ABSTRACT
Sultan Abdulhamid II sought to strengthen his European alliances, forging closer ties with the new unified Germany of Kaiser Wilhelm II. In Ottoman eyes, Germany's new status as a major European power usefully balanced Britain, France, and Russia, with their longstanding imperialist agendas. Under Abdulhamid II, the Ottoman Red Crescent Society became part of a policy to maintain the sultan's image as guardian of the Islamic umma and Muslim tradition on one hand, while presenting him as a progressive and modern European monarch on the other. The broad category of Islamic revivalism in the nineteenth century was a 'resistance' revivalism promoted by Muslim leaders resisting European colonial expansion, typified by the struggles of Abd al-Qadir and Imam Shamil. Parallel to the emergence of nationalist and religious ideologies in the mainstream of Ottoman politics, the nineteenth century also witnessed the rise of popular Islamic religious revival movements on the margins of the Ottoman Empire.
