The growth of Shia Islam in Lebanon stopped around the late thirteenth century, and subsequently Shia communities decreased in size.
Although the Jabal 'Amil enjoyed a degree of autonomy in the eighteenth century under the leader of the Ali al-Saghirs, Nasif al-Nassar, and the Arab leader of northern Palestine, Zahir al-Umar, this ended with the Ottoman appointment of Ahmad al-Jazzar as governor of Sidon province (1775-1804).