Yes, Mohamed, you have nailed most of the issues. Arab “leaders” have led through terror and discrimination and enriched themselves. Take the PLO, where leaders are rich and living off aid money from the west that has been stolen from those for whom it was intended. Where deep divides between versions of Israel slam continue to kill or oppress other versions of a so-called peaceful religion, but where Shia Sunni divisions reign supreme, where education is for the privileged few and women’s right don’t exist. In the Middle Ages Europe has similar disputes between religions and local political factions and the continent did not emerge as a world leader until that destructive devisiveness lessened. Destructive nationalism was stopped by war ( but tries constantly to reassert its destructive nature.

Look to the EU, where nationalism continues to separate nations. People don’t think themselves as westerners unless forced to in some comparison to another term. They are English or German or Portuguese, not westerners. To expect Arabs to think that they are better me people is a similar fallacy. We identify locally and/or tribally. In America we still talk about being Italian or Indian or Iraqi or Irish more often than American. When we travel we become American.

So, naturally, the idea of Arab is a modern identity ascribed to people who have more local identities by people who observe from the outside.