The project of Hejaz railway construction : a historical and historiographic review

Abstract

One of the last attempts to raise the prestige of the Ottoman caliphate during the reign of Abdul Hamid II was the initiative of the Sultan in the construction of the Hejaz railway, which was to provide an easier and a faster access for pilgrims to the shrines of Mecca and Medina. At the end of the 19th century, as well as during several previous centuries, the main link between the Ottoman administration and the Hejaz residents were the gifts and the donations from the Sultan of the Caliph to religious figures, the sheikhs of the tribes and the population of sacred cities. Of course, such a grandiose construction could aggravate the financial debts of the Ottoman Empire, but, according to preliminary calculations, the road had to pay off, and besides, to glorify Abdul Hamid II. In this regard, the goals and the objectives of this study are to analyze the official ideology of the Ottoman Empire and ideological projects implemented in practice during the reign of Sultan Abdul Hamid II in the form of influence on the social-political situation in the Ottoman Empire, as well as the influence of Islamic unity ideas on Muslims embodied in practice by the carrying out the propaganda campaign for the implementation of the Hijaz railway construction project.