Al Hamidiyah

Al Hamidiyah (Arabic: الحميدية‎) is a town on the coastal Syrian line about 3km from the Lebanese border. The town was founded in a very short time on direct orders from the Turkish Sultan ‘Abdu’l-Hamid II circa 1897, to serve as refuge for the Muslim Cretans, be they Muslim Greeks or Cretan Turks, who were forced to leave Crete when the island stop being a part of the Ottoman Empire. The town is home to about 8.000 people, with the majority still speaking Cretan Greek in their daily lives.