Middle Eastern History Quotes & Sayings

MOST OF THE NATIONS OF the Middle East can be divided into those with long histories and no oil, and those that have lots of oil and very little history. With a few notable exceptions, both groups share a common feature: they were cobbled together by outsiders. The borders of the modern Middle East were drawn by Europeans after the First World War with no regard for the interests or backgrounds of the people who inhabited it. — Richard Engel

'Reinventing the Bazaar,' by John McMillan, is a great and fun introduction to the wild variety and importance of markets throughout history and around the world. I finally understood how a Middle Eastern souk actually works economically and how to compare that to modern-day telecom-spectrum auctions. I love that book. — Adam Davidson

Will," she said, voice shaking.
"Yeah?"
"After this? Please don't break me."
I paused, searching her expression. She'd sounded scared, but her face was only hunger. "I won't. — Christina Lauren

Our economic competitors ... are eating us for lunch, and we can get in the game or not. We can be at the table, or we can be on the table. — Jennifer Granholm

Give me a black man, a white woman, a giraffe, a zebra anything but another white man! That last one f***ed up my roof! — Chris Rock

Each of the small enlightenments that a Zen practitioner has, which are known in Zen as "Satori experiences," provides deeper insights into the nature of existence and helps a person prepare for complete enlightenment. — Frederick Lenz

But we're going to smile and pretend we're fine with the dorky birthmas gifts because people do not get that they can't mush a birthday into christmas. — P.C. Cast

I never wanted to be commissioned to paint portraits. I like to choose my own subject and make a character study from it. — William Dobell

I understood from a very young age that school was important and that my parents were making great sacrifices for me. Every morning I saw my father get up and go to a job that he didn't really like. They came to France for the same reasons all immigrants move to another country - so their kids could have a better way of life. — Omar Sy

Intelligence is overrated by any species that has it, and that's provable by the fact that all intelligent species are outlived by a factor of a hundred to one, if not a thousand to one, by nonintelligent species, who don't have the brains or perversity to destroy themselves or their environments. — L.E. Modesitt Jr.

When I was 17, I came to the U.S. to study Middle Eastern history and politics at Columbia University. — Julia Bacha

There's a long history in the Middle East of "bread intifadas," starting with 1977 in Egypt, when Anwar Sadat tried to lift bread subsidies. People rebelled and poured into Tahrir Square, shouting slogans against the government just like they did earlier this year. Sadat learned his lesson and kept bread subsidies in place, and so did a host of other Middle Eastern dictators - many of whom were propped up for years by the West, partly through subsidized American wheat. — Annia Ciezadlo

Human beings are not simple. We are, in fact, quite complicated. In recent American history, we have engaged in such contradictions as owning slaves, while declaring all people to have equal rights, while heading to church to pray for peace and tranquility, while dropping bombs on Middle Eastern nations to secure the oil we need to fuel our vehicles in order to drive to church. We're a mess, and we have to count ourselves as part of the whole, because we're all complicit. — Nick Offerman

The whole scene made Dan think of American history tests, which were almost as scary as exploding museums. — Rick Riordan

Many countries in the Middle East are artificial creations. European colonialists drew their national borders in the nineteenth or twentieth century, often with little regard for local history and tradition, and their leaders have had to concoct outlandish myths in order to give citizens a sense of nationhood. Just the opposite is true of Iran. This is one of the world's oldest nations, heir to a tradition that reaches back thousands of years, to periods when great conquerors extended their rule across continents, poets and artists created works of exquisite beauty, and one of the world's most extraordinary religious traditions took root and flowered. — Stephen Kinzer