Middle East

From dKosopedia

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The Middle East is the imprecisely defined region of the world located approximately at the connection between Africa, Asia and Europe and several contiguous countries in which Arab culture is dominant. The historic birthplace of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, along with their variants, including small populations of Samaritans, Druze, Ismailis, Yazidis and others, it is home to a host of holy sites for each religion as well the antiquities of the ancient Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Persian and Hellenistic civilizations. Already arid, centuries of ecologial mismanagement have turned vast stretches of the region into waste land unable to sustain even dry land agriculture.

Political elites in the United States and the second tier world powers consider the region important because of its concentration of enormous high quality oil deposits. These are located in Saudia Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Algeria and Libya. Local political elites and some external constituencies also consider important the region's concentration of tourist attracting archaelogical and religious sites, especially those in Egypt, Israel, Palestine, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Enormous economic rents are generated by the oil deposits and tourism, and additional economic rents are generated in the form of foreign miltiary and economic aid given in response to the pathologial ethno-national outbidding of elites in the region. The lure of economic rents generates zero-sum struggles for power over the resources waged by constantly upping the ante of radical demands and moralistic denunciation.

The United States and Israel are currently engaged in wars of counter-insurgency much like that that France lost in Algeria.

Criticism of the term

Many scholars consider the term Middle East (and Near Eastern) to be the product of Orientalist and Eurocentric thought, especially considering the phrase is often used to refer exclusively to the Arab world. As such, many non-Arab peoples from the region are opposed to the usage of this phrase.