Mark Twain:
“Stirring scenes ... occur in the valley [Jezreel] no more.
“There is not a solitary village throughout its whole extent-not for thirty miles in either direction. There are two or three small clusters of Bedouin tents, but not a single permanent habitation.
“One may ride ten miles hereabouts and not see ten human beings.”
I noted that when I read what Twain wrote in “Innocents Abroad.” (It’s a free ebook that you can find online.)
The way he described it in the late 1860s was that the Middle East then was a poor, neglected province of the Ottoman Empire.
i was gonna post that quote from Twain if I could find it. g;ad you had it at hand.