page_title: Zahir al-Umar
section_title: Administration
hierarchical_section_title: Zahir al-Umar / Politics / Administration
caption_attribution_description: English: A painting of Daher el-Omar (born ca. 1690, died August 21, 1775) who was the Arab-Bedouin ruler of the Galilee district of the southern Levant during the mid-18th century. The founder of modern Haifa, he fortified many cities, among them Acre.עברית: דאהר אל-עומר, מושל הגליל ב המאה ה-18ממוצא ערבי ובדואי. מקימה של חיפה החדשה. ביצר ערים רבות ובהן עכו. הזמין יהודים להתגורר בטבריה. דאהר אל עומר במגדל אלסולטאן בעכו בשנת 1775. צוייר על ידי זיאד דאהר זידני שהינו מצאצאיו של דאהר אל עומר ומתגורר בנצרת. العربية: لوحة ظاهر العمر (مواليد حوالي عام 1690 - توفي 21 تشرين الأول (أغسطس)، 1775)؛ كان الحاكم العربي-البدوي لمنطقة الجليل في جنوب بلاد خلال منتصف القرن الثامن عشر. مؤسس حيفا الحديثة، قام بتحصين العديد من المدن، من بينها عكا.
context_page_description: Zahir al-Umar al-Zaydani, alternatively spelled Daher al-Omar or Dahir al-Umar was the autonomous Arab ruler of northern Palestine in the mid-18th century, while the area was still nominally part of the Ottoman Empire. For much of his reign, starting in the 1730s, his domain mainly consisted of Galilee, with successive headquarters in Tiberias, Arraba, Nazareth, Deir Hanna and finally Acre, in 1746. He fortified Acre, and the city became a center of the cotton trade between Palestine and Europe. In the mid-1760s, he reestablished the port town of Haifa nearby.
  Zahir successfully withstood assaults and sieges by the Ottoman governors of the Sidon and Damascus provinces, who attempted to limit or eliminate his influence. He was often supported in these confrontations by the rural Shia Muslim clans of Jabal Amil. In 1771, in alliance with Ali Bey al-Kabir of the Eyalet of Egypt and with backing from Russia, Zahir captured Sidon, while Ali Bey's forces conquered Damascus, both acts in open defiance of the Ottoman sultan. At the peak of his power in 1774, Zahir's autonomous sheikhdom extended from Beirut to Gaza and included the Jabal Amil and Jabal Ajlun regions.
context_section_description: Zahir appointed many of his brothers and sons as local administrators, particularly after he consolidated his control over Acre, which became the capital of his territory. Except for Acre and Haifa, Zahir divided the remainder of his territory between his relatives. His eldest brother was appointed to Deir Hanna, and his younger brothers Yusuf and Salih Abu Dani were installed in I'billin and Arraba, respectively. Zahir appointed his eldest son Salibi as the multazim of Tiberias. Salibi was killed in 1773 fighting alongside Ali Bey's forces in Egypt. His death deeply distressed Zahir, who was around 80 years old at the time. He appointed Uthman in Kafr Kanna then Shefa-'Amr, Abbas in Nazareth, Ali in Safad, and Ahmad in Saffuriya. Ahmad replaced Salibi in Tiberias as well, and also conquered Ajlun and Salt in Transjordan. In addition, Ahmad was given authority over Deir Hanna after Sa'd's death. Zahir appointed his nephew Ayyub al-Karimi in Jaffa and Gaza, while al-Dinkizli was made multazim in Sidon in 1774. The appointment of Zahir's relatives and close associates was meant to ensure the efficient administration of his expanding realm and the loyalty of his circle. Among their chief functions was to ensure the supply of cotton to Acre. It is not clear if these posts were recognized by the Ottoman government.
  Zahir had an aide who jointly served in the capacity of mudabbir (manager) and wazir (vizier) to assist him throughout much of his rule in matters of finance and correspondence. This official had always been a Melkite (local Greek Catholic). His first wazir was Yusuf al-Arqash, followed by Yusuf Qassis in 1749. Qassis continued in this role until the early 1760s when he was arrested for attempting to smuggle wealth he had accumulated during his service to Malta. He was succeeded by Ibrahim Sabbagh, who had served as a personal physician for Zahir in 1757 when he replaced Zahir's longtime physician Sulayman Suwwan. Suwwan was a local Greek Orthodox Christian and when he failed to properly treat Zahir during a serious illness in 1757, Qassis used the opportunity to replace him with Sabbagh, a friend and fellow Melkite. Sabbagh became the most influential figure in Zahir's administration, particularly as Zahir grew old. This caused consternation among Zahir's sons as they viewed Sabbagh to be a barrier between them and their father and an impediment to their growing power in Zahir's territory. Sabbagh was able to gain increased influence with Zahir largely because of the wealth he amassed through his integral role in managing Zahir's cotton monopoly. Much of this wealth was acquired through Sabbagh's own deals where he would purchase cotton and other cash crops from the local farmers and sell them to the European merchants in the Syria's coastal cities and to his Melkite partners in Damietta, Egypt. Sabbagh served other important roles as well, including as Zahir's political adviser, main administrator and chief representative with European merchants and Ottoman provincial and imperial officials.
  There were other officials in Zahir's civil administration in Acre, including chief religious officials, namely the mufti and the qadi. The mufti was the chief scholar among the ulama (Muslim scholarly community) and oversaw the interpretation of Islamic law in Zahir's realm. He was appointed by the Sublime Porte, but Zahir managed to maintain the same mufti for many years at a time in contrast with the typical Syrian province which saw its mufti replaced annually. Zahir directly appointed the qadi from Palestine's local ulama, but his judicial decisions had to be approved by the qadi of Sidon. Zahir had a chief imam, who in the last years of his rule was Ali ibn Khalid al-Shaabi. An agha was also appointed to supervise the customs payments made by the European merchants in Acre and Haifa.
  Zahir's initial military forces consisted of his Zaydani kinsmen and the local inhabitants of the areas he ruled. They numbered about 200 men in the early 1720s, but grew to about 1,500 in the early 1730s. During this early period of Zahir'
caption: Modern, artistic representation of Zahir in Acre, Ziad Daher Zedany
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