CURRENT TOPICS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXX, Issue 70, 27 June 1916, Page 5

CURRENT TOPICS.

There is great good news coneariiiJig the progress of the Italian operations in the Trentino. It is no less than the complete defeat of the Austrian*, who have been driven back in the Trentino out of all the conquered positions. Tins is not too good to be true, but one hardly expected such a turning of the tables. In face of the'tremendous so tained shock that the Austrians »re getting from the Eussians, there stems little doubt that the Trentino forces have been weakened, a fact of which our Allies, the Italians, have Ukea immediate advantage. The Russian advance—the Cossacks are now in Austrian soil, having entered Tramyiviinm —is bound to be more far-reaching in its effect on the general situation of the war as time flies, for this is only some of the first fruits of the victories of the soldiers of the Czar. Vienna is feeling the squeeze of the Russian vice only now, and her attempts to minimise the defeat of the Austrians are futile. The statement that General von Pflanzer made no serious attempt to stay, the onward march ot the'Russians, and that he was content to' reiii-e to tup fastnesses of the CarIfci is so thin that, few "of their ow ; £]poople will be taken in by it for very long, ,',|.. ; ....',.. , : Jr ,, ~! ;. ; ;;

The over-night cables brought a somewhat unpleasant report in the advance of the Germans in a desperate attempt to break the French line; in fact, that the enemy had inserted a wedge between the two main French positions, causing the French to evacuate Thiaumont. Now to-day's news does not bear put the. above, the High Commissioner stating that attacks west of Thiaumont were repulsed. However; the net gain .by the enemy h not very great, being only -700 yards, but it is disquieting to a certain degree to know that the Germans are in such strength as to.be able to gradually, beat-back the French, j as theyiare*doing. sFleury, to which;the enemy in the flush of his success pressed- ;onj ;omly to meet with defeat,,;is about 'three.! miles west by south of VatHtFortr The map does not show that'Fort de Souville is the last but one dri the right bank of the Meuse as the cables state, for following the semi-cirle of fortifications round Verdun, we come across Fort de Tavannes, Fort de Mouvanville, and Fort de Belfrupt. The last-named is south of the ruined town, while similarly situated in the north is Fort de Belleville, both of which would be of little service in defence of Verdun once the enemy got so close up. There is no doubt the Crown Prince's determined assault was the outcome of the deliberations of the German War Council the other day, at which the Kaiser is stated to have allowed his ideas to be overrulled regarding the plan of operations. But there was nothing new about the assault. JT was the usual (or rather unususffl) artillery blast (we are told it simply, rained shells for fifty hours), followed by the usual infantry attack when the countryside had been blown to blazes and human existence in the devastated places was out of the question. We have yet to learn at what cost in German flesh and blood the enemy captured those 700 yards. The Indian Moslems are reported to be intensely interested in the operations of the Grand Sherif and the Arabs in instituting the independent e of Arabia. The temporal power of Islam is to them a sacred thing, small though it is compared to the days twelve hundred years ago when it had every appearance of becoming the dominant power in Western Europe. In 732 the title of Islamism turned, and the Moslems were forced to retreat across the Pyrenees. The conquest of Granada by the Spaniards in 1492 drove the Moslems finally across the Straits of Gibraltar into Morocco. The /title caliph, calif, or kalif is a western f> form of the Arabic khalifa, meaning £t "a successor." The title was assumed and borne by the consecutive rulers of Islam as "successors" of their great prophet; and hence the term "califate" or "caliphate" became applied to this supreme office, and in a wider sense to the whole empire of the califs. After the death of Mohammed in the year 632, his place as ruler and spiritual guide of Islam wap at once filled by the father of his wife Ayesha, Abu-Bekr, who, by the prophet's own choice was recognised as better qualified than any other to be the first "successor.- • ■c

Abu-Bekr's short reign (632-634) was marked by tlie extension of the bounds of Islam. Khalid, surnamed the 'Sword of Allah,' Abu-Bekr's greatest general, carried the Moslem warriors to victory again and again, in their battles with the Persians in the east, and against the Romans (636) under Heraclius in Syria. By tlie year. 642 the conquest of Persia was. complete; and as early as 6518 Omar, Abu-Bekr's successor, had founded the two cities of Basra (Bussorah) and Kufa, in tho Euphrates valley. Damascus, Antioch, and Jerusalem had all been surrended by the Romans in 636, and Syria had become wholly Moslem two years later. The conquest of Egypt, begun in 610, was achieved in the following year. Thus, when Omar perished by the hand of an assassin, in 644, the Arab dominion had extended to the Nile and the Levant on the west, and to the farthest limits of Persia on the east. Moreover, the faith had been widely promulgated, and fourteen hundred mosques founded. Nor had Omar been neglectful of internal administration, one notable act of statemanship having bpen his establishment of a 'diwan' or exchequer) by which it was arranged that the past and future spoils ■ of the victorious Moslems should be systematically divided among the conquering race. •He is further remembered as the first of the califs who bore the title of 'Commander of the Faithful'; and it was he who instituted the ' chronological system which begins with the Hejira. The next calif, Othman, reigned from 644 to 656; and he was succeeded in turn by Ali (656-661), who made the new city of Kufa, on the Euphrates, his capital.

The accession of Moawiya I. to the califate in 661 marks the .beginning of the hereditary period, and led directly to the great schfsm in the Mohaddedan, >yorld which persists, to the present day—viz.' the Sunmtes, who recognise and obey the line of the califs as history determined them, and the Shiites, or those (e.g. the Persians) who consider that the califate helonged legimately to the family of Ali. Hitherto the califs, although autocrats, had been the nominees of an oligarchy. But in the person of Moawiya began the dynasty of the Ommayads, or Ommiades, who reigned till 750. During this period the -Vlosion empire was extended :iorth-*astwarcl across the Oxus, Afghanistan and Baluchistan being also included within its borders. Not only did the whole of the north African coast provinces, from the Nile to the Atlantic, fill under the sway of the califate, but a further advance northwavJ into Europe was made. In the reign of Walic! I. Spain fell wholly under Arab dominion; and pushing still farther north, they over-ran Southern and Central France. Then the tide turned