FROM ARAB MIND TO ARAB MINDS

(For SoundCloud audio, scroll down)

Mark Twain once said, “All generalizations are false, including this one.” Well, I wonder what Twain would have made of Raphael Patai’s 1973 book, The Arab Mind—an audacious attempt to anatomize the psychological DNA of an entire region by offering a sweeping, all-encompassing portrait of the Arab world.

Patai proposed a bold thesis: that Arabs—from Morocco to Iraq, from tribal sheikhs in the Gulf to Cairo technocrats—were shaped by a single cultural code: one that prized honor over truth, shame over guilt, and appearance over substance. It was, in short, a one-size-fits-all user’s manual for the Arab psyche.

Patai’s thesis was, in many ways, the alter ego of what Arabists like Edward Said and Arab leaders like Gamal Abdel Nasser were saying at the time. Although, where Patai saw dysfunction in a singular Arab psyche, they saw dignity. Where he pointed to tribalism and stagnation, they spoke of unity and resistance.

Nasser dreamed of a pan-Arab umma—a unified Arab nation stretching across borders and ideologies. Edward Said, for his part, accused Western scholars like Patai of reducing the Arab world to caricature, feeding a colonial narrative that portrayed Arabs as exotic, irrational, and eternally “other.”

And yet, even as they fought Patai’s conclusions, both sides shared the same assumption: that the Arab world was one thing—one mind, one heritage, one culture, one destiny.

For decades, The Arab Mind quietly but persistently shaped U.S. military training manuals, diplomatic strategies, intelligence briefings, and Middle East policy assumptions. It became the go-to guide for Westerners trying to “understand” the Arab world.

But if Patai were writing today—this week, to be precise—he would have had to call his book The Arab Minds, in the plural. Because President Trump’s glitzy, headline-devouring state visit to Saudi Arabia—and other Gulf nations—has just buried the idea of a singular Arab “mind” for good.

This wasn’t a U.S.-Arab summit from the history books. No fiery speeches about Zionist conspiracies. No somber declarations of Arab unity. Instead, it was a who’s who of the Fortune 500, flown in to celebrate hundreds of billions of dollars in investment deals between the U.S. and its Arab allies. Artificial intelligence, military hardware, aerospace, healthcare, infrastructure—even a Saudi CubeSat hitching a ride on NASA’s Artemis II. This wasn’t pan-Arabism. It was pan-capitalism.

Although… Israel wasn’t invited. Cue the heartburn in Jerusalem. Why is Trump cozying up to the Saudis, the Qataris, even the Syrians—without us? Why is Israel being left out in the cold? But here’s the thing: it’s not a snub. It’s a setup. Because this trip—if you read between the lines—might just be the runway for some of the most unexpected Israeli breakthroughs since the Abraham Accords.

The winds are shifting. Trump’s announcement in Riyadh that U.S. sanctions on Syria are being lifted wasn’t merely symbolic—it was seismic. Suddenly, Syria isn’t a regional pariah—it’s back on the guest list. Trump’s declaration that “peace in the region requires a new approach” may sound like typical political varnish, but it is more likely a nod toward Israeli-Syrian dialogue, which Trump requested from Syria’s new leader. A year ago, that would have sounded like science fiction.

Even more significant is the growing Arab consensus that Hamas and the Houthis are not cherished symbols of resistance—instead, they are a strategic liability. The Saudis and the Emiratis are done with them. Egypt’s stance has shifted. And Qatar, the lifeline for Islamists, is feeling real pressure: either keep backing terror, or keep your seat at the global investment table. You can’t do both anymore.

And here’s the real shocker: there’s serious talk that the Muslim Brotherhood, long hailed as the great hope of pan-Arabism, is on the verge of official disavowal. Arab leaders are beginning to say—openly—that the Brotherhood isn’t the engine of Arab renewal, but the architect of regional chaos. The entire pan-Arab narrative, once held together by slogans and shared grievance, is starting to unravel.

So where does that leave Israel? Exactly where it should be—at the center of the new story. Israel is proof that a small country in a tough neighborhood can thrive when it refuses to dissolve its identity, no matter how intense the pressure to conform or collapse. In a region finally swapping ideology for pragmatism, Israel is no longer the outlier—it’s the blueprint.

So yes, it may have stung to be left off this week’s summit stage. But it wasn’t sidelining—it was positioning. What we witnessed wasn’t exclusion. It was groundwork. This is the slow construction of something much bigger than a photo op or a flashy deal.

The Arab world is no longer a monolith. It’s a collection of countries with diverging interests and evolving priorities—finally ready to let go of the imposed identities of the past and embrace something far more honest, and far more promising.

Which brings us, unexpectedly but powerfully, to Parshat Emor. After a long stretch of laws about priestly purity and sacred times, the narrative suddenly shifts. A fight breaks out in the Israelite camp. One of the men involved is described not by name, but by lineage: “The son of an Israelite woman—who was the son of an Egyptian man—went out among the Israelites…” (Lev. 24:10).

This man ends up blaspheming the Divine Name and is ultimately put to death. It’s a grim episode, but what’s striking is how the Torah frames it. His identity—half Israelite, half Egyptian—isn’t incidental. It’s the whole point.

Here is someone who couldn’t let go of Egypt. Even physically standing among the Israelites, he remained spiritually tethered to a different world. And that wasn’t just a personal issue—it was a national warning.

This wasn’t the only time in the wilderness that Egypt reappeared. Again and again, the Israelites looked back: “We remember the fish we ate in Egypt!” “Let’s appoint a leader and return to Egypt!” But that longing wasn’t innocent nostalgia. It was sabotage. A refusal to embrace a new identity, a new mission, and a different kind of future.

Seen this way, the man’s sin may not have been blasphemy in the narrow sense—it was symbolic. Blasphemy as an expression of identity confusion. Of clinging to something toxic that had already been discarded. He couldn’t break free of Egypt—and in the end, it broke him.

And isn’t that exactly the drama playing out in the Middle East today? For decades, Arab leaders—some sincerely, some cynically—held tight to inherited identities: pan-Arab unity, perpetual resistance, and victimhood. The old slogans were seductive. But they were also paralyzing. And now, slowly, country by country, those slogans are being replaced. With individualism. With trade. With technology, education, and ambition. It’s not perfect—but it’s facing forward.

Israel figured this out a long time ago. That’s why it’s still here. And that’s why it thrives. For all the turbulence of Jewish history, Israel refused to ever be shackled to ghosts of the past. It chose to move forward—to build, to innovate, to surge ahead. And now the Arab world stands at that same crossroads.

Those who choose to let go of their ideological Egypts—who move past Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the tired illusions of The Arab Mind—just might discover what Israel already knows: that real strength begins the moment you stop looking backward.