Middle Eastern Culture Quotes

The Turks were a great nation even before they adopted the Muslim religion…The religion founded by Muhammad was based on a policy of setting Arab nationalism above all other nationalisms.

I'm an immigrant. I'm from the Middle East.

I don't go to these places where there are belly dancers and this and that.

I've been on camels before, lumbering slowly through the desert - not hugely exciting, but I enjoyed the 'Lawrence of Arabia' vibe.

My dad was a brilliant civil engineer. My parents later divorced, but we lived in Abu Dhabi, Greece, Kuwait.

Americans don't know a lot about the Middle East - [they] don't know we laugh.

I was proud my father spoke Arabic fluently - his father sent him to learn Arabic from a sheikh - and we had Arab friends. His task of understanding the Arabs - not only politics but poetry - was very important; he took it as a vocation.

But Saudi Arabia is surprising in a lot of ways. Like any place, or any people, it relentlessly defies easy categorization.

I've got many letters from Muslim organizations thanking me for making 'Kingdom of Heaven.'

I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries.

In 2003, as a 21-year-old convert to Islam, I moved from Colorado to Cairo to see what life was like in a Muslim country.

I grew up in Cyprus and Egypt, these fantastic places I remember fondly.

I do fairly represent Middle Eastern women.

[Arabs are] a people, whom it is dangerous to provoke, and fruitless to attack.

… the invariable Oriental custom of demanding more than is expected

My dad was working abroad, in Iraq, and he was a doctor. We used to go and visit him, in Baghdad, off and on. For the first ten years of my life, we used to go backwards and forwards to Baghdad, so that was quite amazing. I spent a lot of time traveling around the Middle East.

A fascinating book and a great pleasure to read: Betool Khedairi is a talented new voice in fiction.

Once upon a time, my mother lived in the posh downtown of Homs, Syria. She described my grandfather as a king in a storybook, atop a horse, wearing a didashah and pointing a long arm.

Your stereotypical L.A. Persian kids were not working at Sbarro pizza in the mall, but I was.

'Butterfly Mosque' came out of the emails I wrote to family and friends back home after moving to Egypt.

There are certain comforts of living here in Dubai, the comforts of so many mosques and so much good food... It's just that much more secure. And may God keep it safe.

I was amazed to realize that for many Westerners, Scheherezade was considered a lovely but simple-minded entertainer, someone who relates innocuous tales and dresses fabulously. In our part of the world, Scheherezade is perceived as a courageous heroine and is one of our rare female mythological figures.

I was raised in a very Middle Eastern household, and modesty was very important, and dressing to not be desirable or provocative was very important.

Arabic is very twisting, very beautiful. The call to prayer is quite haunting; it almost makes you a believer on the spot.

Can-do Americans courageously go about their duty in Iraq - mostly unafraid that a culture of 2,000 years, the reality of geography, the sheer forces of language and religion, the propaganda of state-run Arab media and the cynicism of the liberal West are all stacked against them.