Al Hamidiyah (or al-Hamidiyya) (Arabic: الحميدية‎) is a Cretan Greek town on the Syrian coast, about 3 km from the Lebanese border. It is the only settlement in Syria that is wholly Greek. The town was founded in a very short time on the direct orders of the Ottoman Sultan ‘Abdu’l-Hamid II around 1897, to serve as a refuge for the Muslim Cretans, often referred to as Cretan Turks are Greek speaking Muslims of Ottoman Greek convert origin.