Have you ever heard the phrase, the enemy of my enemy is my friend? It's a pretty simple saying that holds true across a lot of eras of history,

eras of warfare and conquest, of rulers vying for power of people trying to consolidate an empire, or to break one apart.

But perhaps at no time was it more true than during World War I. After Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in the summer of 1914,

Germany was quick to come to the defense of its ally Austro-Hungary. Serbia, meanwhile, called in their

friend Russia, who brought in both Britain and France and eventually the United States. And the big war

would prove again that if your friends could make or break

your success in battle, the same was true of your enemies. Across centuries of world history

leading up to the World War I, various groups had of course developed various grudges. For example,

the Russian Jews who had fled to the Middle East in the wake of pogroms, understandably hated

Russia, their former homeland,

so much so that they were very willing to jump in on the side of the Ottoman Empire in Germany.

And even countries that were allies on the surface were enemies in the grand scheme of things.

Britain and France, for example, both had different designs on claiming territory once the Ottoman Empire was carved up,

meaning they were both allies and also competitors.

They were basically frenemies.

But perhaps nobody embodied the enemy of my enemy is my friend more

than the hundreds of Arab families, tribes, and clans living across the Arabian Peninsula,

the land comprising modern-day Saudi Arabia,

Oman, Yemen, the UAE, Qatar, Iraq, Syria, Palestine, and Lebanon.

For centuries, they had been subjected to Ottoman rule, seen as second-class citizens,

more or less, good for paying taxes and running or working for various businesses, but not much

else. With the onset of World War I, however, they represented a unique possibility. The Ottoman

...