Are the Middle East Mullahs past and present responsible for the ill-affected minds of todays Arab people?

Question

...Westhill?...ur kidding right?...you seem educated...let's look at the root of their problems that seem to never go away. =MULLAHS

Answer 1

They're definitely capitalizing on the fervor of the religious extremists, absolutely!  

Just like the ridiculous Christian Fundamentalist preachers are ill-affecting the minds of so many well-meaning Americans.

My belief is that there are as many Middle Easterners who can see through the mullahs' bulls*** as there are Americans who aren't sending in their $9.95 for Miracle Holy Water (you do realize that if there's one American flag burning in Baghdad, every western camera is trained on it .)

Answer 2

Of course. Hassan al Banna and Sayyid Qutb in particular among others.

Answer 3

When people use terms such as "ill affected minds" I tend to think they already have their minds made up.

There are a lot of cultural and historal factors at work in the middle east. Let's not forget outside factors such as colonialism of the early to mid 20th century, the nationalist movements, the tension between secularism and religion,  the discovery of oil and all the positive and negative results from that, the instablity caused by the Palestinian problem, the wars with Israel, the civil war in Lebanon, the influence of non state actors including terrorists, the foreign occupations of the early 21st century.

To summarize, there's really a lot that goes in that region, that's not related to religion or the opinions of clerics.

Answer 4

Just think about it : you get a lot of poor, rather frustrated people who look for scapegoats.   Along comes the extremist variety of Mullah who preys on vulnerable people and what do you think happens?

Answer 5

They share a huge part of the repsonsibility for sure. Other issues such a traditional tribal conflict and attitudes also come into the picture.

Though the area has many modern "things", the level of education and the traditions of the region are still ancient.