section_path: Regional history/Middle East
section_name: Middle East
paragraph_text: Middle East
  
  the Persian famine of 1870–1872 is believed to have caused the death of 1.5 million persons (20–25% of the population) in Persia (present-day Iran).
  
  In the early 20th century an Ottoman blockade of food being exported to Lebanon caused a famine which killed up to 450,000 Lebanese (about one-third of the population). The famine killed more people than the Lebanese Civil War. The blockade was caused by uprisings in the Syrian region of the Empire, including one which occurred in the 1860s which led to the massacre of thousands of Lebanese and Syrian by Ottoman Turks and local Druze.