History UsefulNotes / ArabWorld

Also note that many Arab countries have minority ethnic groups that speak different languages. The biggest are the Kurds of Iraq and Syria, followed by the Imazighen of Algeria and Morocco. Religion is also an enduring issue; although most Arabs are Muslims, there are significant populations of Arabs who follow different religions, including Christianity and Druze. In fact, Lebanon was a Christian country until its civil war and still hosts the largest percentage of Christians in any Arab country.

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While the countries of the Arab world all speak Arabic, their dialects are NOT mutually intelligible. The Arabic language is an example of a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialect_continuum dialect continuum]], in that the closer two dialects are, the more likely they are mutually intelligible, and vice versa. There are somewhere around 25 dialects, many of which are very different to each other. In far-flung areas, the dialects are actually more divergent than different languages in Europe (e.g. Moroccan Arabic is utterly incomprehensible to Egyptians, much more than German is to the Dutch). The official unifying language of Arabs is a register called Modern Standard Arabic, but its usage lies in writing and official publications; it is ''never'' used for day-to-day communication, which can be a real pain for foreigners. The unofficial unifying language is Egyptian Arabic because of the country's reputation as an entertainment powerhouse; most Arabs understand the dialect thanks to the dozens of soap operas and films Egypt churns out every year.

The Arab world is often divided into two big regions by the Arabs themselves: the Mashriq, meaning "East" (Egypt, Sudan, the Fertile Crescent minus UsefulNotes/{{Israel}} and the Arabian Peninsula), and the Maghreb, meaning "West" (consisting of the Western Sahara/Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, Morocco, Libya, Algeria, Tunisia and Mauritania).[[note]]The line that separates the Mashriqi and Maghrebi worlds is usually construed to be located somewhere in Egypt, a bit west of Alexandria.[[/note]] The Mashriq, specifically the Arabian Peninsula, is the cradle of Arabs and the Arabic language, whose standard register developed there.[[note]]Modern Standard Arabic is based on Classical Arabic, a highly antiquated language spoken in the peninsula during the 7th century CE, when Literature/TheQuran was composed.[[/note]] The Maghreb, meanwhile, is distinguished by its history as the homeland of the indigenous Imazighen people; most people there can trace their roots back to ethnic Amazighs.

To describe the Arab world, one must first describe the Arabs themselves. The Arabs are, simply put, people who speak the Arabic language and adhere to Arab culture and traditions. Taken together, Arabs constitute the world's second largest ethnic group, after the Han Chinese. However, the Arabs are at the same time also a heterogeneous people. Many Arabs prefer to identify themselves based on their local region first before a unified Arab identity, which is not surprising, considering the size of their population and settlement. The fact that there are many Arab countries is a testament to this.[[note]]Of course, [[DivideAndConquer political interference by European colonials]] was a major factor as well, but even leaving it out, many historians and ethnologists have argued that a unified state encompassing the ''entirety'' of the Arab world will simply not work, as the various short-lived all-encompassing caliphates could testify.[[/note]] Like the Han Chinese, the Arabs started out in a relatively small area of settlement and expanded it through conquest, intermarriage, and assimilation, transforming many other formerly unrelated ethnic groups in the Middle East and North Africa into Arabs.

->'''Capitals''': Sana'a (''de jure under the SPC control''), Aden (temporary capital)[[note]]Yemen has been mired in civil war since 2015. The UN-backed government was forced to retreat from the capital Sana'a and relocate many times, with the president himself living in exile in Saudi Arabia. The government is technically based in Aden, but the city has been under the control of the Southern Transitional Council, which nominally sides with the government but has agendas of its own, since 2019.[[/note]]

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* UsefulNotes/EgyptiansWithEagleFighters (Egyptian military)

* UsefulNotes/SaudisWithSabers (Saudi Arabian military)

* UsefulNotes/WarriorsOfDesertWinds (Jordanian Army)

* UsefulNotes/{{Palestine}} (UN observer state, de jure independent country, occupied by Israel)[[note]]The Palestinian National Authority exercises limited self-rule over the West Bank, which has been occupied by Israel since 1965. Both the PNA and Israel have little say in the Gaza Strip since the Hamas group took over the territory in 2007.[[/note]]

* [[UsefulNotes/ModernEgypt Egypt]] (part of both North Africa and Western Asia, though mostly located in North Africa)

* UsefulNotes/{{Egypt}} (part of both North Africa and Western Asia, though mostly located in North Africa)

->'''Capitals''': Sana'a (''de jure''), Aden (provisional)[[note]]Yemen has been mired in civil war since 2015. The UN-backed government was forced to retreat from the capital Sana'a and relocate many times, with the president himself living in exile in Saudi Arabia. The government is technically based in Aden, but the city has been under the control of the Southern Transitional Council, which nominally sides with the government but has agendas of its own, since 2019.[[/note]]

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->'''Largest City''': Gaza City[[note]]As with the rest of the Gaza Strip, the PNA and Israel have little say in the administration of the Gaza Strip after the 2007 Hamas takeover.[[/note]]

* UsefulNotes/{{Palestine}} (UN observer state, de jure independent country, occupied by Israel)[[note]]The Palestinian National Authority has limited self-rule over the West Bank, which has been occupied by Israel since 1965. Both the PLA and Israel have little say in the Gaza Strip since the Hamas group took over the territory in 2007.[[/note]]
->'''Proclaimed Capital''': Jerusalem[[note]]As with the West Bank, the PLA has limited self-rule over East Jerusalem since the Six-Day War. West Jerusalem has been under Israeli control since the Arab-Israeli conflict first erupted in 1948.[[/note]]

->'''Largest City''': Gaza City[[note]]As with the rest of the Gaza Strip, the PLA and Israel have little say in the administration of the Gaza Strip after the 2007 Hamas takeover.[[/note]]

->'''Capitals''': Sana'a (''de jure''), Ataq (provisional)

* [[UsefulNotes/ThatDryPatchOfLandUnrecognized Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic]] (Western Sahara) (de facto independent country, claimed by Morocco)
->'''Capitals''': Laayoune (claimed), Tifariti (''de facto'')

!!!East Africa (honorary member)

* UsefulNotes/{{Palestine}} (UN observer state, de jure independent country, occupied by Israel)
->'''Proclaimed Capital''': Jerusalem

->'''Largest City''': Gaza City

The Arab world is often divided into two big regions by the Arabs themselves: the Mashriq, meaning "East" (Egypt, Sudan, the Fertile Crescent minus UsefulNotes/{{Israel}} and the Arabian Peninsula), and the Maghreb, meaning "West" (consisting of the Western Sahara/Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, Morocco, Libya, Algeria, Tunisia and Mauritania).[[note]]The line that separates the Mashriqi and Maghrebi worlds is usually construed to be located somewhere in Egypt, a bit west of Alexandria.[[/note]] The Mashriq, specifically the Arabian Peninsula, is the cradle of Arabs and the Arabic language, whose standard register developed there.[[note]]Modern Standard Arabic is based on Classical Arabic, a highly antiquated language spoken in the peninsula during the 7th century CE, when Literature/TheQuran was composed.[[/note]] The Maghreb, meanwhile, is distinguished by its history as the homeland of the indigenous Berber people; most people there can trace their roots back to ethnic Berbers.

Also note that many Arab countries have minority ethnic groups that speak different languages. The biggest are the Kurds of Iraq and Syria, followed by the Berbers of Algeria and Morocco. Religion is also an enduring issue; although most Arabs are Muslims, there are significant populations of Arabs who follow different religions, including Christianity and Druze. In fact, Lebanon was a Christian country until its civil war and still hosts the largest percentage of Christians in any Arab country.

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