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This work is focused on the Halachic Approach of Rabbi Moshe Chalfon HaCohen from Djerbah. Rabbi Moshe Chalfon HaCohen was born in 1874 and died 1950. He was appointed Chief Rabbi of Djerbah, an island near Tunisia, in 1935, and is considered to have been one of the greatest rabbis of North Africa, particularly of Tunisia and Djerbah. With the French occupation of Tunisia in 1881, French culture, technological innovations and modernity penetrated the community. All of these affected life in Djerbah and the rabbis, including Rabbi Chalfon, needed to relate to this new situation. This research deals with two of Rabbi Chalfon’s essays dealing with Halachic responsa: “Brit Kehuna” – a compilation of the Halachic responsa and customs of the Jewish community in Djerbah, and “Shoel Venishal,” a book of Halachic responsa which deals with questions and his answers. Among other aspects, this research shows Rabbi Chalfon's unique emphasis on the humane aspects of Halacha and his ability to utilize them versus formal considerations.

The tower-fortress on the Oman Peninsula have always been a mystery to archeologists. A total of 15 tower-houses have been excavated or surveyed by archeologists in the past decades and yet their purpose inside the settlements is still poorly understood. This thesis analyzes and evaluates the existing theories about the tower-houses and offers an alternative theory by taking into account the locations, sizes and construction techniques of these buildings, using the survey and excavation rapports. The origins of the tower-fortresses can be found as early as the end of the fourth millennium B.C., when the settlement pattern on the Oman Peninsula shifts from the coast to the hinterland. The shift from the coast to the oasis brought a diversification of resources as well as a tighter appropriation of space. Combined with an increase in the copper trade at the beginning of the third millennium, this induced more complexity in the social system. The form of social organization which emerged on the Oman Peninsula due to these factors, was one which was in a liminal stage between a chiefdom and a state society, called a stratified non-state society. The tower-fortress of the Oman Peninsula functioned in such a society as dwellings and locus of regional power of a particular family or moiety. The few towers that have been excavated show many similarities, such as: he positioning of the towers within the settlements, the usage of a platform on which the towers rest, the interior of the platform consisting of two rows of chambers divided by a corridor or well, the ditches surrounding the towers and thus separating them from the rest of the settlement, the fact that all of the towers could only have been accessed by a ramp, etc. All of these similarities indicate specialization and one has to wonder if the possibility exists of a specialized class of tower-builders, travelling from settlement to settlement

There are thousands of burial monuments in the Sultanate of Oman. Despite some gaps in the cairn sequence, they are among the most consistent evidence of the human occupation between the third millennium B.C.E. and the seventh century C.E. For this reason, they have been used as a proxy for researching the ancient communities that inhabited these territories. Unfortunately, the majority of the extant studies have failed to develop comprehensive and systematic analyses of these tombs. The cause of the current situation is the absence of efficient methods to detect and record the burials. Traditional archaeological surveys cannot provide quantitative data for analysis of large areas. At the same time, the visual interpretation of satellite images is extremely time-consuming and cannot address the changes in archaeological data that have happened during the last decade. Recent developments in remote sensing have aimed to replicate the operation of visual interpretation automatically using computer power. This application has the potential to overcome the issues of the current methodologies used for the detection of the burial monuments of Oman. This project aims to develop an efficient method to detect and record the burial monuments of Oman automatically. This approach allows for the limits of visual interpretation to be overcome and thus to fully exploit the quality and quantity of satellite images currently available. Furthermore, this thesis seeks to go beyond the simple detection of the burials, developing a process aimed at automatically digitalising the tombs. This will allow for the extraction of morphological information that, together with the geographical position of the remains, will allow for the burials to be dated. As a consequence, it will be possible to create rich datasets of tombs suitable for use in addressing current archaeological issues. Furthermore, the automation will also greatly assist in monitoring the status of the remains over time. This is necessary due to ongoing developments and looting activities that threaten the preservation of the tombs. The study and preservation of the burial monuments are indeed urgent issues for the archaeology of the Middle East

This thesis focusses on Hafit tombs (3200-2500 BC) in the Wadi Suq and Wadi al-Jizzi regions of the Sultanate of Oman. The main research question proposed is whether existing theories on the Hafit period can explain the distribution pattern present in the study area. In order to answer this question, four sub-questions were created exploring: the general distribution of the tombs, the orientation of the tombs and the correlation between the tombs, visibility and the dry river beds also known as wadis. Each of the sub-questions was answered by applying different tools in ArcGis on the dataset provided by the Wadi al-Jizzi Archaeological Project. Regarding the overall distribution of the tombs, it can be concluded that significant sites with large numbers of Hafit tombs are primarily located around the Wadi Suq, instead of the larger Wadi al-Jizzi and that all the Hafit cemeteries seem to have been located more closely to the area known as the Lower Batinah than towards the mountains. The analysis also revealed that the tombs at Site 43 seem to be clustered like Late Prehistoric Tombs (LTPs), which are of a post-Hafit date. The orientation of the tombs seemed initially clearly focused towards the north-east/south-west and east-west. This coincides with the variation in the azimuth of the sunrise between the months of June and September for the Sohar region. However, a site-to-site comparison displayed a more nuanced picture. The orientation of the tombs at S6 and S58 are evenly distributed, suggesting that they might have been constructed in a later phase of the Hafit period. The analyses in the current thesis also displayed that at the threshold of 1500 meters all tombs in the study area correlate to a wadi system. Interestingly, all of the tombs are clearly visible from the wadi system, despite the different distances to a wadi. This thesis concludes that current theories are unsatisfactory to explain the distribution of Hafit tombs in the study area and that more research is needed in this regard. Not only to improve existing theories or add new ones, but also to determine whether the patterns discussed in this thesis are unique for the study area or are also visible in other parts of the Oman peninsula.

This thesis examines the Ibadi nahda of 1913 through an Islamic Modernist framing to show links between the Ibadi revival and a wider pan-Islamist and anti-colonial moment. The main focus are the writings of Nur al-Din al-Salimi (d. 1914) and Abu Muslim al-Bahlani (d. 1920), two luminaries and revolutionaries of the Ibadi revival movement. An 'episodic discourse' model of ideology production is used to relate the social and material conditions of turn of the century colonial Zanzibar and Oman to modernist religious discourse.

THE MEDITERRANEAN DOMINATION AND OTTOMAN NAVAL POWER IN EARLY MODERN AGE (1578-1645) The Mediterranean witnessed a clash for domination between two equally powerful empires during most of the 16th century. The last sign of this competition was re-conquest of Tunisia in 1574 by Ottomans. After that date, due to the alteration on the political and economic conditions, on the one hand, Habsburg Empire directed its interest across the ocean, Ottomans had to fight against the Safavids for many years, on the other. This remarkable shift in politics doesn’t mean the end of the struggles. The states commenced to follow new policies and the Ottoman struggles in the Mediterranean went hand in hand with the status quo of the time. In the thesis, the Ottoman naval power is analyzed in terms of the concepts of domination and naval power in early modern times and a fresh look tries to be settled for the Ottoman struggles on the Mediterranean between 1578 and 1645.

Giriş kısmından sonra, İbadiye'nin kaynakları hakkında bilgi veriliyor. İbadiye'nin doğuşu, görüşleri, devlet anlayışı, imâmet görüşü. İbadiye'nin itikadî görüşleri, imân, ru'yetullah ve murtekibu'l-kebîre konuları tedkîk edilerek tez, umûmî bir "Netice" son bulmaktadır.

Nous avons abordé cette étude avec l'intention de montrer que l'architecture bioclimatique durable est inspirée et réinterprète les éléments fondateurs de l'architecture vernaculaire de Djerba dans ce cas dans la conception actuelle. Dans ce cas, l'architecture vernaculaire de Djerba n'était pas seulement une source d'inspiration mais aussi une étape dans la compréhension et la conception d'une architecture bioclimatique contemporaine. Notre approche a été d'abord de prendre en compte les principes de la construction vernaculaire Djerbienne et, plus tard, de montrer que nous pouvons les utiliser en présentant le lien qui peut unir cette architecture à l'architecture bioclimatique. La ville entière est construite de façon à prendre en considération les matériaux, de l'environnement et de la composition des maisons et des bâtiments avec l'environnement. En effet, ce lien permet d'intégrer les spécificités de l'architecture vernaculaire de Djerba dans un mode de vie contemporain adapté aux besoins de l'habitant à partir d'un savoir-faire nourri du passé pour innover et ne pas stagner. Cependant, si nous voulons aujourd'hui construire une architecture respectueuse de son environnement, il est nécessaire de mettre en évidence le lieu, le climat et les caractéristiques de l'environnement. En d'autres termes, comprendre les particularités de l'architecture vernaculaire de ce pays puis les adapter dans des constructions contemporaines pour trouver des solutions issues du savoir-faire acquis à partir d'expériences que nous souhaitons renouveler. En conséquence, nous avons montré que les caractéristiques utilisées dans la construction vernaculaire de Djerba pourraient bien représenter une véritable leçon pour la construction d'un habitat bioclimatique autour du monde.

Ce présent travail se penche sur l’Histoire du peuplement et de la gestion des ressources naturelles, ainsi que de l’organisation territoriale de l’île de Djerba entre le XIIe et le XVIe siècle, au travers des sources médiévales et modernes musulmanes et latines. Il sera mesuré l’impact des événements historiques et de l’environnement sur le paysage insulaire, comment elle façonne les spécificités de Djerba, et son insertion dans l’espace méditerranéen.

During the twelfth century, the Mediterranean Sea contained a complex array of economic, political, military, religious, and social networks. My dissertation explores the relationship of two dynasties that were at the center of these networks: the Norman lords of Sicily and the Zirid emirs of Ifriqiya (roughly modern-day Tunisia, eastern Algeria, and western Libya) in the years leading up to the Norman conquest of Zirid lands and the formation of the Norman Kingdom of Africa (1148-1160). Previous scholarship, particularly work written by French colonial historians, has emphasized the triumph of the Christian Normans over their Muslim foes and disregarded the agency of the Zirids. I show that the medieval sources tell a different story. Latin and Arabic texts attest to the importance of the Zirid emirs of Ifriqiya to larger networks in the Mediterranean. In 1123, for example, the Zirid emir al-Hasan ibn ‘Ali united a group of Arab and Berber (indigenous North African) tribes to defeat the navy of the Norman lord Roger II. Several years later, al-Hasan ibn ‘Ali formed an alliance with the Almoravids of Morocco to raid cities along the coast of Sicily. Zirid power in Ifriqiya only waned in the wake of a decade-long drought, which allowed the opportunistic Normans to seize Zirid lands. The Normans under Roger II and his son William I ruled the coastline of Ifriqiya for twelve years, during which time they made small changes to its society that favored Christians over Muslims while occasionally proclaiming themselves “King of Africa.” Arabic chroniclers writing about the Norman conquest of Ifriqiya did not acknowledge the legitimacy of the Normans’ kingship in Ifriqiya and instead presented the Normans as one prong of a Mediterranean-wide “Frankish” assault upon the lands of Islam, one that warranted jihad on all fronts.