On watching the news, it seems that the Arab countries which now are protesting suffer variations of the same afflictions - undemocractic autocracies and lack of economic/education opportunities (the two of which may or may not be related).
The time is ripe for a panArab federation, in which the various Arab nations become states in a federation linked by a common language and religion. The existence of such a federation would give coherence to the opposition movements of countries which had not yet joined. The size of this federation would confer economic clout and dampen moves by individual nations towards chaos and self-destructive behaviors. An open border would solve the Palestinian problem as they could freely emigrate to areas with greater opportunity.
The question is who could lead up such a federation. Ideally it would be a member state which was already democratic and which was stable enough to serve as the fulcrum. Maybe Lebanon?-- bungston, Mar 30 2011 United Arab Republic http://en.wikipedia...nited_Arab_Republic [theircompetitor, Mar 31 2011] I agree with [21] - it's going to be tricky. I have only the vaguest grasp of the political geography out there, but my understanding is that the countries are far less cohesive (within themselves) than they are in, say Europe. This makes bolting them together even harder.-- MaxwellBuchanan, Mar 30 2011 /Then, tell me what advantages this would have over the Arab League./
Taken as a rhetorical question, I suppose some visionary might perceive deficiencies in his or her nation's own language or religion and so compel the nation to change, possibly for the better. This is not what the idea is about. The PanArab federation as proposed does not entail any such change for any prospective member, as they all are majority Muslim and all speak Arabic - this latter bit gives them the edge over the European union and even Canada where some people answer phones in French.-- bungston, Mar 30 2011 //The question is who could lead up such a federation.// Gamal Abdel Nasser and Saddam Hussein are the obvious candidates, but they're dead. So is Hafez al-Assad, but there's still his son Bashar.
(What I mean is, this sounds a lot like Pan-Arabism.)-- mouseposture, Mar 31 2011 Bin Laden's been looking for a new career for a while....-- xenzag, Mar 31 2011 //Bin Laden's been looking for a new career for a while....// Nothing new in the proposal, I think there's been calls for a United Caliphate for a long time now, Bin Ladin's been a strong voice in calling for exactly this. Ends/Means and all that.-- zen_tom, Mar 31 2011 this is hardly a new idea. And saying tat they can be united by a common language/religion is almost as insightful as say, saying that England and Northern Ireland can be united since they speak English and practice Christianity
On top of the major Sunni and Shia divisions, there are numerous Muslim sects, as well as Christians, Druze, Copts, etc.
As to language, the spoken dialects diverge pretty strongly, though off hand I'm not sure as to how far they diverge as compared to regional English accents.-- theircompetitor, Mar 31 2011 Silly Irish. Churchill should've just let Hitler have a go at them.-- RayfordSteele, Mar 31 2011 Do we want countries in the middle east to be a powerful and united force? Just throwing that out there.-- DIYMatt, Mar 31 2011 Whoa this thread doesn't make any sense at all. England and Northern Ireland are united, and the subsequent comment makes even less sense.-- rcarty, Mar 31 2011 <...adjusts [rcarty]'s irony detection antennae...>-- RayfordSteele, Mar 31 2011 Go for it. I'm willing to lead.
Sorry to tell you the news about the "Palestinian problem", as my Arab friend once told me: "Ya Sahbi! Look! Everybody hate the Jew. In the whole wide world who do everybody hate: The Jew. And everybody hate the Balestini. Even in Arabia Saudia and Kuweit who do they hate the most. The Palestini. And here we are together killing each other!-- pashute, Mar 31 2011 @ [DIYMatt]: No-- MikeD, Mar 31 2011 /countries in the middle east/ If there is concern for the ascendance of Iran, a political entity emphasizing arab vs nonarab (ie Persian) might be useful.-- bungston, Apr 01 2011 random, halfbakery