Associations for the Defense of Rights

Associations for the Defense of Rights, patriotic league formed in Anatolia and in Thrace in 1918, after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I. Its purposes were to defend Turkey against foreign occupation and to preserve its territorial integrity, and it served as the political instrument of the Turkish struggle for independence (1918–22). The league was actually a coalition of middle-class organizations, composed of town notables, ulama (men of religious learning), landlords,...