Sanjak of Alexandretta

Asia portal The Sanjak of Alexandretta (Arabic: لواء الإسكندرونة, romanized: Liwa' Al-Iskandarūna; Turkish: İskenderun Sancağı; French: Sandjak d'Alexandrette) was a sanjak of the Mandate of Syria composed of two qadaas of the former Aleppo Vilayet (Alexandretta and Antioch, now İskenderun and Antakya).

It became autonomous under Article 7 of the 1921 Treaty of Ankara: "A special administrative regime shall be established for the district of Alexandretta.

[3] The 1936 elections in the sanjak returned two MPs favoring the independence of Syria from France, and this prompted communal riots as well as passionate articles in the Turkish and Syrian press.

Under its new statute, the sanjak became 'distinct but not separated' from the French Mandate of Syria on the diplomatic level, linked to both France and Turkey for defence matters.

The president Tayfur Sökmen was a member of Turkish parliament elected in 1935 (representing Antalya Province) and the prime minister Dr. Abdurrahman Melek, was also elected to the Turkish parliament (representing Gaziantep Province) in 1939 while still holding the prime-ministerial post.

Map showing the states of the French Occupation (Mandate) from 1921 to 1922
Reglement Organique of the Sandjak of Alexandretta, within the State of Syria, 14 May 1930
Turkish forces under Colonel Şükrü Kanatlı entering İskenderun on July 5, 1938.
Protests in Damascus by women demonstrators against Turkey's annexation of the Sanjak of Alexandretta in 1939. One of the signs reads: "Our blood is sacrificed for the Syrian Arab Sanjak."