In the years leading up to World War I (1914–18; war in which Great Britain, France, the United States, and their allies defeated Germany, Austria-Hungary, and their allies), the Ottoman Empire (a vast Turkish empire of southwest Asia, northeast Africa, and southeast Europe that reigned from the thirteenth century to the early twentieth century) held control over much of what is known today as the Middle East. The modern nations of the Middle East were then territories within the empire, their populations...