Arabian culture is much different than Western when it comes to interpreting events. For example, in the aftermath of the six-day war in 1967, many Arab believed that it was not the tiny state of Israel that defeated them, but a vast American force that suddenly appeared and vanquished the Arabs, and then disappeared. It was about that time that the world learned what Israelis have known for a long time; Arabs and their governments tend to favor self-destructive policies. Western nations have generally ignored this madness or excused each instance as a momentary lapse in good judgment. But this bad behavior has spawned Islamic terrorism and sustains it.

Many Arabs believe what al Qaeda preaches, that the world should be ruled by an Islamic religious dictatorship, and that this must be achieved by any means necessary. This sort of thinking has been popular with Islamic conservatives since Islam first appeared in the sixth century. Since then, it has periodically flared up into major outbreaks of religious inspired violence. But that’s not the only problem. Arabs, in particular, sustain these outbursts with their fondness for paranoid fantasies and an exaggerated sense of persecution and entitlement. For example, most Arabs believe that the September 11, 2001, attacks were not carried out by Arabs, but were a CIA scam, to provide an excuse for the West to make war on Islam. That’s just the tip of the iceberg. U.S. troops in Iraq were amazed at the number of fantastical beliefs that were accepted as reality there. Then there is the corruption and intense hatred. It’s a very volatile and unpredictable part of the world, and always has been.

For centuries, the West was shielded from this problem because the Ottoman Turks ruled most of the Arabs. Western diplomats often heard the Turks complain about their Arab subjects. A favorite quip among the Turks was, one should not involve oneself with the affairs of the Arabs. Then, when World War I, and the Ottoman Empire, ended in 1918, Western nations found themselves temporarily in charge of these former Turkish Arab provinces. Before World War II broke out in 1939, most of these Arab provinces were turned into separate states. These new countries were not stable. After World War II began, for example, Iraq attempted to ally itself with Nazi Germany. Arabs admired the Nazi attitudes towards Jews. Britain could not afford to have a Nazi ally sitting on their major source of oil and gathered together a few divisions and invaded. Three weeks later, Iraq was conquered, and a more agreeable group of Iraqis were found to run the place for the rest of the war.

After World War II, there were problems in several Arab states, most of them involving reformers who turned out to be dictators, once they took over from the ruling traditionalists who were less efficient dictators, for the most part. Then there was Israel, where Arabs had been demonstrating the religious intolerance, they have long been infamous for. Around the same time, Saudi Arabia was explaining to Western oil workers why the long list of lifestyle rules for foreigners, as in no non-Moslem houses of worship, restrictions on the dress and activities of women was necessary, and mandatory on pain of death.