street market in Tallinn in which about 8 000–10 000 people participated, killing 94 and injuring over 200. The October Manifesto was supported in Estonia and the Estonian flag was displayed publicly for the first time. Jaan Tõnisson used the new political freedoms to widen the rights of Estonians by establishing the first Estonian political party – "National Progress Party".


title: 1905 Russian Revolution

text: Another, more radical political organisation, the "Estonian Social Democratic Workers' Union" was founded as well. The moderate supporters of Tõnisson and the more radical supporters of Jaan Teemant could not agree about how to continue with the revolution, and only agreed that both wanted to limit the rights of Baltic Germans and to end Russification. The radical views were publicly welcomed and in December 1905, martial law was declared in Tallinn. A total of 160 manors were looted, resulting in ca. 400 workers and peasants being killed by the army. Estonian gains from the revolution were minimal, but the tense stability that prevailed between 1905 and 1917 allowed Estonians to advance the aspiration of national statehood.


title: 1905 Russian Revolution

text: Following the shooting of demonstrators in St. Petersburg, a wide-scale general strike began in Riga. On , Russian army troops opened fire on demonstrators killing 73 and injuring 200 people. During the middle of 1905, the focus of revolutionary events moved to the countryside with mass meetings and demonstrations. 470 new parish administrative bodies were elected in 94% of the parishes in Latvia. The Congress of Parish Representatives was held in Riga in November. In autumn 1905, armed conflict between the Baltic German nobility and the Latvian peasants began in the rural areas of Livonia and Courland. In Courland, the peasants seized or surrounded several towns. In Livonia, the fighters controlled the Rūjiena-Pärnu railway line. Martial law was declared in Courland in August 1905, and in Livonia in late November. Special punitive expeditions were dispatched in mid-December to suppress the movement. They executed 1170 people without trial or investigation and burned 300 peasant homes. Thousands were exiled to Siberia. Many Latvian intellectuals only escaped by fleeing to Western Europe or US. In 1906, the revolutionary movement gradually subsided.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: Professor Minerva McGonagall is a fictional character in J. K. Rowling's "Harry Potter" series. Professor McGonagall is a professor at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry, the head of Gryffindor House, the professor of Transfiguration, the Deputy Headmistress under Albus Dumbledore and a member of the Order of the Phoenix. Following Lord Voldemort's defeat at the hands of her student Harry Potter and the deaths of Headmasters Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape, McGonagall takes the position of Headmistress. McGonagall was originally portrayed in the film adaptations by actress Maggie Smith, and later by Fiona Glascott in the "Fantastic Beasts" prequel films "" and "".


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: Minerva McGonagall was born on 4 October in Scotland to Robert McGonagall and Isobel Ross. McGonagall was born a half-blood witch as her father was a Muggle and her mother a witch. McGonagall began her Hogwarts education at the age of eleven and was sorted into Gryffindor after being the longest ever Hatstall between Gryffindor and Ravenclaw. McGonagall became friends with Hufflepuff student and future colleague Pomona Sprout and gained a particular talent in the art of Transfiguration under the tutelage of then Transfiguration professor Albus Dumbledore. During this time, McGonagall managed to become an Animagus, taking the form of a tabby cat and filed her paperwork to be officially registered. McGonagall was also a skilled member of the Gryffindor Quidditch team. After graduation, McGonagall became an employee for the Ministry of Magic in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement where she met her husband, Elphinstone Urquart. McGonagall was offered a promotion but turned it down and applied to teach Transfiguration at Hogwarts under Dumbledore. During her employment at Hogwarts, McGonagall grew particularly close to Dumbledore and the two were near inseparable friends and colleagues, and he began to recognise her as one of his most trusted allies. Eventually, McGonagall became the Head of the Transfiguration Department as well as the Head of Gryffindor House. After Headmaster Armando Dippet's retirement and Dumbledore's appointment as Headmaster, McGonagall became his Deputy Headmistress. Despite being a crucial force during the First Wizarding War against Lord Voldemort, McGonagall was not a member of the initial forming of the Order of the Phoenix. During the war, McGonagall lost her brother, Robert Jr, and two of her favourite students, James and Lily Potter. Following the death of the Potters and the first downfall of Voldemort, McGonagall accompanied Dumbledore and Rubeus Hagrid in delivering the sole survivor of the encounter, Harry Potter, to his aunt and uncle Petunia and Vernon Dursley in Surrey. Despite McGonagall's reservations that the Dursleys were the "worst kind of Muggles", she understood that due to the framing and imprisonment of Harry's godfather Sirius Black, the Dursleys were the only family the infant had left. After the war, McGonagall and Elphinstone married, but three years later he died from a Venomous Tentacula bite, making Minerva a widow.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: In 1991, Dumbledore revealed to his closest colleagues and allies that he would be keeping the philosopher's stone that was keeping Nicholas Flamel alive at Hogwarts, and tasked each of his colleagues to devise a protection for the stone. McGonagall's protection was a life-sized enchanted game of Wizard's Chess. That year, Harry Potter began his first year of education at Hogwarts and was sorted into Gryffindor, placing him in the care of McGonagall. After noticing Potter's flying skills whilst retrieving Neville Longbottom's Remembrall from Draco Malfoy, McGonagall quickly introduced Potter to Quidditch captain Oliver Wood, claiming to have found the new Seeker for the team. Harry made the Quidditch team, becoming the youngest Seeker in history. To ensure Potter had his own broom, McGonagall bought Harry a Nimbus 2000 broomstick, which was the fastest broom at the time. During the Halloween feast, Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher Quirinus Quirrell interrupted warning everyone of a mountain troll in the dungeon. Dumbledore ordered the students to return to their dormitories whilst he and the teachers headed towards the dungeons. The troll was not in the dungeon, but the teachers noticed a racket from the upper floor. They arrived upon the scene where the girls' lavatories had been wrecked and the troll defeated by Harry and Ron Weasley while saving their friend Hermione Granger. Hermione took the blame for her friends claiming that she had gone looking for the troll but would have been killed if it weren't for Harry and Ron. McGonagall took five points away from Hermione but gave five points each to Harry and Ron for "sheer dumb luck". Later on during the year, McGonagall caught Draco Malfoy roaming the castle after hours. Malfoy claimed to have seen Harry at Hagrid's with an illegal baby dragon. Meanwhile, Hermione and Neville were caught by the groundskeeper Argus Filch and all of them were sentenced to a detention. Towards the end of the year, it was revealed that Professor Quirrell was attached to Lord Voldemort and was the one attempting to steal the philosopher's stone, but was stopped by Harry, Ron and Hermione. Due to the trio's bravery as well as Neville Longbottom's courage attempting to stand up to them for breaking the rules, Gryffindor eventually won the House Cup that year.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: The following school year began with McGonagall having to deal with Harry and Ron crashing Arthur Weasley's flying Ford Anglia into the Whomping Willow after they were unable to access Platform 9 3/4 and missed the Hogwarts Express, and nearly exposing the wizarding world to the Muggle populace. McGonagall was fairer than Slytherin Head and Potions master Severus Snape in punishing Harry and Ron, and instead assigned them to a detention rather than expelling them. Later that year, it was revealed that the Chamber of Secrets had been opened, which led to the petrifications of two of her students in her house, Hermione Granger and Colin Creevey, as both were Muggle-born. Towards the end of the year McGonagall was forced to act as temporary Headmistress after the Ministry of Magic suspended Dumbledore. Finally, she discovered another note from the Heir of Slytherin which stated that he had taken Ginny Weasley into the Chamber. McGonagall believed that this would be the end of Hogwarts, and forced the new Defence Against the Dark Arts professor Gilderoy Lockhart to find the Chamber of Secrets and rescue Ginny, pointing out all of Lockhart's supposed heroic acts. Ginny was saved by Harry and Ron after they descended into the Chamber of Secrets (which was located in a cavern under one of the girls' lavatories). Harry defeated the Basilisk with help from Dumbledore's pet phoenix, Fawkes, who delivered Harry the Sword of Godric Gryffindor. During this encounter, Harry unknowingly destroyed the first of Voldemort's Horcruxes by destroying Tom Riddle's diary with a Basilisk's fang. With the monster defeated and the Chamber of Secrets closed, Dumbledore was reinstated and assigned McGonagall to prepare a celebratory feast.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: At the beginning of this school year, McGonagall assigned Hermione a Time-Turner to allow her to take multiple classes at the same time. After Azkaban escapee Sirius Black infiltrated the Castle, he was able to enter the Gryffindor common room. Black was apparently able to get in due to a list of passwords written down by Neville due to his constant forgetfulness. After a Dementor attack that caused Harry's Nimbus 2000 to be destroyed, Harry was sent a Firebolt. However, McGonagall confiscated it assuming it was sent by Sirius and cursed. However, the broomstick was returned to Harry after being declared safe. That year McGonagall watched as her house won their first Quidditch Cup in years, which resulted in McGonagall openly crying tears of joy.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: During this school year, it was announced that Hogwarts would be hosting the Triwizard Tournament as well as providing accommodation for the wizarding schools Beauxbatons and Durmstrang. Harry was chosen as a Triwizard Champion despite being underage and underequipped. McGonagall worried for the safety of her student and pleaded with Dumbledore and Ministry representative Barty Crouch Sr to remove Harry from the tournament to no avail. McGonagall would lend her classroom to Harry, Ron and Hermione to practice for the third and final task of the championship. After the end of the championship and the death of Cedric Diggory, McGonagall accompanied Dumbledore and Snape rescuing Harry from Death Eater Barty Crouch Jr, who had been masquerading as new Defence Against the Dark Arts professor Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody as a part of the plan to resurrect Lord Voldemort. It was revealed that Crouch had placed Harry's name into the Goblet of Fire and bewitched it to force Harry into participation in the tournament. Due to this, Crouch was able to transform the Triwizard Cup into a Portkey to transport Harry to the graveyard in Little Hangleton where his blood could be used to resurrect Voldemort. McGonagall was instructed to guard Crouch, but was unable to prevent the Dementor sent by Minister for Magic Cornelius Fudge to kill Crouch in an attempt to stop mass hysteria over the return of Lord Voldemort. The Ministry began a smear campaign against Harry and Dumbledore and silenced any rumours that the Dark Lord had returned and downplayed the death of Cedric Diggory as a result.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: Due to Voldemort's return, McGonagall finally joined the re-formed Order of the Phoenix alongside colleagues Dumbledore, Snape and Hagrid, as well as former colleagues Remus Lupin and Alastor Moody. Upon returning to Hogwarts, McGonagall was faced with the challenges of Ministry-appointed Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Dolores Umbridge. McGonagall was unafraid to show her disgust and hatred of Umbridge and her methods. Umbridge began to take control over the school, and appointed herself as "High Inquisitor". McGonagall was supportive of Harry, Ron and Hermione's formation of Dumbledore's Army in an attempt to teach the students how to defend themselves, considering Umbridge's refusal to do so. Due to Dumbledore's absence, Umbridge appointed herself as Headmistress rather than McGonagall. While Umbridge invaded the career advising sessions, McGonagall finally lost her temper at Umbridge after she kept interrupting Harry stating that he will never be an Auror for the Ministry of Magic. McGonagall pulled Harry aside and told him that she will assist Harry in achieving his goal of becoming an Auror even if it was the last thing she ever did. Whilst attempting to protect Hagrid from being sacked by Umbridge, McGonagall was attacked by Umbridge's Aurors and was sent to St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. McGonagall was unable to return to Hogwarts until after the Battle of the Department of Mysteries, where Voldemort's return was revealed to the world. McGonagall awarded fifty points each to all six students present at the battle, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Neville, Ginny and Ravenclaw student Luna Lovegood for alerting the world of Voldemort's return. McGonagall was present when Umbridge was forcibly removed from Hogwarts grounds, stating that she would have joined Peeves the poltergeist in chasing Umbridge off if her injuries had not prevented her from doing so.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: McGonagall was one of the first people Harry, Ron and Hermione turned to after Katie Bell was cursed. McGonagall called upon Snape and Filch to investigate the necklace she touched that caused her to be cursed. Snape stopped the curse from spreading and Harry professed his theory that Draco Malfoy was responsible. However, his theory was dismissed. Later in the year, McGonagall duelled with Death Eater Alecto Carrow during the Battle in the Astronomy Tower and later learned of Snape's murder of Dumbledore. McGonagall was initially appointed as Headmistress, but was demoted after Voldemort took control of the school and placed Snape as Headmaster.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: Despite the school being overrun by Death Eaters, McGonagall remained at Hogwarts to ensure little harm came to the students. Later during the year, McGonagall was present when Harry, Ron and Hermione returned to Hogwarts searching for Rowena Ravenclaw's diadem. She found Amycus Carrow attempting to break into Ravenclaw Tower, claiming his sister Alecto was inside. McGonagall opened the common room and found Alecto unconscious. Amycus revealed that he had been warned Harry would try to break into Ravenclaw Tower and admitted he would project the blame onto the students in the dormitories. When McGonagall refused and Amycus spat in her face, Harry angrily revealed himself and incapacitated the siblings with help from Luna. McGonagall then defeated Severus Snape and banished him from Hogwarts and began to defend the school. She tasked Neville and Seamus to destroy the wooden bridge to prevent Snatchers from sneaking into the school. McGonagall helped evacuate the younger students to Hogsmeade and ordered Pansy Parkinson and all those in favour of giving Harry over to Voldemort in exchange for their lives to leave. She was present to watch Harry defeat Voldemort once and for all and was one of the first people, aside from Ron, Hermione and Ginny, to congratulate him.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: After the war ended, McGonagall was fully instated as the Headmistress of Hogwarts and was awarded the Order of Merlin, First Class by new Minister for Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt. McGonagall eventually hired Neville as the new Herbology professor due to his gifts in the subject, and elected him as the new Head of Gryffindor House. McGonagall later learned that Snape was secretly Harry's protector and had killed Dumbledore at Dumbledore’s request. McGonagall then made a controversial decision to add Snape's portrait in the Headmaster's Office as a testament to his bravery.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: McGonagall is considered to be a formidable witch who is skilled in many forms of magic, notably transfiguration and spell-casting. She is able to perform certain magic without casting spells or sometimes without the use of a wand. McGonagall is a registered Animagus and can transform herself into a tabby cat at will. McGonagall was always held in high respect by her peers and students at Hogwarts and commanded a position second only to Dumbledore. She was notable for her sternness and dry sense of humour. Furthermore, Minerva McGonagall was inspired by the Roman goddess, Minerva or Athena in Greek mythology. Minerva was the goddess of wisdom and war (particularly in defensive war). During the series, Professor McGonagall displays many traits similar to the Roman goddess. For example, in the Deathly Hallows Part II, McGonagall directs and orders vital defensive tactics before the penultimate battle against Voldemort.


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: IGN ranked McGonagall as the 18th-best character in the franchise stating, "As the head of Gryffindor house and Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts, Professor McGonagall can be a strict disciplinarian. She is quick to kick misbehaving students out of her class, and deduct house points when the situation warrants. But she can also be kind of like that cool aunt of yours -- the one who sometimes lets you get away with a bit of mischief. And that's what's so endearing about McGonagall."


title: Minerva McGonagall

text: WatchMojo ranked McGonagall as their ninth-best character, stating, "Professor of Transfiguration at Hogwarts, Gryffindor head of house and member of the Order of the Phoenix, Professor McGonagall is an austere, imposing woman with a strict sense of responsibility. She keeps her students in line with the threat of detention, but also has a softer side on rare occasions – and not just when she transforms herself into a cat. When push comes to shove, Minerva McGonagall is a formidable witch with powerful magical abilities, even facing Voldemort himself at the Battle of Hogwarts." Maggie Smith also received much praise for her interpretation of the character, with author J.K. Rowling stating that she had always pictured the actress in the role of McGonagall. Despite this, Smith stated that she didn't feel wholly comfortable while making the films and that "it didn't really feel like acting", but has said that she enjoyed being a part of the franchise as it gives her something to bond with her grandchildren over. In 2007, Smith was diagnosed with breast cancer and struggled during the filming of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince", but made a full recovery in 2009. McGonagall's inclusion in "" was controversial for some fans of the series, as the character had been believed not to be born yet and was shown in the film teaching at Hogwarts.


title: Military dictatorship

text: A military dictatorship is a dictatorship in which the military exerts complete or substantial control over political authority, and the dictator is often a high-ranked military officer.


title: Military dictatorship

text: Most military dictatorships are formed after a "coup d'état" has overthrown the previous government. There have been cases, however, where the civilian government had been formally maintained but the military exercises "de facto" control—the civilian government is either bypassed or forced to comply with the military's wishes. For example, from 1916 until the end of World War I, the German Empire was governed as an effective military dictatorship, because its leading generals had gained such a level of control over Kaiser Wilhelm II that the Chancellor and other civilian ministers effectively served at their pleasure. Alternatively, the Empire of Japan after 1931 never in any formal way drastically altered the constitutional structure of its government, but from that point, it is typically seen as a military dictatorship, since the Army and Navy had the effective legal right to veto the formation of undesirable governments (and also to compel the resignation of an existing government that had lost their favor), and since key cabinet posts traditionally held by civilians (especially the Premiership) were instead filled by active flag officers.


title: Military dictatorship

text: Military dictatorships may gradually restore significant components of civilian government while the senior military commander still maintains executive political power. As an example, the Chilean military dictatorship under Augusto Pinochet conducted a plebiscite in 1980 that instituted a new constitution, thus legitimizing the regime's rule.


title: Military dictatorship

text: In the past, military juntas have justified their rule as a way of bringing political stability for the nation or rescuing it from the threat of "dangerous ideologies". For example, the threat of communism, socialism, and Islamism was often used. Military regimes tend to portray themselves as non-partisan, as a "neutral" party that can provide interim leadership in times of turmoil, and also tend to portray civilian politicians as corrupt and ineffective. One of the almost universal characteristics of a military government is the institution of martial law or a permanent state of emergency.


title: Military dictatorship

text: A military dictatorship is distinct from an absolute monarchy, although there are some similarities, especially concerning how the two are (or historically have been) established. Virtually all absolute monarchs (and even most constitutional monarchs) are commanders-in-chief of their nations' militaries, wear military uniforms at least on a ceremonial basis and hold military ranks and/or titles. Also, senior members of royal families, especially if they are male and/or heirs apparent or presumptive, are expected to perform military service prior to ascending the throne. Moreover, almost all monarchies (both current and defunct) established themselves over the past centuries and millennia by force of arms. A key difference between a monarchy and a military dictatorship is that once they are established and recognized by their subjects (a process that has often taken many generations) a monarchy typically establishes some form of hereditary succession to legitimately transfer power from generation to generation, and while there historically have been many cases of disputed claims to a throne, attempting to seize power through sheer force of arms without some sort of credible hereditary claim is usually regarded as illegitimate and/or illegal by monarchists. In constitutional monarchies the monarch is usually the commander-in-chief and is often formally the highest-ranking military officer but in practice is expected to defer to the advice of civilian ministers, especially when appointing flag officers who will exercise actual operational command, thus maintaining civilian control of the military.


title: Military dictatorship

text: On the other hand, modern military dictatorships typically eschew hereditary succession with long-lasting juntas often emphasizing the traditional methods of promotion within the officer ranks as the eventual path to civil power. Military dictatorships which have attempted to establish themselves as monarchies or otherwise implement hereditary succession, whether or not by attempting to establish themselves as monarchies, have often collapsed very quickly. In one example, Oliver Cromwell after deposing and executing King Charles I of England refused all offers to take the English Crown, but nevertheless attempted to have power transferred after his death to his son Richard Cromwell; however, the younger Cromwell lacked the respect or support of the English military establishment, and was thus quickly forced to relinquish power. In another, a few years after staging a coup and establishing himself as the French First Republic's dictator, Napoleon Bonaparte crowned himself French Emperor. Although he subsequently married a Habsburg princess and sired an heir to his newly established throne, Napoleon's claim to power was never fully accepted by French royalists who supported the deposed House of Bourbon, nor by other European monarchies. Eventually, Napoleon's armies were defeated and he was forced to abdicate and go into exile. Although Napoleon's nephew eventually re-established the Bonapartist monarchy for a time, his seizure of power might be better described in the context of a civilian dictatorship as described in the next section.


title: Military dictatorship

text: A military dictatorship is also different from civilian dictatorship for a number of reasons: their motivations for seizing power, the institutions through which they organize their rule and the ways in which they leave power. Often viewing itself as saving the nation from the corrupt or myopic civilian politicians, a military dictatorship justifies its position as "neutral" arbiters on the basis of their membership within the armed forces, which in many countries are nominally expected to be apolitical institutions. For example, many juntas adopt titles along the lines of "Committee of National Restoration", or "National Liberation Committee". Military leaders often rule as a junta, selecting one of themselves as a head.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Qajar Iran (), also referred to as Qajar Persia, the Qajar Empire, Sublime State of Persia, officially the Sublime State of Iran ( ') and also known then as the Guarded Domains of Iran ( '), was an Iranian state ruled by the Qajar dynasty, which was of Turkic origin, specifically from the Qajar tribe, from 1789 to 1925. The Qajar family took full control of Iran in 1794, deposing Lotf 'Ali Khan, the last Shah of the Zand dynasty, and re-asserted Iranian sovereignty over large parts of the Caucasus. In 1796, Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar seized Mashhad with ease, putting an end to the Afsharid dynasty. He was formally crowned as Shah after his punitive campaign against Iran's Georgian subjects.


title: Qajar Iran

text: In the Caucasus, the Qajar dynasty permanently lost many of Iran's integral areas to the Russian Empire over the course of the 19th century, comprising modern-day eastern Georgia, Dagestan, Azerbaijan, and Armenia. Despite its territorial losses, Qajar Iran reinvented the Iranian notion of kingship and maintained relative political independence, but faced major challenges to its sovereignty, predominantly from the Russian and British empires. Foreign advisers became powerbrokers in the court and military. They eventually partially partitioned Qajar Iran into two influence zones in the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907.


title: Qajar Iran

text: In the early 20th century, the Persian Constitutional Revolution created an elected parliament or Majilis, and sought the establishment of a constitutional monarchy, deposing Mohammad Ali Shah Qajar for Ahmad Shah Qajar, but many of the constitutional reforms were reversed by an intervention led by the Russian Empire. Qajar Iran's territorial integrity was further weakened during the Persian campaign of World War I and the invasion by the Ottoman Empire. Four years after the 1921 Persian coup d'état, Reza Shah took power in 1925 forming Imperial State of Persia.


title: Qajar Iran

text: The Qajar rulers were members of the Karagöz or "Black-Eye" sect of the Qajars, who themselves were members of the Qajars (tribe) or "Black Hats" lineage of the Oghuz Turks. Qajars first settled during the Mongol period in the vicinity of Armenia and were among the seven Qizilbash tribes that supported the Safavids. The Safavids "left Arran (present-day Republic of Azerbaijan) to local Turkic khans", and, "in 1554 Ganja was governed by Shahverdi Soltan Ziyadoglu Qajar, whose family came to govern Karabakh in southern Arran".


title: Qajar Iran

text: Qajars filled a number of diplomatic missions and governorships in the 16–17th centuries for the Safavids. The Qajars were resettled by Shah Abbas I throughout Iran. The great number of them also settled in Astarabad (present-day Gorgan, Iran) near the south-eastern corner of the Caspian Sea, and it would be this branch of Qajars that would rise to power. The immediate ancestor of the Qajar dynasty, Shah Qoli Khan of the Quvanlu of Ganja (also spelled Ghovanloo or Ghovanlou), married into the Quvanlu Qajars of Astarabad. His son, Fath Ali Khan (born c. 1685–1693) was a renowned military commander during the rule of the Safavid shahs Sultan Husayn and Tahmasp II. He was killed on the orders of Shah Nader Shah in 1726. Fath Ali Khan's son Mohammad Hasan Khan Qajar (1722–1758) was the father of Mohammad Khan Qajar and Hossein Qoli Khan (Jahansouz Shah), father of "Baba Khan," the future Fath-Ali Shah Qajar. Mohammad Hasan Khan was killed on the orders of Karim Khan of the Zand dynasty.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Within 126 years between the demise of the Safavid state and the rise of Naser al-Din Shah Qajar, the Qajars had evolved from a shepherd-warrior tribe with strongholds in northern Persia into a Persian dynasty with all the trappings of a Perso-Islamic monarchy.


title: Qajar Iran

text: "Like virtually every dynasty that ruled Persia since the 11th century, the Qajars came to power with the backing of Turkic tribal forces, while using educated Persians in their bureaucracy". Among these Turkic tribes, however, Turkmens of Iran played the most prominent role in bringing Qajars to power. In 1779 following the death of Karim Khan of the Zand dynasty, Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar, the leader of the Qajars, set out to reunify Iran. Agha Mohammad Khan was known as one of the cruelest kings, even by the standards of 18th-century Iran. In his quest for power, he razed cities, massacred entire populations, and blinded some 20,000 men in the city of Kerman because the local populace had chosen to defend the city against his siege.


title: Qajar Iran

text: The Qajar armies at that time were mostly composed of Turkoman warriors and Georgian slaves. By 1794, Agha Mohammad Khan had eliminated all his rivals, including Lotf Ali Khan, the last of the Zand dynasty. He reestablished Persian control over the territories in the entire Caucasus. Agha Mohammad established his capital at Tehran, a town near the ruins of the ancient city of Rayy. In 1796, he was formally crowned as shah. In 1797, Agha Mohammad Khan was assassinated in Shusha, the capital of Karabakh Khanate, and was succeeded by his nephew, Fath-Ali Shah Qajar.


title: Qajar Iran

text: In 1744, Nader Shah had granted the kingship of the Kartli and Kakheti to Teimuraz II and his son Erekle II (Heraclius II) respectively, as a reward for their loyalty. When Nader Shah died in 1747, they capitalized on the chaos that had erupted in mainland Iran, and declared "de facto" independence. After Teimuraz II died in 1762, Erekle II assumed control over Kartli, and united the two kingdoms in a personal union as the Kingdom of Kartli-Kakheti, becoming the first Georgian ruler to preside over a politically unified eastern Georgia in three centuries. At about the same time, Karim Khan Zand had ascended the Iranian throne; Erekle II quickly tendered his "de jure" submission to the new Iranian ruler, however, "de facto", he remained autonomous. In 1783, Erekle II placed his kingdom under the protection of the Russian Empire in the Treaty of Georgievsk. In the last few decades of the 18th century, Georgia had become a more important element in Russo-Iranian relations than some provinces in northern mainland Persia, such as Mazandaran or even Gilan. Unlike Peter the Great, Catherine the Great, the then-ruling monarch of Russia, viewed Georgia as a pivot for her Caucasian policy, as Russia's new aspirations were to use it as a base of operations against both Iran and the Ottoman Empire, both immediate bordering geopolitical rivals of Russia. On top of that, having another port on the Georgian coast of the Black Sea would be ideal. A limited Russian contingent of two infantry battalions with four artillery pieces arrived in Tbilisi in 1784, but was withdrawn in 1787, despite the frantic protests of the Georgians, as a new war against Ottoman Turkey had started on a different front.


title: Qajar Iran

text: The consequences of these events came a few years later when a strong new Iranian dynasty under the Qajars emerged victorious in the protracted power struggle in Persia. Their head, Agha Mohammad Khan, as his first objective, resolved to bring the Caucasus again fully under the Persian orbit. For Agha Mohammad Khan, the resubjugation and reintegration of Georgia into the Iranian Empire was part of the same process that had brought Shiraz, Isfahan, and Tabriz under his rule. He viewed, like the Safavids and Nader Shah before him, the territories no different from the territories in mainland Iran. Georgia was a province of Iran the same way Khorasan was. As the "Cambridge History of Iran" states, its permanent secession was inconceivable and had to be resisted in the same way as one would resist an attempt at the separation of Fars or Gilan. It was therefore natural for Agha Mohammad Khan to perform whatever necessary means in the Caucasus in order to subdue and reincorporate the recently lost regions following Nader Shah's death and the demise of the Zands, including putting down what in Iranian eyes was seen as treason on the part of the "vali" of Georgia.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Finding an interval of peace amid their own quarrels and with northern, western, and central Persia secure, the Persians demanded Erekle II to renounce the treaty with Russia and to reaccept Persian suzerainty, in return for peace and the security of his kingdom. The Ottomans, Iran's neighboring rival, recognized the latter's rights over Kartli and Kakheti for the first time in four centuries. Erekle appealed then to his theoretical protector, Empress Catherine II of Russia, asking for at least 3,000 Russian troops, but he was ignored, leaving Georgia to fend off the Persian threat alone. Nevertheless, Erekle II still rejected Agha Mohammad Khan's ultimatum.


title: Qajar Iran

text: In August 1795, Agha Mohammad Khan crossed the Aras River, and after a turn of events by which he gathered more support from his subordinate khans of Erivan and Ganja, and having re-secured the territories up to including parts of Dagestan in the north and up to the westernmost border of modern-day Armenia in the west, he sent Erekle the last ultimatum, which he also declined, but, sent couriers to St.Petersburg. Gudovich, who sat in Georgievsk at the time, instructed Erekle to avoid "expense and fuss", while Erekle, together with Solomon II and some Imeretians headed southwards of Tbilisi to fend off the Iranians.


title: Qajar Iran

text: With half of the troop's Agha Mohammad Khan crossed the Aras river with, he now marched directly upon Tbilisi, where it commenced into a huge battle between the Iranian and Georgian armies. Erekle had managed to mobilize some 5,000 troops, including some 2,000 from neighboring Imereti under its King Solomon II. The Georgians, hopelessly outnumbered, were eventually defeated despite stiff resistance. In a few hours, the Iranian king Agha Mohammad Khan was in full control of the Georgian capital. The Persian army marched back laden with spoil and carrying off many thousands of captives.


title: Qajar Iran

text: By this, after the conquest of Tbilisi and being in effective control of eastern Georgia, Agha Mohammad was formally crowned Shah in 1796 in the Mughan plain. As the "Cambridge History of Iran" notes; "Russia's client, Georgia, had been punished, and Russia's prestige, damaged." Erekle II returned to Tbilisi to rebuild the city, but the destruction of his capital was a death blow to his hopes and projects. Upon learning of the fall of Tbilisi General Gudovich put the blame on the Georgians themselves. To restore Russian prestige, Catherine II declared war on Persia, upon the proposal of Gudovich, and sent an army under Valerian Zubov to the Qajar possessions on April of that year, but the new Tsar Paul I, who succeeded Catherine in November, shortly recalled it.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Agha Mohammad Shah was later assassinated while preparing a second expedition against Georgia in 1797 in Shusha. Reassessment of Iranian hegemony over Georgia did not last long; in 1799 the Russians marched into Tbilisi, two years after Agha Mohammad Khan's death. The next two years were a time of muddle and confusion, and the weakened and devastated Georgian kingdom, with its capital half in ruins, was easily absorbed by Russia in 1801. As Iran could not permit or allow the cession of Transcaucasia and Dagestan, which had formed part of the concept of Iran for centuries, it would also directly lead up to the wars of even several years later, namely the Russo-Persian War (1804–1813) and Russo-Persian War (1826–1828), which would eventually prove for the irrevocable forced cession of aforementioned regions to Imperial Russia per the treaties of Gulistan (1813) and Turkmenchay (1828), as the ancient ties could only be severed by a superior force from outside. It was therefore also inevitable that Agha Mohammad Khan's successor, Fath Ali Shah (under whom Iran would lead the two above-mentioned wars) would follow the same policy of restoring Iranian central authority north of the Aras and Kura rivers.


title: Qajar Iran

text: On 12 September 1801, four years after Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar's death, the Russians capitalized on the moment, and annexed Kartli-Kakheti (eastern Georgia). In 1804, the Russians invaded and sacked the Iranian town of Ganja, massacring and expelling thousands of its inhabitants, thereby beginning the Russo-Persian War of 1804–1813. Under Fath Ali Shah (r. 1797–1834), the Qajars set out to fight against the invading Russian Empire, who were keen to take the Iranian territories in the region. This period marked the first major economic and military encroachments on Iranian interests during the colonial era. The Qajar army suffered a major military defeat in the war, and under the terms of the Treaty of Gulistan in 1813, Iran was forced to cede most of its Caucasian territories comprising modern-day Georgia, Dagestan, and most of Azerbaijan.


title: Qajar Iran

text: About a decade later, in violation of the Gulistan Treaty, the Russians invaded Iran's Erivan Khanate. This sparked the final bout of hostilities between the two; the Russo-Persian War of 1826–1828. It ended even more disastrously for Qajar Iran with temporary occupation of Tabriz and the signing of the Treaty of Turkmenchay in 1828, acknowledging Russian sovereignty over the entire South Caucasus and Dagestan, as well as therefore the ceding of what is nowadays Armenia and the remaining part of Republic of Azerbaijan; the new border between neighboring Russia and Iran were set at the Aras River. Iran had by these two treaties, in the course of the 19th century, irrevocably lost the territories which had formed part of the concept of Iran for centuries. The area to the North of the river Aras, among which the territory of the contemporary Republic of Azerbaijan, eastern Georgia, Dagestan, and Armenia was Iranian territory until they were occupied by Russia in the course of the 19th century.


title: Qajar Iran

text: As a further direct result and consequence of the Gulistan and Turkmenchay treaties of 1813 and 1828 respectively, the formerly Iranian territories became part of Russia for around the next 180 years, except Dagestan, which has remained a Russian possession ever since. Out of the greater part of the territory, six separate nations would be formed through the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, namely Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and three generally unrecognized republics Abkhazia, Artsakh and South Ossetia claimed by Georgia. Lastly and equally important, as a result of Russia's imposing of the two treaties, It also decisively parted the Azerbaijanis and Talysh ever since between two nations.


title: Qajar Iran

text: With the conclusion of the Akhal Treaty on 21 September 1881, Iran ceased any claim to all parts of Turkestan and Transoxiana, setting the Atrek River as the new boundary with Imperial Russia. Hence Merv, Sarakhs, Eshgh Abad, and the surrounding areas were transferred to Russian control under the command of General Alexander Komarov in 1884.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Following the official losing of the aforementioned vast territories in the Caucasus, major demographic shifts were bound to take place. Solidly Persian-speaking territories of Iran were lost, with all its inhabitants in it. Following the 1804–1814 War, but also per the 1826–1828 war which ceded the last territories, large migrations, so-called Caucasian Muhajirs, set off to migrate to mainland Iran. Some of these groups included the Ayrums, Qarapapaqs, Circassians, Shia Lezgins, and other Transcaucasian Muslims.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Through the Battle of Ganja of 1804 during the Russo-Persian War (1804–1813), many thousands of Ayrums and Qarapapaqs were settled in Tabriz. During the remaining part of the 1804–1813 war, as well as through the 1826–1828 war, the absolute bulk of the Ayrums and Qarapapaqs that were still remaining in newly conquered Russian territories were settled in and migrated to Solduz (in modern-day Iran's West Azerbaijan province). As the "Cambridge History of Iran" states; "The steady encroachment of Russian troops along the frontier in the Caucasus, General Yermolov's brutal punitive expeditions and misgovernment, drove large numbers of Muslims, and even some Georgian Christians, into exile in Iran."


title: Qajar Iran

text: In 1864 until the early 20th century, another mass expulsion took place of Caucasian Muslims as a result of the Russian victory in the Caucasian War. Others simply voluntarily refused to live under Christian Russian rule, and thus disembarked for Turkey or Iran. These migrations once again, towards Iran, included masses of Caucasian Azerbaijanis, other Transcaucasian Muslims, as well as many North Caucasian Muslims, such as Circassians, Shia Lezgins and Laks.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Many of these migrants would prove to play a pivotal role in further Iranian history, as they formed most of the ranks of the Persian Cossack Brigade, which was also to be established in the late 19th century. The initial ranks of the brigade would be entirely composed of Circassians and other Caucasian Muhajirs. This brigade would prove decisive in the following decades to come in Qajar history.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Furthermore, the 1828 Treaty of Turkmenchay included the official rights for the Russian Empire to encourage settling of Armenians from Iran in the newly conquered Russian territories. Until the mid-fourteenth century, Armenians had constituted a majority in Eastern Armenia.


title: Qajar Iran

text: At the close of the fourteenth century, after Timur's campaigns, Islam had become the dominant faith, and Armenians became a minority in Eastern Armenia. After centuries of constant warfare on the Armenian Plateau, many Armenians chose to emigrate and settle elsewhere. Following Shah Abbas I's massive relocation of Armenians and Muslims in 1604–05, their numbers dwindled even further.


title: Qajar Iran

text: At the time of the Russian invasion of Iran, some 80% of the population of Erivan Khanate in Iranian Armenia were Muslims (Persians, Turkics, and Kurds) whereas Christian Armenians constituted a minority of about 20%. As a result of the Treaty of Gulistan (1813) and the Treaty of Turkmenchay (1828), Iran was forced to cede Iranian Armenia (which also constituted the present-day Armenia), to the Russians. After the Russian administration took hold of Iranian Armenia, the ethnic make-up shifted, and thus for the first time in more than four centuries, ethnic Armenians started to form a majority once again in one part of historic Armenia.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Fath Ali Shah's reign saw increased diplomatic contacts with the West and the beginning of intense European diplomatic rivalries over Iran. His grandson Mohammad Shah, who fell under the Russian influence and made two unsuccessful attempts to capture Herat, succeeded him in 1834. When Mohammad Shah died in 1848 the succession passed to his son Nasser-e-Din, who proved to be the ablest and most successful of the Qajar sovereigns. He founded the first modern hospital in Iran.


title: Qajar Iran

text: During Nasser-e-Din Shah's reign, Western science, technology, and educational methods were introduced into Persia and the country's modernization was begun. Nasser ed-Din Shah tried to exploit the mutual distrust between Great Britain and Russia to preserve Persia's independence, but foreign interference and territorial encroachment increased under his rule. He was not able to prevent Britain and Russia from encroaching into regions of traditional Persian influence. In 1856, during the Anglo-Persian War, Britain prevented Persia from reasserting control over Herat. The city had been part of Persia in Safavid times, but Herat had been under the non-Persian rule since the mid–18th century. Britain also extended its control to other areas of the Persian Gulf during the 19th century. Meanwhile, by 1881, Russia had completed its conquest of present-day Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, bringing Russia's frontier to Persia's northeastern borders and severing historic Persian ties to the cities of Bukhara, Merv and Samarqand. Several trade concessions by the Persian government put economic affairs largely under British control. By the late 19th century, many Persians believed that their rulers were beholden to foreign interests.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Mirza Taghi Khan Amir Kabir, was the young prince Nasser-e-Din's advisor and constable. With the death of Mohammad Shah in 1848, Mirza Taqi was largely responsible for ensuring the crown prince's succession to the throne. When Nasser ed-Din succeeded to the throne, Amir Nezam was awarded the position of the prime minister and the title of Amir Kabir, the Great Ruler.


title: Qajar Iran

text: At that time, Persia was nearly bankrupt. During the next two and a half years Amir Kabir initiated important reforms in virtually all sectors of society. Government expenditure was slashed, and a distinction was made between the private and public purses. The instruments of central administration were overhauled, and Amir Kabir assumed responsibility for all areas of the bureaucracy. There were Bahai revolts and a revolt in Khurasan at the time but were crushed under Amir Kabir. Foreign interference in Persia's domestic affairs was curtailed, and foreign trade was encouraged. Public works such as the bazaar in Tehran were undertaken. Amir Kabir issued an edict banning ornate and excessively formal writing in government documents; the beginning of a modern Persian prose style dates from this time.


title: Qajar Iran

text: One of the greatest achievements of Amir Kabir was the building of Dar ol Fonoon in 1851, the first modern university in Persia and the Middle East. Dar-ol-Fonoon was established for training a new cadre of administrators and acquainting them with Western techniques. It marked the beginning of modern education in Persia. Amir Kabir ordered the school to be built on the edge of the city so it could be expanded as needed. He hired French and Russian instructors as well as Persians to teach subjects as different as Language, Medicine, Law, Geography, History, Economics, and Engineering, amongst numerous others. Unfortunately, Amir Kabir did not live long enough to see his greatest monument completed, but it still stands in Tehran as a sign of a great man's ideas for the future of his country.


title: Qajar Iran

text: These reforms antagonized various notables who had been excluded from the government. They regarded the Amir Kabir as a social upstart and a threat to their interests, and they formed a coalition against him, in which the queen mother was active. She convinced the young shah that Amir Kabir wanted to usurp the throne. In October 1851, the shah dismissed him and exiled him to Kashan, where he was murdered on the shah's orders. Through his marriage to Ezzat od-Doleh, Amir Kabir had been the brother-in-law of the shah.


title: Qajar Iran

text: The Qajar Iran would become a victim of the Great Game between Russia and Britain for influence over central Asia. As the Qajar state's sovereignty was challenged this took the form of military conquests, diplomatic intrigues, and the competition of trade goods between two foreign empires. Ever since the 1828 Treaty of Turkmanchay, Russia had received territorial domination in Iran. With the Romanovs shifting to a policy of 'informal support' for the weakened Qajar dynasty — continuing to place pressure with advances in the largely nomadic Turkestan, a crucial frontier territory of the Qajars — this Russian domination of Persia continued for nearly a century. The Persian monarchy became more of a symbolic concept in which Russian diplomats were themselves powerbrokers in Iran and the monarchy was dependent on British and Russian loans for funds. In 1879, the establishment of the Cossack Brigade by Russian officers gave the Russian Empire influence over the modernization of the Qajar army. This influence was especially pronounced because the Persian monarchy's legitimacy was predicated on an image of military prowess, first Turkic and then European-influenced. By the 1890s, Russian tutors, doctors and officers were prominent at the Shah's court, influencing policy personally. Russia and Britain had competing investments in the industrialisation of Iran including roads and telegraph lines, as a way to profit and extend their influence. However, until 1907 the Great Game rivalry was so pronounced that mutual British and Russian demands to the Shah to exclude the other, blocked all railroad construction in Iran at the end of the 19th century. In 1907 the British and Russian Empires partitioned Iran into spheres of influence with the Anglo-Russian Convention.


title: Qajar Iran

text: When Nasser al-Din Shah Qajar was assassinated by Mirza Reza Kermani in 1896, the crown passed to his son Mozaffar-e-din. Mozaffar-e-din Shah was a moderate, but relatively ineffective ruler. Royal extravagances coincided with an inadequate ability to secure state revenue which further exacerbated the financial woes of the Qajar. In response, the Shah procured two large loans from Russia (in part to fund personal trips to Europe). Public anger mounted as the Shah sold off concessions – such as road building monopolies, the authority to collect duties on imports, etc. – to European interests in return for generous payments to the Shah and his officials. Popular demand to curb arbitrary royal authority in favor of the rule of law increased as concern regarding growing foreign penetration and influence heightened.


title: Qajar Iran

text: The shah's failure to respond to protests by the religious establishment, the merchants, and other classes led the merchants and clerical leaders in January 1906 to take sanctuary from probable arrest in mosques in Tehran and outside the capital. When the shah reneged on a promise to permit the establishment of a "house of justice", or consultative assembly, 10,000 people, led by the merchants, took sanctuary in June in the compound of the British legation in Tehran. In August, the shah, through the issue of a decree promised a constitution. In October, an elected assembly convened and drew up a constitution that provided for strict limitations on royal power, an elected parliament, or Majles, with wide powers to represent the people and a government with a cabinet subject to confirmation by the Majles. The shah signed the constitution on 30 December 1906, but refusing to forfeit all of his power to the Majles, attached a caveat that made his signature on all laws required for their enactment. He died five days later. The Supplementary Fundamental Laws approved in 1907 provided, within limits, for freedom of press, speech, and association, and for the security of life and property. The hopes for the constitutional rule were not realized, however.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Mozaffar-e-din Shah's son Mohammad Ali Shah (reigned 1907–1909), who, through his mother, was also the grandson of Prime-Minister Amir Kabir (see before), with the aid of Russia, attempted to rescind the constitution and abolish parliamentary government. After several disputes with the members of the Majles, in June 1908 he used his Russian-officered Persian Cossack Brigade (almost solely composed of Caucasian Muhajirs), to bomb the Majlis building, arrest many of the deputies (December 1907), and close down the assembly (June 1908). Resistance to the shah, however, coalesced in Tabriz, Isfahan, Rasht, and elsewhere. In July 1909, constitutional forces marched from Rasht to Tehran led by Mohammad Vali Khan Sepahsalar Khalatbari Tonekaboni, deposed the Shah, and re-established the constitution. The ex-shah went into exile in Russia. Shah died in San Remo, Italy, in April 1925. Every future Shah of Iran would also die in exile.


title: Qajar Iran

text: On 16 July 1909, the Majles voted to place Mohammad Ali Shah's 11-year-old son, Ahmad Shah on the throne. Although the constitutional forces had triumphed, they faced serious difficulties. The upheavals of the Constitutional Revolution and civil war had undermined stability and trade. In addition, the ex-shah, with Russian support, attempted to regain his throne, landing troops in July 1910. Most serious of all, the hope that the Constitutional Revolution would inaugurate a new era of independence from the great powers ended when, under the Anglo-Russian Entente of 1907, Britain and Russia agreed to divide Persia into spheres of influence. The Russians were to enjoy exclusive right to pursue their interests in the northern sphere, the British in the south and east; both powers would be free to compete for economic and political advantage in a neutral sphere in the center. Matters came to a head when Morgan Shuster, a United States administrator hired as treasurer-general by the Persian government to reform its finances, sought to collect taxes from powerful officials who were Russian protégés and to send members of the treasury gendarmerie, a tax department police force, into the Russian zone. When in December 1911 the Majlis unanimously refused a Russian ultimatum demanding Shuster's dismissal, Russian troops, already in the country, moved to occupy the capital. To prevent this, on 20 December, Bakhtiari chiefs and their troops surrounded the Majles building, forced acceptance of the Russian ultimatum, and shut down the assembly, once again suspending the constitution.


title: Qajar Iran

text: British and Russian officials coordinated as the Russian army, still present in Persia, invaded the capital again and suspended the parliament. The Tsar ordered the troops in Tabriz "to act harshly and quickly", while purges were ordered, leading to many executions of prominent revolutionaries. The British Ambassador, George Head Barclay reported disapproval of this "reign of terror", though would soon pressure Persian ministers to officialize the Anglo-Russian partition of Iran. By June 1914, Russia established near-total control over its northern zone, while Britain had established influence over Baluch and Bakhtiari autonomous tribal leaders in the southeastern zone. Qajar Iran would become a battleground between Russian, Ottoman, and British forces in the Persian campaign of World War I.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Though Qajar Iran had announced strict neutrality on the first day of November 1914 (which was reiterated by each successive government thereafter), the neighboring Ottoman Empire invaded it relatively shortly after, in the same year. At that time, large parts of Iran were under tight Russian influence and control, and since 1910 Russian forces were present inside the country, while many of its cities possessed Russian garrisons. Due to the latter reason, as Prof. Dr. Touraj Atabaki states, declaring neutrality was useless, especially as Iran had no force to implement this policy.


title: Qajar Iran

text: At the beginning of the war, the Ottomans invaded Iranian Azerbaijan. Numerous clashes would take place there between the Russians, who were further aided by the Assyrians under Agha Petros as well as Armenian volunteer units and battalions, and the Ottomans on the other side. However, with the advent of the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the subsequent withdrawal of most of the Russian troops, the Ottomans gained the upper hand in Iran, occupying significant portions of the country until the end of the war. Between 1914 and 1918, the Ottoman troops massacred many thousands of Iran's Assyrian and Armenian population, as part of the Assyrian and Armenian genocides, respectively.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Ahmad Shah Qajar was born 21 January 1898 in Tabriz, and succeeded to the throne at age 11. However, the occupation of Persia during World War I by Russian, British, and Ottoman troops was a blow from which Ahmad Shah never effectively recovered.


title: Qajar Iran

text: In February 1921, Reza Khan, commander of the Persian Cossack Brigade, staged a coup d'état, becoming the effective ruler of Iran. In 1923, Ahmad Shah went into exile in Europe. Reza Khan induced the Majles to depose Ahmad Shah in October 1925 and to exclude the Qajar dynasty permanently. Reza Khan was subsequently proclaimed monarch as "Reza Shah Pahlavi", reigning from 1925 to 1941.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Iran was divided into five large provinces and a large number of smaller ones at the beginning of Fath Ali Shah's reign, about 20 provinces in 1847, 39 in 1886, but 18 in 1906. In 1868, most province governors were Qajar princes.


title: Qajar Iran

text: The Qajar military was one of the dynasty's largest conventional sources of legitimacy, albeit was increasingly influenced by foreign powers over the course of the dynasty.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Irregular forces, such as tribal cavalry, were a major element until the late nineteenth century, and irregular forces long remained a significant part of the Qajar army.


title: Qajar Iran

text: Russia established the Persian Cossack Brigade in 1879, a force which was led by Russian officers and served as a vehicle for Russian influence in Iran.


title: Qajar Iran

text: By the 1910s, the Qajar Iran was decentralised to the extent that foreign powers sought to bolster the central authority of the Qajars by providing military aid. It was viewed as a process of defensive modernisation; however, this also led to internal colonisation.


title: Qajar Iran

text: The Iranian Gendarmerie was founded in 1911 with the assistance of Sweden. The involvement of a neutral country was seen to avoid "Great Game" rivalry between Russia and Britain, as well as avoid siding with any particular alliance (in the prelude to World War I). Persian administrators thought the reforms could strengthen the country against foreign influences. The Swedish-influenced police had some success in building up Persian police in centralizing the country. After 1915, Russia and Britain demanded the recall of the Swedish advisers. Some Swedish officers left, while others sided with the Germans and Ottomans in their intervention in Persia. The remainder of the Gendarmerie was named "amniya" after a patrol unit that existed in the early Qajar dynasty.


title: Qajar Iran

text: The number of Russian officers in the Cossack Brigade would increase over time. Britain also sent sepoys to reinforce the Brigade. After the start of the Russian Revolution, many tsarist supporters remained in Persia as members of the Cossack Brigade rather than fighting for or against the Soviet Union.


title: Qajar Iran

text: The British formed the South Persia Rifles in 1916, which was initially separate from the Persian army until 1921.


title: Qajar Iran

text: In 1921, the Russian-officered Persian Cossack Brigade was merged with the gendarmerie and other forces, and would become supported by the British.


title: Qajar Iran

text: At the end of the Qajar dynasty in 1925, Reza Shah's Pahlavi army would include members of the gendarmerie, Cossacks, and former members of the South Persia Rifles.


title: Porky's

text: Porky's is a 1981 sex comedy film written and directed by Bob Clark about the escapades of teenagers in 1954 at the fictional Angel Beach High School in Florida. The film influenced many writers in the teen film genre and spawned two sequels: "" (1983) and "Porky's Revenge!" (1985), and an ashcan copy titled "Porky's Pimpin' Pee Wee" (2009). "Porky's" was the fifth highest-grossing film of 1982. The film received generally positive reviews at the time of its release, but have become more mixed-to-negative over time.


title: Porky's

text: In 1954, each boy in a group of Florida high school students plans to lose his virginity. They go to Porky's, a strip club in the Everglades, believing that they can hire a prostitute to satisfy their sexual desires. The club's proprietor, Porky, takes their money but humiliates the boys by dumping them into the swamp. When the group demands their money back, the sheriff, Porky's brother, drives them away but not before he extorts them for the rest of their money, further embarrassing them.


title: Porky's

text: After Mickey, who returned to Porky's for revenge, is beaten so badly he has to be hospitalized, the gang becomes hellbent on exacting revenge on Porky and his brother, eventually sinking Porky's establishment into the swamp. Porky and his men, joined by the sheriff, chase the group, but the boys make it across the county line, out of Porky's brother's jurisdiction, where local police officers and the high school band meet them. One of the officers, Mickey's older brother, Ted, repeatedly damages Porky's Hudson Hornet, promising to drop all charges against Porky for driving an unsafe vehicle if the night's events are forgiven. Because the boys are too young to have been allowed into Porky's legally, Porky and his brother agree.


title: Porky's

text: In a subplot, the boys peep on co-ed students in the girl's locker room shower, and Tommy, Billy, and Pee Wee see several girls showering. Pee Wee gives them away when he shouts at a heavier girl, who has been blocking his view, to move so that he can see. While a few girls run out, most stay, finding the situation funny. To test their attitude, Tommy sticks his tongue out through his peephole but gets it smeared with soap. Infuriated, he drops his pants and sticks his penis through the opening just before female coach Beulah Balbricker, who has a running feud with Tommy, walks into the shower area. Spotting the protruding member, she sneaks up on Tommy, grabs his penis, and pulls with all her might. Tommy pulls free and escapes, but Beulah is determined to prove that the offending member, which has a mole on it, belongs to Tommy, going so far as to request that Principal Carter hold a police-type line-up of the boys in the nude so she can identify it. However, Carter balks at her request. As the other basketball coaches laugh, Coach Brackett suggests asking the police to send a sketch artist and hang wanted posters around the school. When that suggestion gets even Carter laughing, Balbricker leaves in a huff. At the end of the film, she sneaks out of the bushes to ambush Tommy and actually drags his pants down, but she is pulled off him by police and dragged away screaming that she saw "it" and that she can identify its owner. Tommy breaks the fourth wall, saying, "Jeez!" to the camera.


title: Porky's

text: Another subplot involves Coach Brackett taking an interest in attractive Coach Honeywell. Coach Warren repeatedly refers to Honeywell as "Lassie" while pointing to the equipment room, much to Coach Brackett's confusion. He quickly finds out why when he and Honeywell hide out in the equipment room after an argument with Balbricker, and Honeywell becomes turned on by the smell. This leads to the pair having sex in the room, but Honeywell begins loudly howling like a dog, thus revealing why she is called Lassie. Her howls are heard throughout the entire school, much to the students' and Coach Warren's amusement. Brackett and Honeywell are fired as a result.


title: Porky's

text: Bob Clark got the idea to make the film in 1972. It was based on his experiences with five high school friends in Florida in the 1950s. He based the story on actual occurrences at Boca Ciega High School in Gulfport, Florida, and Fort Lauderdale High School in the early 1960s, and on a venue called Porky's Hide Away in Oakland Park, Florida.


title: Porky's

text: Clark teamed up with Roger Swaybill on a film, "Breaking Point". When Clark fell ill with mononucleosis in 1979, he dictated the story of "Porky's" to Swaybill, who then wrote a draft of the script. Every studio in Hollywood turned down the project. Clark eventually obtained financing from Melvin Simon Productions and a Canadian firm, Astral Bellevue Pathe. The film had to be made in Canada to obtain government tax benefits. This meant Clark, who was an American, got sole screen credit as writer. However, Swaybill was reimbursed with a six-figure sum and was co-writer on the sequel.


title: Porky's

text: "It seems incredible to realize that "Porky's", which earned more than $200 million worldwide, was done as a tax shelter, but that's the way it was," Swaybill says.


title: Porky's

text: Kim Cattrall took a small role in the film because she needed the money, and was horrified, at first, to see her name at the top of the poster: "People thought it was the end of my career".


title: Porky's

text: "Porky's" was released in Colorado Springs, Colorado and Columbia, South Carolina, on November 13, 1981. It then received a wide release in Canada and the United States on March 19, 1982.


title: Porky's

text: In Ireland, the film was banned on February 1, 1982; the decision was overturned nineteen days later.


title: Porky's

text: Upon its release, "Porky's" was viewed as "a likeable lowbrow coming-of-age comedy", but the critical appraisal has been more negative since then. Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, which collects both contemporary and modern reviews, gives the film a score of 34% based on reviews from 38 critics and an average rating of 4.8/10. The consensus reads, "Gleeful in its misogyny and celebratory of bad behavior, "Porky's" is an intermittently funny farce that will leave audiences feeling in need of a shower." On Metacritic the film has a score of 40% based on reviews from 8 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".


title: Porky's

text: Film critics Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert in their syndicated "At the Movies" television series both expressed disdain for "Porky's" and later called it one of the worst films of 1982. In particular, they criticized the film for what they viewed as its objectification and degradation of women and the childish nature of its antagonists, and they disliked that the film took what they felt was a thin, shallow and off-color stance against anti-Semitism. In his print review for "The Chicago Sun-Times", Ebert noted that the film's sexual content "per se" was not the film's failing, but rather the manner it was used: "Even in an easy scene like the one where the guys spy on the girls in the locker room, the director, Bob Clark, blows it. Peeping Tom scenes can be very funny (remember John Belushi on the ladder in “Animal House?”) Here, it's just smarmy."


title: Porky's

text: The film grossed $7.6 million for the weekend when it opened wide in 1982. It grossed a total of $106 million in its initial release in the United States and Canada, including $12 million in Canada. It grossed $25–30 million overseas, for a worldwide gross of over $130 million. Although it was written and directed by an American and was filmed in Miami and Miami Beach Florida, "Porky's" was produced by the Canadian company Astral Media. As a result, "Porky's" can be classed as the highest-grossing Canadian film of all time in the United States and Canada, with a total of C$111 million by 1999, including $6 million from a 1983 re-issue prior to the release of the sequel.


title: Porky's

text: On May 22, 2007, 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment released all three films in an "Ultimate Collection" box set on DVD.


title: Porky's

text: The DVD of the film from the "Ultimate Collection" was also released as a stand-alone release called the "One Size Fits All" Edition and includes a retrospective featurette with Bob Clark, a discussion on how Porky's is a comedy classic, movie commentary by Bob Clark, the theatrical trailer, two television spots, trailers for "Porky's II: The Next Day" and "Porky's Revenge!", and the sales pitch for the Porky's video game.


title: Porky's

text: "Porky's" was released on Blu-ray on September 25, 2012. The bonus material for the Blu-ray is the bonus material from the "One Size Fits All" Edition that focuses on the movie itself. The trailers for "Porky's II: The Next Day" and "Porky's Revenge!", and the Porky's video game sales pitch were not included as bonus materials for the Blu-ray release.


title: Porky's

text: The first two "Porky's" films were directed by Bob Clark and produced by Harold Greenberg, who founded Astral Communications (now known as Astral Media). Following the success of "Porky's" in North America and Europe, a sequel, "", was released in 1983. It was poorly received by critics and was less commercially successful than the original. Bob Clark did not want to make another film in the series, so director James Komack made the third and last part of the saga. The third film, "Porky's Revenge!", was the worst-received of the series both critically and commercially.


title: Porky's

text: A video game based on the film, also titled "Porky's", was released for the Atari 2600 and Atari 8-bit family by 20th Century Fox in 1983.


title: Porky's

text: In 2002, Howard Stern acquired the remake rights and has long hoped to produce a remake of the film. The potential remake ran into legal trouble in 2011 when two other production companies stepped forward claiming to own the rights. In 2013, the parties reached a confidential settlement and agreed to dismiss a claim and counterclaim with prejudice. The terms of the settlement remain confidential, and to date, if it allows for Stern's remake to be made is unknown.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Shimon Peres (; ; born Szymon Perski; 2 August 1923 – 28 September 2016) was an Israeli politician who served as the eighth prime minister of Israel from 1984 to 1986 and from 1995 to 1996 and as the ninth president of Israel from 2007 to 2014. He was a member of twelve cabinets and represented five political parties in a political career spanning 70 years. Peres was elected to the Knesset in November 1959 and except for a three-month-long interregnum in early 2006, served as a member of the Knesset continuously until he was elected president in 2007. Serving in the Knesset for 48 years (with the first uninterrupted stretch lasting more than 46 years), Peres is the longest serving member in the Knesset's history. At the time of his retirement from politics in 2014, he was the world's oldest head of state and was considered the last link to Israel's founding generation.


title: Shimon Peres

text: From a young age, he was renowned for his oratorical brilliance, and was chosen as a protégé by David Ben-Gurion, Israel's founding father. He began his political career in the late 1940s, holding several diplomatic and military positions during and directly after the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. His first high-level government position was as deputy director general of defense in 1952 which he attained at the age of 28, and director general from 1953 until 1959. In 1956, he took part in the historic negotiations on the Protocol of Sèvres described by British Prime Minister Anthony Eden as the "highest form of statesmanship". In 1963, he held negotiations with U.S. President John F. Kennedy, which resulted in the sale of Hawk anti-aircraft missiles to Israel, the first sale of U.S. military equipment to Israel. Peres represented Mapai, Rafi, the Alignment, Labor and Kadima in the Knesset, and led Alignment and Labor.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres first succeeded Yitzhak Rabin as acting prime minister briefly during 1977, before becoming prime minister from 1984 to 1986. As foreign minister under Prime Minister Rabin, Peres engineered the 1994 Israel–Jordan peace treaty, and won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize together with Rabin and Yasser Arafat for the Oslo Accords peace talks with the Palestinian leadership. In 1996, he founded the Peres Center for Peace, which has the aim of "promot[ing] lasting peace and advancement in the Middle East by fostering tolerance, economic and technological development, cooperation and well-being." After suffering a stroke, Peres died in 2016 near Tel Aviv.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Shimon Peres was born Szymon Perski, on 2 August 1923, in Wiszniew, Poland (now Vishnyeva, Belarus), to Yitzhak (1896–1962) and Sara (1905–1969, née Meltzer) Perski. The family spoke Hebrew, Yiddish and Russian at home, and Peres learned Polish at school. He then learned to speak English and French. His father was a wealthy timber merchant, later branching out into other commodities; his mother was a librarian. Peres had a younger brother, Gershon. He was related to the American film star Lauren Bacall (born Betty Joan Perske), and they were described as first cousins, but Peres said, "In 1952 or 1953, I came to New York... Lauren Bacall called me, said that she wanted to meet, and we did. We sat and talked about where our families came from, and discovered that we were from the same family... but I'm not exactly sure what our relation is... It was she who later said that she was my cousin; I didn't say that".


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres told Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson that he had been born as a result of a blessing his parents had received from a chassidic rebbe and that he was proud of it. Peres's grandfather, Rabbi Zvi Meltzer, a grandson of Rabbi Chaim Volozhin, had a great impact on his life. In an interview, Peres said: "As a child, I grew up in my grandfather's home. … I was educated by him. … My grandfather taught me Talmud. It was not as easy as it sounds. My home was not an observant one. My parents were not Orthodox but I was Haredi. At one point, I heard my parents listening to the radio on the Sabbath and I smashed it." When he was a child, Peres was taken by his father to Radun to receive a blessing from Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan (known as "the "Chofetz Chaim""). As a child, Peres would later say, "I did not dream of becoming president of Israel. My dream as a boy was to be a shepherd or a poet of stars." He inherited his love of French literature from his maternal grandfather.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1932, Peres's father immigrated to Mandatory Palestine and settled in Tel Aviv. The family followed him in 1934. He attended Balfour Elementary School and High School, and Geula Gymnasium (High School for Commerce) in Tel Aviv. At 15, he transferred to Ben Shemen agricultural school and lived on Kibbutz Geva for several years. Peres was one of the founders of Kibbutz Alumot.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1941, he was elected Secretary of HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed, a Labor Zionist youth movement, and in 1944 returned to Alumot, where he had an agricultural training and worked as a farmer and a shepherd.


title: Shimon Peres

text: At age 20, he was elected to the HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed national secretariat, where he was only one of two Mapai party supporters, out of the 12 members. Three years later, he took over the movement and won a majority. The head of Mapai, David Ben-Gurion, and Berl Katznelson began to take an interest in him, and appointed him to Mapai's secretariat.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1944, Peres led an illicit expedition into the Negev, then a closed military zone requiring a permit to enter. The expedition, consisting of a group of teenagers, along with a Palmach scout, a zoologist, and an archaeologist, had been funded by Ben-Gurion and planned by Palmach head Yitzhak Sadeh, as part of a plan for future Jewish settlement of the area so as to include it in the Jewish state. The group was arrested by a Bedouin camel patrol led by a British officer, taken to Beersheba (then a small Arab town) and incarcerated in the local jail. All of the participants were sentenced to two weeks in prison, and as the leader, Peres was also heavily fined. The expedition came across a nest of bearded vultures, called "peres" in Hebrew, and from this Peres took his Hebrew name.


title: Shimon Peres

text: All of Peres's relatives who remained in Wiszniew in 1941 were murdered during the Holocaust, many of them (including Rabbi Meltzer) burned alive in the town's synagogue.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1945, Peres married Sonya Gelman, who preferred to remain outside the public eye. They had three children.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1946, Peres and Moshe Dayan were chosen as the two youth delegates in the Mapai delegation to the Zionist Congress in Basel.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1947, Peres joined the Haganah, the predecessor of the Israel Defense Forces. David Ben-Gurion made him responsible for personnel and arms purchases; he was appointed to head the naval service when Israel received independence in 1948.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres was director of the Defense Ministry's delegation in the United States in the early 1950s. While in the U.S. he studied English, economics, and philosophy at The New School and New York University, and completed a four-month advanced management course at Harvard University.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1952, Peres was appointed deputy director general of the Ministry of Defense, and the following year, he was promoted to director general. At age 29, he was the youngest person to hold this position. He was involved in arms purchases and establishing strategic alliances that were important for the State of Israel. He was instrumental in establishing close relations with France, securing massive amounts of quality arms that, in turn, helped to tip the balance of power in the region.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1955, he testified against Minister of Defense Pinhas Lavon in what became known as the Lavon Affair.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Owing to Peres's mediation, Israel acquired the advanced Dassault Mirage III French jet fighter, established the Dimona nuclear reactor and entered into a tri-national agreement with France and the United Kingdom, positioning Israel in what would become the 1956 Suez Crisis. Peres continued as a primary intermediary in the close French-Israeli alliance from the mid-1950s, although from 1958, he was often involved in tense negotiations with Charles de Gaulle over the Dimona project.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres is considered to have been the architect of Israel's secret nuclear weapons program in the 1960s, and he stated that, in the 1960s, he recruited Arnon Milchan, an Israeli-American Hollywood film producer, billionaire businessman, and secret arms dealer and intelligence operative, to work for the Israeli Bureau of Scientific Relations (LEKEM or LAKAM), a secret intelligence organization tasked with obtaining military technology and science espionage.


title: Shimon Peres

text: From 1954, as director general of the Ministry of Defense, Peres was involved in the planning of the 1956 Suez War, in partnership with France and Britain. Peres was sent by David Ben-Gurion to Paris, where he held secret meetings with the French government. Peres was instrumental in negotiating the Franco-Israeli agreement for a military offensive. In November 1954, Peres visited Paris, where he was received by the French Defense Minister Marie-Pierre Kœnig, who told him that France would sell Israel any weapons it wanted to buy. By early 1955, France was shipping large amounts of weapons to Israel. In April 1956, following another visit to Paris by Peres, France agreed to disregard the Tripartite Declaration, and supply more weapons to Israel. During the same visit, Peres informed the French that Israel had decided upon war with Egypt in 1956. Throughout the 1950s, an extraordinarily close relationship existed between France and Israel, characterised by unprecedented cooperation in the fields of defense and diplomacy. For his work as the architect of this relationship, Peres was awarded the highest order of the French, the Legion of Honor, as Commander.


title: Shimon Peres

text: At Sèvres, Peres took part in planning alongside Maurice Bourgès-Maunoury, Christian Pineau and Chief of Staff of the French Armed Forces General Maurice Challe, and British Foreign Secretary Selwyn Lloyd and his assistant Sir Patrick Dean. Britain and France enlisted Israeli support for an alliance against Egypt. The parties agreed that Israel would invade the Sinai. Britain and France would then intervene, purportedly to separate the warring Israeli and Egyptian forces, instructing both to withdraw to a distance of 16 kilometres from either side of the canal. The British and French would then argue, according to the plan, that Egypt's control of such an important route was too tenuous, and that it needed be placed under Anglo-French management. The agreement at Sèvres was initially described by British Prime Minister Anthony Eden as the "highest form of statesmanship". The three allies, especially Israel, were mainly successful in attaining their immediate military objectives. However, the extremely hostile reaction to the Suez Crisis from both the United States and the USSR forced them to withdraw, resulting in a failure of Britain and France's political and strategic aims of controlling the Suez Canal.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres was first elected to the Knesset in the 1959 elections as a member of the Mapai party. He was given the role of deputy minister of defense, which he filled until 1965 (holding this position in the 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th governments of Israel under Prime Ministers David Ben-Gurion and Levi Eshkol). In this position, he held negotiations with John F. Kennedy, which concluded with the sale of Hawk anti-aircraft missiles to Israel, the first sale of US military equipment to Israel.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres resigned from the 12th government in late May 1965, citing the growing rift between Prime Minister Eshkol and former prime minister Ben-Gurion (Peres was aligned with Ben Gurion). In 1965, Peres and Moshe Dayan were among those that left Mapai with David Ben-Gurion when Ben-Gurion formed a new party, Rafi. Peres was a co-founder of the Rafi party. The party reconciled with Mapai in 1968, merging to form the Israeli Labor Party. The Labor Party then joined the Alignment (a left-wing alliance).


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1969, Peres was appointed minister of immigrant absorption in the 15th government (led by Prime Minister Golda Meir), and in 1970 (also in the 15th government), he became minister of transportation and communications. After this, he served as minister of information in the Meir-led 16th government.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres was appointed minister of defense in the Yitzhak Rabin-led 17th government, after having been Rabin's chief rival for the post of Labor Party leader (and, in effect, the Israeli premiership) in the 1974 Israeli Labor Party leadership election that was held after Golda Meir resigned in the aftermath of the Yom Kippur War.


title: Shimon Peres

text: On 27 June 1976, Peres, as minister of defense, in collaboration with Prime Minister Rabin, handled Israel's response to a coordinated act of terrorism when 248 Paris-bound travelers on an Air France plane were taken hostage by pro-Palestinian hijackers and flown to Uganda, Africa, 2,000 miles away.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres and Rabin were responsible for approving what became known as the "Operation Entebbe", which took place on 4 July 1976. The rescue boosted the Rabin government's approval rating with the public. The only Israeli soldier that was killed during the successful rescue operation was its commander, 30-year-old Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Netanyahu, older brother of Benjamin Netanyahu.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Before Rabin ultimately approved the rescue mission, he and Peres were at odds on how to proceed. Rabin was open to acquiescing to the terrorists' demands to release forty Palestinian militants if no military option presented itself. Peres, however, felt acquiescing to be a nonstarter, believing it would encourage further terrorism. Rabin initially took steps to begin negotiations with the terrorists, seeing no other option. Peres felt that negotiating with terrorists would, in effect, be a surrender, and thought a rescue operation should be planned.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres organized a secret Israel Crisis Committee to come up with a rescue plan. When a plan had been made, he met with commander Netanyahu a number of times. During one of their final private meetings, they both examined maps and went over precise details. Peres later said of Netanyahu's explanation, "My impression was one of exactitude and imagination," saying that Netanyahu seemed confident the operation would succeed with almost no losses. Netanyahu left the meeting understanding that Peres would do everything in his power to see that the operation went smoothly. Peres then went unannounced to Moshe Dayan, the former minister of Ddfense, interrupting his dinner with friends in a restaurant, to show him the latest plan to get his opinion. Peres told Dayan of the objections that had been raised by Rabin and Chief of Staff, Mordechai Gur. Dayan dismissed the objections after reviewing the written details: "Shimon," he said, "this is a plan that I support not one hundred percent but one hundred and fifty percent! There has to be a military operation." Peres later got the approval from Gur, who became fully supportive. Peres then took the plan to Rabin, who had been lukewarm and still didn't like the risks, but he reluctantly approved the plan after Peres answered a number of key questions and Rabin learned that the cabinet had also endorsed it.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Shortly after the mission ended, Rabin recounted, "we called into my office seven of our top commanders...I told our friends in uniform that the honor of the Jewish people, their destinies, are challenged and what we are considering is not just a calculated risk in the military sense, but a comparative risk, which exists between surrender to terror and daring rescue stemming from independence."


title: Shimon Peres

text: After the success of the operation, Peres angled to receive some of the credit and adulation, somewhat competing with Rabin for credit.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In February 1977, Peres challenged Prime Minister Rabin for the leadership of Labor Party, but lost to Rabin in a narrow 50.72% to 49.28% result in the vote by the party's Central Committee. The leadership election was expected to determine who would lead the party into the 1977 Knesset election. This was at moment when Labor was threatened with the prospect of losing its control of government after 28-consecutive years due to the rise of both the right-wing Likud bloc and the centrist Democratic Movement for Change, which were seen as collectively cutting into the Labor Party's support in the upcoming election. At the time, Rabin and Peres presented little policy difference, with Peres being seen as only slightly to the right of Rabin on domestic matters. Instead of positioning himself in contrast to the incumbent Rabin on policy, Peres instead capitalized off of the political atmosphere and staked his candidacy largely on an argument that the Labor Party needed to satisfy the nation's desire for change by choosing a new leader for itself.


title: Shimon Peres

text: On 8 April 1977, Prime Minister Rabin announced that, in the wake of a foreign currency scandal involving his wife, he would be stepping down prior to the 1977 Knesset election. Peres made himself a candidate to replace him as the new Labor Party leader. Initially, Foreign Minister Yigal Allon also made himself a candidate. However, Allon and Peres reached an agreement that Peres would appoint Allon to any ministerial position that Allon preferred in exchange from his withdrawal of his candidacy. Following Allon's withdrawal, the Labor Party leadership announced on 10 April 1977 that they had chosen to endorse Peres as the party's new leader. On 11 April 1977, the 815-member Central Committee of the party elected Peres by acclamation as the party's new leader.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Rabin ended his active service as prime minister on 22 April 1977, and Peres became Israel's unofficial acting prime minister. The reason why Peres was not officially the holder of this office was that Rabin could not, under Israeli law, resign from his position as prime minister because the government was, at the time, a caretaker government.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In his first election as party leader, Peres led Labor Party and the Alignment coalition to its first ever electoral defeat, and the result afforded the first-place Likud party (led by Menachem Begin) the ability to form a coalition that excluded the left. When the new Likud-led government was formed on 20 June 1977 Peres' time as the unofficial acting prime minister ended.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Once the Likud-led government took power, Labor and the Alignment bloc entered the Knesset opposition for the first time in its history, and Peres assumed the unofficial role of Knesset opposition leader.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1978, Peres was elected vice president of Socialist International. Through his role within the leadership of this organization, Peres befriended foreign politicians including Willy Brandt, Bruno Kreisky, members of the British Labour Party, and politicians from parts of Africa and Asia.


title: Shimon Peres

text: After handily winning reelection as Labor Party leader in 1980 (defeating a challenge from Rabin, who was attempting a comeback to the leadership), Peres led his party to another, narrower, loss in the 1981 elections.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In the 1984 elections (Peres' third election as Labor Party leader), the Alignment coalition won more seats than any other party, but the left-wing failed to win the majority of 61 seats needed to form a coalition on their own. Alignment and Likud agreed to an unusual “rotation" arrangement to form a grand coalition unity government during which, for the first twenty-five months, Peres would serve as prime minister and the Likud leader Yitzhak Shamir would be foreign minister, with the two swapping positions thereafter for the second half of the term.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres was regarded to be a popular prime minister in his two years as premier under the rotation arrangement. During a portion of his premiership, he also held the position of minister of religious affairs.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Among the most noteworthy moments of his first tenure as prime minister was Operation Wooden Leg (a long-range Israeli airstrike against the PLO headquarters in Tunisia) and a trip to Morocco to confer with King Hassan II.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1985, Peres publicly supported the quick pursuit of a military pullback from Beirut to Israel's south Lebanon security belt. A partial Israeli pullback had earlier been approved in 1983 by the Begin-headed Likud-led government that had been in power at that time.


title: Shimon Peres

text: A major domestic policy decision of Peres' first premiership was the implementation of the 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan.


title: Shimon Peres

text: By 1985, Israel's economic fortunes were looking dire, with immense and quickly rising inflation (Israel was experiencing hyperinflation), a government budget deficit equal to between twelve and fifteen percent of the nation's GDP and national debt equal to 220% of the nation's GDP, and Israel's foreign currency reserves were quickly dissipating. With the assistance of the government of the United States, Peres assembled a board of American economist to advise him on the situation. Conditional on him implementing reforms, Peres secured emergency economic assistance from the United States of $750 million (equivalent to 3.5% of the nation's GDP at the time) annually over a two-year period.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres was initially hesitant to take the drastic measures that he ultimately would pursue, as they had the strong potential of proving unpopular and came with a risk of potentially creating a drastic increase in unemployment. Peres ultimately was convinced to push through the 1985 Israel Economic Stabilization Plan. Once convinced, he was assertive in pushing for the passage of the program, which was quickly after approved by his cabinet on 1 July 1985. This program had quick success in improving the course of the Israeli economy. By the end of the year, inflation immensely decreased. Additionally, the shekel stabilized and the government balanced its budget. While Israel would subsequently slide into a recession, the stabilization has been regarded as an important and greatly successful model for addressing economies in crisis, and has been credited with saving the nation's economy.


title: Shimon Peres

text: As per the rotation arrangement, after Peres' two years as prime minister, he and Shamir traded places in 1986, with Shamir becoming prime minister of the new twenty-second government of Israel and Peres becoming foreign minister. During this government, Peres was the designated acting prime minister of Israel.


title: Shimon Peres

text: In 1988 the Alignment, led by Peres, suffered another narrow defeat. This came despite the fact that polling in 1988 showed Peres to be the most popular politician in the nation. Peres agreed to renew the grand coalition with the Likud, this time conceding the premiership to Shamir for the entire term. In the grand coalition unity government of 1988–90 (the twenty-third government of Israel), Peres served as minister of finance and also continued to be the designated acting prime minister of Israel.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres and the Alignment finally left the government in 1990, after "the dirty trick" – a failed bid by Peres to form a narrow government based on a coalition of the Alignment, small leftist factions and ultra-orthodox parties. Peres' hope had been to create a Labor-led government that would be focused on peace talks with Palestine. Likud had declined proposals by the United States for Israel and Palestine to initiate what would have been the first peace talks between the two sides. Peres' longtime intra-party rival, Yizhak Rabin, had opposed to overthrowing the Likud-led coalition government. Peres succeeded in ending the government twenty-third government with a vote of no confidence. However, Peres was subsequently unable to assemble enough Knesset partners to form a pro-peace talk government. After two months, Shamir managed to form a Likud-led government with right-wing religious parties, establishing what was seen as the most conservative government coalition in the history of Israel up to that point.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Peres led the opposition in the Knesset from 1990 until early 1992, when he was defeated by Yitzhak Rabin in the Israeli Labor Party leadership election, the first leadership election held since the party formally merged with the other parties of Alignment, and the first leadership election open to participation by the party's entire membership. Peres remained active in politics, however.


title: Shimon Peres

text: After the Labor Party was successful in the 1992 Knesset election and Rabin became prime minister again, Rabin made Peres foreign minister in his government. Peres had previously served as foreign minister from 1986 through 1988.


title: Shimon Peres

text: On 26 October 1994, Jordan and Israel signed the Israel–Jordan peace treaty, which had been initiated by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres. The ceremony was held in the Arava valley of Israel, north of Eilat and near the Jordanian border. Prime Minister Rabin and Prime Minister Abdelsalam al-Majali signed the treaty and the President of Israel Ezer Weizman shook hands with King Hussein. United States President Bill Clinton observed, accompanied by United States Secretary of State Warren Christopher, as well as the foreign ministers of eleven other nations (including Russia, which had joined the United States as a formal co-sponsor of the peace talks that led to the treaty). The treaty brought an end to 46 years of official war between Israel and Jordan. It was only the second full peace agreement that Israel had reached with an Arab nation, after the Camp David Accords signed with Egypt in 1978.


title: Shimon Peres

text: Rabin's 1992 campaign for Labor had primarily been run on the idea of negotiating peace with the Palestinians. This campaign had succeeded as a peaceful resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was popular among the Israeli public at the time. The twenty-fifth government of Israel was arguably more pro-peace government than any previous Israeli government. Rabin's government would begin negotiations with the Yasser Arafat-led Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO).