My theory on the sharp, left-to-right, transformations of intellectuals

I have written in Arabic about the sharp left-to-right ideological transformations of Arab intellectuals: I wrote in specifics about the cases of Sadiq `Al-Azm and Al-`Afif Al-Akhdar.  My theory is that you can trace the later transformations and shift of intellectuals by examining closely their early (leftist phase) writings.  I decided to apply it yesterday to the case of Fred Halliday and I came across this:  "The weakness of the left-wing political movements in the Arab world is at the ideological level related to the extremely dense and powerful cultural atmosphere of the Arab world"."  (From Israel and the Palestinians, edited by Davis, Mack, and Yuval-Davis, London: Ithaca Press, p. 164).  Aside from the racism of the statement he wrote it in 1975 when the Arab left was not even weak.