A source on politics, war, the Middle East, Arabic poetry, and art.
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
There is such sympathy for the Palestinians in this country. There is also interest in Arabic and in Arab affairs. I was told that there are some 900 students at the Department of Arabic at the International Islamic University here, and they use the same curricula used in Arab universities. I gave an Arabic lecture at the Usul Ad-Din Department at the university, and students' Arabic was quite advanced I noticed. In the Arab world: there is a bit of arrogance--even among Islamic-minded activists--toward non-Arab Muslims. How many Arab Muslims, for example, study Urdu or Persian or Turkish? I know that the comparison has to take into consideration the religious significance of the Arabic language, but the observation still holds, I think. Thus far, I have noticed that the Saudi government is quite unpopular here: people are generally opposed to the pro-US governments in the region (including their own).