The program also included construction in the countryside. Late in 1926, the Nansen Office set out to build agricultural communities for the Armenian refugees. Initially, some thirty farming families were installed in southern Lebanon, on an estate known as Ras ul-Ain that had once belonged to Sultan Abdülhamid and was later taken over by the Lebanese government. This first attempt ended in failure. In 1927, Burnier and his staff redirected their efforts toward the purchase of several tracts of land, many of them in the sanjak of Alexandretta, where they set up small farming communities in 1927-1928:54
• Nor Zeytun (sanjak of Alexandretta). Formerly known as Ikiz Köpru, near the village of Bitias, in the Jebel Musa. This tract of around 1500 acres was purchased in August 1927 for £200. By 1929, one hundred sixty peasants, most of them from Zeytun, had settled in this village.
• Sug-Su (sanjak of Alexandretta). This lot of some 250 acres (eight thousand dunams), lying two-and-a-half miles from Kirikhan, was purchased for £1,450. In 1929, around two hundred Armenians, a majority of whom were natives of Dört-yol, settled here. Read all
The Building of Armenian Neighborhoods in Syria and Lebanon