Though the article, What Every American Should Know About the Middle East (Daniel Miessler), has already done a decent job of summarizing Arabs, Islam and the Middle East, there’s still probably too much text, so here’s a summary of the summary.
- Arabs are an ethnic group.
- Iraqis are mostly Arab.
- Iranians are mostly Persian (another ethnic group).
- Afghans are Pashtun, Hazira, Uzbek or Tajik (also ethnic groups).
- Afghani is the unit of currency in Afghanistan.
- They speak Arabic in Iraq.
- They speak Farsi in Iran.
- They speak Pashto and Farsi in Afghanistan.
- Semitic refers to a set of languages.
- Arabic and Hebrew are both Semitic languages.
- Arabs can be any religion.
- Islam is a religion.
- Muslims are people of Islamic faith.
- Islam has two major sects, Shia and Sunni.
- Sunnis make up 90% of all Muslims.
- Muhammad is a prophet of Islam.