Your Favorite Middle Eastern Country?

[Mingle]

From around 900-1200 AD, it was considered North Africa, basically an extension of Tunisia.

But some people would say Tunisia isn't even a ME nation.

Frankly I think Turkey should not be on the list.

Tunisia is in the Maghreb not ME. Even including Egypt in the ME is stretching it.

[Lafaur]

Me likes the cedar-worshipping country and the 'lil Jewish playground

[Dandelion]

Culturally Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Turkey and Iran.

[MinervaItalica]

Iran (top) plus: Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. Mostly because their rich history.

From around 900-1200 AD, it was considered North Africa, basically an extension of Tunisia.

But some people would say Tunisia isn't even a ME nation.

Frankly I think Turkey should not be on the list.

Tunisia has always been an extension of Europe, a colony of Europeans especially Siculo-Normans, French and Italian. It's probably the whitest among the North African countries thx to these colonists.

[Dandelion]

Hahah no chance you cross the borders between Lebanon & Israel except if you want to be killed ;-)
Id suggest to don’t have a stamp of Israel in your passport either (but I think they give a paper now and no stamp), you’d be expelled from Lebanon straightfully
With Arab stamps on your passport to go to Israel will depend of your luck.
I have a friend who has been to Israel twice with a French passport, he is ethnic European and Christian, he has been «harassed by Israeli customs because he had a Turkish stamp (not even Arab) in his passport... it has been really complicated for him

Israeli Arabs also have that problem. They can't enter Lebanon even if they wanted to. There's one YT'er, a Christian Arab woman, but she's banned from Lebanon. And as a normal person she has Hebrew-speaking Israeli friends.
Politics is different from people of course, though it affect most people in how they treat each other regardless.

She lives in Italy now, married to an Italian. Has a YT channel about the Arabic language.

https://www.youtube.com/user/LearnArabicwithMaha

[MsSPF]

I think Egypt is mostly associated with the Middle East because of geopolitical reasons going back to the time when it was part of the United Arab Republic. So including Egypt in the Middle East is probably something that started in the 1960's or so. Either way, I don't think Egypt should be grouped with the ME and should instead be grouped with other North African countries. Its one of the reasons I prefer the term West Asia, its less ambigious.

No discussion, we agree on that, Egypt is indeed a North African country and not a West Asian one but it definitely share culturally & even geographically strong affinities with the Levant region & Arabian Peninsula. Middle East is, like you said, mostly a geopolitical & cultural term,a region where there are strong cultural/historical/economic bonds. I don't think it should be associated only to West Asia, the word is not related to a continent. Honestly, Egypt is way closer to SouthWest Asia culturally speaking than Maghreb so it makes sense to me, so Egypt is, in my opinion, really0 a Middle Eastern country. Maghreb is really isolated when it comes to the cultural aspects,it's a "world" in its own! Tunisia,like you have said it in another post, is defininetely not a Middle Eastern country for example

[Borealis]

I wouldn’t consider Turkey to be ME but since is on the list then i vote for Turkey and Egypt

Why do so many people here think they can just come up with their own personal geographic definitions smh...

[Dandelion]

Egypt is borderline Middle Eastern a bit like the Southern Caucasus is (Armenians and Azerbaijani especially; both heavily Persian-influenced, the latter even Turkic and with a large Azeri community in Iran). Somehow I would consider Egypt closer to the Middle East culturally.

[Joso]

Israel, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt

[Mingle]

No discussion, we agree on that, Egypt is indeed a North African country and not a West Asian one but it definitely share culturally & even geographically strong affinities with the Levant region & Arabian Peninsula. Middle East is, like you said, mostly a geopolitical & cultural term,a region where there are strong cultural/historical/economic bonds. I don't think it should be associated only to West Asia, the word is not related to a continent. Honestly, Egypt is way closer to SouthWest Asia culturally speaking than Maghreb so it makes sense to me, so Egypt is, in my opinion, really0 a Middle Eastern country. Maghreb is really isolated when it comes to the cultural aspects,it's a "world" in its own! Tunisia,like you have said it in another post, is defininetely not a Middle Eastern country for example

Egypt is closer to Asian Arab countries than to other African Arab countries, but it has almost nothing in common with non-Arab Asian countries, but instead sharing more with Sudan and Libya. Am Egyptian even told me he doesn't consider Libya part of the Maghreb before (even though it is part of the Maghreb) cause it was very similar to Egypt. But I guess if Egypt is gonna be included, I can see why the northern Middle East is sometimes considered a separate region from the southern ME.