The End of the French Religious Protectorate in Jerusalem (1918-1924)

Abstract

In early 1924, last vestiges of the protectorate exercised by France for four centuries – and unbroken except for World War I – over the “Latin” Christians of the former Ottoman Empire disappeared. The era of the privileged French presence in Palestine and more specifically in Jerusalem – the seat of the most venerated Christian Holy Places – had come to a close. For French diplomacy, this failure signaled its ultimate defeat in the battle against the English begun as of late 1915 for the pos..