French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon Army of the Levant and had helped it against the Arab nationalist uprisings. As in Al-Jazira Province, the French authorities refused to grant any autonomy status to the Golan Circassians. French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon The Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon (; "") (1923−1946) was a League of Nations mandate founded after the First World War and the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire concerning Syria and Lebanon. The mandate system was supposed to differ from colonialism, with the governing country acting as a trustee until the inhabitants would be able to stand on their own. At that
Lebanon–Syria relations French territorial mandate. France identified itself as a protector of Christians (in particular Maronites) throughout the region. To protect its power, France aimed to encourage “existing religious, ethnic, and regional differences within Syria”. Political unity would threaten France’s military and political establishment within Greater Syria. These divisions included the 1920 creation of Greater Lebanon as a mandate separate from Syria. France ensured that the largest religious group within newly created Lebanon was the Maronite Christians. The remainder of Syria (while titled as a unified Syrian state) was further divided into 5 separate political entities (State of Damascus, State of Aleppo,