Middle Eastern Borders And The Middle East

The wars of the Middle East over the past one hundred year are very complicated. When the Ottoman Empire chooses the losing side in WWI, then France and Britain started drawing new borders to the region as a result of the Sykes Picot agreement. After WWII, the United States intervened its force to change the governments of countries in the Middle East. Now, the same behaviors have been continued by the major powers in the world for their own interests, as stated by Jeffrey D. Sachs, the special advisor to the Secretary General of the United Nations on the Millennium development

Often called “The Crossroads of the World”, the Middle East stands between three continents: Asia, Africa, and Europe. Over thousands of years, migrating traders and conquerors crossed this region and spread the ideas, inventions, and achievements of many civilizations. It is an incredibly important part of the world with rich history, important resources, and deep religious and cultural traditions. However, in the past decades up to today, the Middle East has been consumed by conflict and chaos. Although different circumstances surround each issue, religion, terrorism, disputes over the control of natural resources, and weak governance primarily allow conflict to persist in the Middle East.

The Middle East was under the control of the Ottoman Empire for many centuries. It was declining but still in control until World War 1. World War 1 impacted the modern Middle East a tremendous amount. Who controlled the Middle East changed because of oil, resources, and the relationships between Israelis and Palestinians also changed drastically.

During the war England promised all of these countries in the middle east region their own land and country to get them on their side. However, when the war ended the English realized how hard it would be to follow through on every promise so they just made a few countries grouping different types of people together. This will cause problems later in time because the people who were grouped together in these new countries did not want to be together since they can not identify with each other. This will cause these countries to receive a lot of pushing back from their people, wanting separate

All throughout history from the from the pre-modern period all the way to the contemporary period, there have been major events both inside and outside of the middle east that have had an impact on the middle eastern communities. While some were more drastic than others, they all had an impact one way or another that helped shape the society we know of today.

For much of the United States’ history, affairs in the Middle East have been an important focus. A more recent example is President Barack Obama attempting to deal with the terrorist organization, ISIS, because they are threatening the security of American allies. In the past, multiple other presidents have intervened in Middle Eastern affairs because they believe that doing so would be in the best interest of the United States. The importance of Middle Eastern affairs to the United States during the 1960s through the 1980s is apparent with President Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger’s diplomacy tactics to prevent Arab-Israeli war and lift the Arab oil embargo, President Jimmy Carter’s peace negotiations during the Camp David Accords,

On May 4, 1948, the Middle East changed as we knew it. Israel had become an official nation in the land where Palestinians once resided. Jewish people needed a place to reside after the persecution of over six million Jews. The British government, because it was in control of Palestine, allowed the Jewish people to reside in Palestine. This caused great tensions in the Middle East. In 1948-1949, there was a war between Israel and the Arab states. This war resulted in 700,000 Palestinian refugees. The Palestine-Israel conflict has been in effect since May 15, 1948. In 1967, Israel controlled 78% of what was Palestine, and the number is even higher today. (http://auphr.org/index.php/news/5100-palestinian-loss-of-land-1946-2012) Auphr (Americans

The Middle East is a region of Western Asia and Egypt; some of the countries in this region are Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Iraq. According to Anderson, Seibert & Wagner (2006), this region is of vast geo-economic importance and since ancient times, it has been a center of world affairs. This part matters to almost all superpowers. The geographic factors that contribute to the strategic importance of the Middle East are; trade routes, oil, terrain or geography, ideology, and faith. The Middle East has always been a destination for both tourists and entrepreneurs.

Over the past decade, wars and interventions in the Middle East have broken up existing states, fostered sectarianism and destroyed infrastructures, creating the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. After years of revolutionary upheaval, the Arab world 's old system is on the verge of collapse. The United States and other countries bear the blame for this emergence and growth of the indigenous movements like the Taliban, AL-Qaeda, and IS. Order in the Middle East has been undermined by corrupt and illegitimate governments, abundance of energy resources, inadequate educational systems, and various religion-related and secular problems. Outside action have added to the problems, from poorly drawn national borders to recent interventions. In

This was the primer to the large history of exploitation in the region. Many of the worlds superpowers sought to control the Middle East for it’s unique resources and pushed their agendas upon the citizens of the region. These ideologies did not always mesh well and created what would turn out to be a large pressure cooker that is still overflowing today. One of these factors was the redistribution of boundary lines. After World War One, with the fall of the Ottomans, the area was redrawn in order to distribute the former empire's territories. This was done mainly by the British and French, with a small Russian influence. The agreement was deemed the Sykes-Picot Agreement named after two of the gentlemen who structured the boundaries (Sorenson 20). This geopolitical reorganization took place without accounting for marginalized groups and regional differences. It focused instead on how to best spread regional “control” over the area between the French, British, and Russians. These boundaries still play a large role in our current day and age. The Islamic State has specifically stated that one of their goals is to destroy the boundaries set by this agreement (Daily

Following the events of World War II, the Middle East region of the world became a focal point for the United States. From natural resources, like oil, to world politics, this part of the world has been a hot-bed of activity since 1945. World Wars Impact The first main issue in the Middle East began as World War I came to a close.

The Middle East as a whole is not viewed in a very bright light within the United States, and Iran is no exception. Many Americans view that Iran and it 's people are full of hatred for the U.S. and that they all have the same ideology and hatred that their government has shown. What Americans don 't know is that this is not the case. Many Iranians are oppressed and resent their government, though they won 't outright say it for fear. There are Iranians who resent the U.S. as well, but those Iranians dislike U.S. not because of religion or any other cliche reason that many Americans would believe. The only thing Americans see and hear is what the news and government has to say regarding Iran. This American viewpoint stemmed from the 1979 Iranian Revolution in which the U.S. favored shah was overthrown and the U.S. consulate was attacked. This made it seem as if the Iranians were irrational and bloodthirsty against the West for no reason, but they had a very good reason for being filled with anger.

The Modern Middle East that most scholars know of today didn’t just come to be overnight, but rather decades worth of events during the 19th century such as WWI helping form the modern Middle East we know of currently. WWI specifically left a political impact to be exact on the political landscape leading to new beginnings and taking away old ones while the 19th century in general led to economic and social changes as well as political changes.

The Middle East has been filled with conflict since the middle ages. The conflicts mainly have to do with religion and land. Today, those conflicts matter to most of the world because of our dependency on the Middle East for oil. An important conflict that is going on today is between Israel and the Arab nations that surround it. It is actually not just one conflict, but a series of conflicts that have happened since Israel became a nation for the second time.

World War I ended in 1918, although the vanquishment of the Ottoman Empire on behalf of the Allies—especially that of Europe—has led to a domino effect from which the Middle East still hasn't and probably will never bounce back. The fate of the Middle East inevitably fell into the hands of the Europeans—chiefly that of Great Britain and France. Because of the dismantled state of the economy and government the Middle East became a breeding ground for imperialism with Great Britain and France at the forefront. Nevertheless, one can see that the effects of the Sykes-Picot agreement and the Mandate System resulted in the European imperialistic mindset which laid the foundation of the modern Middle East’s problems.