The island of
Cyprus is divided in three, the Greek-dominated
Principality of Cyprus, part of the Byzantine Empire; the Turk-dominated
Province of Cyprus, part of the Ottoman Empire; and finally the Phoenician-plurality
Crown Colony of Cyprus, part of the Kingdom of Britain. How did we get here?
Cyprus was part of the Byzantine Empire until the wars of the 1500s between it and the Ottoman Empire, which was hungering to take over more Byzantine lands after being frustrated in their attempts at taking parts of Greece or even the City itself. Britain was disinterested in helping Byzantium in this war due to being in an intense religious awakening that eclipsed their Romanitas attitude for a while. And the other European countries were, as a result of the "Problem of Two Emperors" and heavy Papal distrust of the Byzantines, heavily disinclined to help the Byzantine Empire. Hence the Ottomans successfully seized Cyprus in a war. Their control was irregular, and once or twice it fell to Byzantine hands. But ultimately it stuck in Ottoman hands until the Eastern War in the 1870s in which Britain seized Cyprus at the same time as the Byzantines retook Crete and several Aegean islands. Britain holding Cyprus made a lot of strategic sense for them, but the Byzantines distrusted this, seeing Cyprus as rightfully theirs.
Cyprus' Turkish minorities, growing due to Turkish settlement of the island and cultural conversion of some Northern Cypriots, and later by the fleeing of Turkish Cretans to Cyprus, increased the sectarian tensions. The Dog Days of the late 19th century was primarily caused by Egypt, but Cyprus' possession was also an argument, and indeed, you would see Greek and Turkish Cypriots argue in the British Parliament. Conservatives, due to being the party more amenable to Christians and Romanitas, would get Greek loyalty, while Turks would side with the more religious Liberal Democrats. The Dog Days was underlined by this bitter feud between Cypriot parliamentarians. However, do not assume this was reflective of the communities.
Indeed, before the 1950s, this was an island noted for strong cultural exchange and melding, with families regularly participating in Greek, Turkish and even Phoenician cultural customs and both Christian and Muslim religious observations. The British were more or less uninterested in stoking any religious strife, since they associated overt sectarianism with domestic division at home, at least in the Dog Days. Under Liberal governments, mosques were funded and more Cypriots identified as Turks, under Conservative governments, churches and Greeks. But more or less it was manageable and a strange sort of balance was found. Then after WWI, with both Byzantines and Ottomans unsatisfied by the outcome, they both funded nationalist movements in Cyprus, and hence created two ideas that would permanently divide the island -
enosis and
taksim.
Now, on the surface those ideas were simple.
Enosis argued that Cyprus was majority-Greek [which by
some readings yes, but remember the flexibility of identity] and should be a part of the Byzantine Empire, which was the natural home of Greeks.
Taksim was the response to that by Turks. They believed that Cyprus should be divided into two and the Northern half allowed to return to the Ottoman Empire, which they argued was the natural home of Turks, as the nation-state of all Turks. Both of those arguments had a certain appeal in the 1920s, and especially once the economy crashed in 1929. The people of Cyprus felt that they needed a change, and a lot of them blamed the British colony.
Hence Cypriot anti-colonialism was extremely coloured by the rhetoric of
enosis and
taksim. And the once cultural flexibility ossified as people more virulently identified as Greeks or Turks. However, there were those who felt more loyalty to Phoenician culture, the third and most marginalised culture in Cyprus. And with them were the families who felt themselves neutral in this growing divide. With Britain studiously avoiding favouring one religion or identity for too long, those people, the neutrals and Phoenicians, they argued for a third way. They argued for
mexrab.
Mexrab can only be understood by what it is a reaction against. To the neutrals and Phoenicians (the neutrals would eventually be absorbed into the Phoenicians), the rhetoric of
enosis threatened them as it argued for Cyprus to be explicitly identified as Greek and thus join the Byzantine Empire.
Enosis rejected comprehensively the very idea that you could be Greek and not want to join the Byzantine Empire. Hence it rejected the validity of the neutrals. Yet to them,
taksim was anathema.
Taksim's rhetoric was the same, and perhaps even worse, for
taksim identified only two communities in Cyprus, and defined the Turkish Cypriots by who they were not, namely Greeks. To the neutrals and Phoenicians, this was rejected immediately, and of course
taksim's argument about joining the Ottoman Empire, forget it.
So, what did
mexrab propose as a solution, to
enosis' joining the Byzantine Empire and
taksim's Ottoman Empire? It was a very simple solution, and one rooted in Britain's perceived neutrality. They wished to
continue the status quo of being a crown colony of Britain. The Phoenicians argued that instead of risky divisive ways, the continuation of local self-government and representation in the British Parliament worked well enough. And the British were able neutrals in the growing sectarian division (due to
their politics, but shh). And it did help the Phoenician case that while Liberal Democrats favoured Turks due to their religiosity and Conservatives Greeks due to their Romanitas, Labour favoured the Phoenicians due to their tendency to form considerable union organisation to resist discrimination and marginalisation in the workplace. So every now and then, the Phoenicians would get some funding their way from a Labour government, boosting their argument.
Now, was all of this merely the natural wish of the Phoenicians? Of course not! After the end of WWII, Cyprus started getting rowdy as nationalist sentiment grew,
enosis and
taksim flooded the airwaves, and sectarianism soared. The British government, by then dimly aware that there was a slice of Cypriot population supporting their continued control, funded them even more than Labour did in the past, and explicitly funded those advocating
mexrab. They were doing the exact same as the Byzantines did for
enosis and the Turks
taksim. As the Concord of Nations called for a Cyprus Convention to decide its future, the British were the loudest to demand Phoenician presence despite Byzantine and Ottoman scepticism. They knew the Phoenicians were the only community favourable to them, and they exploited it mercilessly.
The Cyprus Convention of 1959 was a mess, but it hammered out a three-community model under loose British suzerainty as the "Cypriot State". And all sides agreed that after 15 years, in 1974, there would be a referendum on its future. The Cypriot State honestly never had a chance. The Greek nationalists dominated the Greek community, the Turkish nationalists the Turkish, and the Phoenicians were too burnt by the past to give up
mexrab. The three Presidents regularly clashed, the religious fights intensified, and the British had to place soldiers there to maintain peace in 1970, which got outrage from the Byzantines and the Ottomans. To be fair, there were a lot of attacks on peaceful protesters from both Greek and Turkish communities, which poisoned the water further, and as the referendum approached,
nobody wanted the Cypriot State to survive.
The 1974 referendum was deceivingly simple. It had four choices. 1) Continue the Cypriot State. Only 4% of people voted for this. 2) Join the Byzantine Empire. This was
enosis, and it was voted by Greeks in a landslide, making up around 60% of the vote. 3) Split into Turkish and Greek slices. This was
taksim, and the Turks voted for it in a landslide, making up 24% of the total vote. And finally 4) Rejoin Britain as a Crown Colony. This one was the most bitterly opposed by Byzantines and Ottomans, of course, and was added without their knowledge by the British. It was
mexrab, and basically every voting Phoenician cast their vote for it, making up 12% of the vote. The map of the referendum was clear in its regional favouring. The North, tending Turkish, voted
taksim. The east, tending Phoenician, voted
mexrab. The rest, tending Greek, voted
enosis. As much as the Byzantines argued that 60% was a clear mandate, even the Concord of Nations rejected it fearing that it would lead to ethnic conflict.
Hence the present division which in a sense fulfilled
enosis,
taksim and
mexrab. The outcome would lead to decades of a frosty relationship between the British and the Byzantines, only healing with the wedding of the Byzantine Emperor with a British princess in 1991.
In recent times, there seems to be a fourth idea emerging, and this time in the British colony of Cyprus, that of
xismat.
Xismat is very much rooted in the idea of "Phoenician self-achievement", and argues that Lebanon is Phoenicia [it certainly is Phoenician-
majority in ethnicity, even if not in
language...] and that the Cypriot Phoenicians should seek to achieve union with the Lebanese, to form one "State of Phoenicia". It is not popular with elderly people, who perceive it as more a "Phoenician" version of the accursed
enosis or
taksim, and instead argue that being part of British rule is fine. However, due to a wave of youth support one of the Cypriot representatives to the British Senate is from the Phoenician Nationalist Union, or the Phalanx for short, and has certainly made waves as the latest headache from the island for British politics, following in a rich Cypriot tradition.