Islam has set up a world-wide brotherhood and a Muslim finds himself at home almost everywhere. As mentioned already, Muslims have been great voyagers. The idea of divided and separate nationalities is for them a comparatively new and somewhat unfamiliar concept, restrictive and sometimes disturbing in its manifestations, and irksome in practice. A Muslim is, by instinct and outlook, more of an Internationalist, or rather a world citizen, than a nationalist.
Arab nationalism, which began to be nurtured in the period immediately preceding the first World War, and received a great fillip during the course of that war and in the post-war period, is a recent phenomenon. The policies and rivalries of the Colonial powers, which did not fail to influence Turkey; the Middle East mandates, followed by the partition of Palestine and the setting up of the State of Israel, are some of the factors that have served to invest Arab nationalism with an aura of permanence. Even so, it is a linguistic, cultural and regional rather than a strict national concept.