Darya Melekhova on Vesti.FM: a family is a core of the Arab society

A core that holds the whole Arab society together is a family, analyst of Vestnik Kavkaza Darya Melekhova said in the National Question program on Vesti FM. Today's program was dedicated to Saudi Arabia and its relations with the United States.

Darya Melekhova said that Arabs is one of the most numerous and constantly growing groups of the population on the Earth. "This nation was formed in the Arabian Peninsula. In a historically short period, it captured vast territories in Western Asia and North Africa. The term ‘Arabs’ was used to refer to Bedouin nomads of northern Arabia as early as in the 9th century BC."

She noted that, although the early history of the Arab culture was associated with the Arabian Peninsula, today the population of the Arab world has no common origin, because, for many centuries, many people arabized, mainly through Islam in the Middle East and North Africa.

Darya Melekhova pointed out, that Arabs is the dominant population in Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Sudan and Tunisia. ”Today, almost 430 million people live in the countries of the Arab world, 416 million of whom are Arabs. Several million Arabs live outside the Arab world - in Europe, America, Australia, and the Arab communities are constantly growing. This is what contributes to the spread of Islam in the economically developed Western countries,’’ the analyst of Vestnik Kavkaza said.

According to the expert, there are significant elements of the general Arab culture manifested in everyday life, traditions and spiritual life, but at the same time, the cultural characteristics of individual Arab peoples are very noticeable. “Today, the population of Arab countries can be divided into three main groups: nomads and semi-nomads, rural people and urban dwellers. The Bedouins, who are also desert dwellers, freely crossed the state borders during their migrations and, therefore, were closer to each other than the settled population of various Arab countries ", Darya Melekhova said.

“The Arab community is built on the basis of a clan affiliation, where the individual is subordinated to the interests of the family, clan and entire tribe. The family relations and family traditions is a core that permeates the entire Arab society,” the analyst of Vestnik Kavkaza emphasized.