Arabs do not care much about the borders between other Arab states. The Arab revolt was never about Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia or the UAE. It was about the
Arab revolt. The aim and expectation was a united Arab state, this is why pan-Arabism as an ideology grew strongly after the formation of all these states.
Jordan might just as well be part of Syria, or Iraq (which it was for 1 year) or Saudi Arabia. Iraq's borders with Syria make no sense as the people in Deir al Zour speak the Iraqi dialect and are the same people as the people in Anbar. The borders between Saudi Arabia and Iraq are artificial, they are drawn and agreed upon. That makes the border artificial, not the nation which remains Arab.
Arab regions all have their differences in dialect, people's looks and sub cultures, that doesn't take away the general culture and linguistic traits that bind them together as Arab peoples.
There never was a reason for 22 Arab states other than to ensure division, small countries that do not grow too powerful and it makes it easier to intervene. People here like to call the countries fake, as if we belong to non-Arab neighbors whilst we are Arabs.
An example is the Saudi-Iraq neutral zone dispute. Disputes between all these states were mainly about political ideologies, the people do not differ that much from one another from right across the border.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Arabian–Iraqi_neutral_zone
When people dispute the 'realness' of these countries, they always tend to suggest for division based on sectarian or ethnic lines which would not make the nation any more 'real'. They never suggest for unification based on the Arab identity as that is a very negative development for neighboring countries.
A fine post.
My point was
precisely that these artificial divisions should be wiped out and those 'nations' re-united.
Unfortunately, I find myself in typical fashion agreeing with two exactly opposed points of view. I find that I agree with
@Philosopher on the one hand, and with
@camelguy on the other.
On the one hand, there are still deeply divisive characteristics of different groups of Arab-speaking people.
@Philosopher is right in contending that as it is, it is difficult and unreasonable to contemplate a united Arab state; it has also been argued in another post that one of the reasons for lack of unifying impulse among Arab-speaking people is the differences in administrative and legal systems among different Arab 'countries', that if they were, like the EU, all of the same type (the reference is to representative democracy; the same type of tribal monarchy would not succeed), it would be easier to combine.
On the other hand, I deeply sympathise, coming from the country that I do, with the point of view of
@camelguy that using these differences to suggest that separate nations should exist is the work of those who wish to divide and keep divided the Arab-speaking people. In my country, even within a linguistic bloc, there are differences in the spoken language that forms the bloc, and in food types, in dress and clothing, in religious festivals followed (even within the same majority Hindu religion) and in almost every possible cultural index. For instance, in Karnataka, that was formed to unite all Kannada (in English, Canarese) speakers, there is a deep gulf between the Kannada spoken in the old Mysore state, and the Kannada spoken by those regions united with Mysore but earlier administered under Bombay. The food changes almost every hundred kilometres. And this is the situation in one of the most cohesive language blocs. The same is true of many others, and sometimes across national borders. My own language Bengali shares roots in the ancient Magadhi Prakrit, a descendant of the language of the Vedas, with Nepali, spoken in Nepal, Maithil, spoken in one northern section of the state of Bihar, Assamese, spoken in Assam, and Odiya, spoken in the state of Odisha. Even within Bengali, from the south-east of the state of West Bengal, proceeding in a straight line across Bangladesh to the Cachar region of the state of Assam, the language itself changes, from 'standard' Bengali spoken in West Bengal (this definition as 'standard' is bitterly opposed by Bangladeshis), to the language of the central Bangladeshi section, the Dhaka dialect, to the Sylheti of the north-east corner of Bangladesh on to the neighboring Assamese language.
I envy Iran for the firm unity that the Iranian language and its variations bring, although it was not possible to check my amusement at the rebellious murmur of the post that invited Iranians to live for even one day as Azeris. Even in that case, Tajikistan is separate, after all, and it is widely understood and agreed that Tajik is a bona fide branch of Iranian. As is Azeri, for that matter.
I hope that Arab-speaking groups will find their way forward to unification, in an Arab state with very many equally-empowered provinces, somewhat in the fashion of India herself, and I hope that the natural ties among Iranian-speakers improve and deepen with the years.
