Concept
Arab nationalism (القومية العربية al-Qawmīya al-ʿArabīya) is a political ideology asserting that Arabs constitute a single nation. As a traditional nationalist ideology, it promotes Arab culture and civilization, celebrates Arab history, glorifies the Arabic language as well as Arabic literature, and calls for the rejuvenation of Arab society through total unification. It bases itself on the premise that the people of the Arab world — from the Atlantic Ocean to the Indian Ocean — constitute one nation bound together by a common identity: ethnicity, language, culture, history, geography, and politics. One of the primary goals of modern Arab nationalism is ridding the Arab world of influence from the Western world (seen as a "nemesis" of Arab strength), and the removal of those Arab governments that are considered to be dependent upon Western hegemony. This form of the ideology is rooted in the undesirable outcome of the Arab Revolt; in successfully achieving their primary goal of dissolving the Ottoman Empire, the Arab rebels simultaneously enabled the partitioning of their would-be unified Arab state by Western powers. Anti-Western sentiment grew as Arab nationalists centralized themselves around the newfound Palestine cause, promoting the view that Zionism posed an existential threat to the territorial integrity and political status quo of the entire region, and that the resulting Arab–Israeli conflict was directly linked to Western imperialism due to the British fostering of Jewish sovereignty. Arab unity was considered a necessary instrument to "restoring this lost part" of the nation, which in turn meant eliminating the "relics" of foreign colonialism. However, the ideology as a whole began to decline across the Arab world following the decisive Israeli victory in the Six-Day War. Notable personalities and groups that are associated with Arab nationalism include Faisal I of Iraq, Gamal Abdel Nasser, the Arab Nationalist Movement, Michel Aflaq, Muammar Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, the Palestine Liberation Organization, and the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party.
