Poverty makes the poor peacefull , that the attacking Islam- ists coincidce with prosperity is no coincidence.
I suggest no one gave a serious sh*t about the Arabs until they had something others wanted. In the 1700's they controlled the Mediterranean, and exacted a toll on shipping from merchantmen. This was in many ways similar to to the duties exacted by the Spanish, French , English and Dutch on goods sent to the colonies.
In the 1900's, the Arabs had oil and of course, they inhabited the area between the UK and India, and therefore some potential control over trade along that route. The discovery of oil and the strategic position came first.. the prosperity came as a result of these possessions. The Brits and the French assumed that they could simply take over from the Ottomans and assume the role as colonial overlords, but they did not understand the Arabs as well as the Turks had, and the Arabs never liked Turkish rule anyway.
I agree with MT that the main reason for hostility between the Arabs is the colonial attitude of superiority that gave the British the idea that their new ownership of the colonies gave them the right to buy, sell or give away whatever they had in those colonies without consulting the locals. They took the oil and paid a relative pittance for it (it was of no use to a sheik, as a racing camel was) and they took a chunk of Palestine and gave it to the Zionists because of what they had learned in Sunday School about how the Hebrews were legitimate Chosen People and the Arabs were descended from Ishmael, one of history's more prominent bastards.
