ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the multiple reactions to the Ottoman jihad fatwa across the British Empire. It argues that in order to gain a greater understanding of the wide reach and relative failure of the jihad among Muslims in multiple regions, it is necessary to examine the local circumstances in each territory that mitigated against the jihad, and pay attention to how these interlinked with broader imperial structures. The chapter shows that the call to jihad had a very wide reach, from the Sahel to the lakes of east-central Africa, to the Nile Valley and the mountains in Oman, to the Gangetic plain and the port cities of Peninsular Malaya. The Ottoman jihad was proclaimed on 14 November 1914 in Constantinople. It was announced by the Shaykh al-Islam, the highest-ranking religious scholar in the Ottoman Empire, and took the form of a fatwa, a learned interpretation of Islamic law.
