The Arabian Gulf is not only  considered to be a geographical separation between two nations – the Arabs and the Persians – but it is, metaphorically, a sea of hatred that comes from one side of the sea to the other, that is, coming from the middle of Iran towards Arab nationalism. However, the Arabs, in the other side, have managed to stand against this hatred.  Hatred and conspiracy are no longer abstract concepts chanted by the Persian Ferdowsi in the “Shahnameh”, but have turned into endless wars, militarization and a sea of blood that almost floods the entire region.

The Iranian intellectual and cleric have founded the hatred of the Arabs in the conscience of the Iranian public, and have transformed it from a folklore perspective to the core of Persian nationalism. The Iranian intellectual has employed the written and oral literature throughout the ages to hate the Arabs- exclusively – describing him as a Bedouin lizard eater, who has dared to stand against the Sassanid civilization. And, what we see today as Iranian trial to destroy everything that is Arab in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen, and their attempt to jump on Bahrain is part of a long-established plan in the Iranian mind to fail the Arabs and move them back to the desert, or as they say – just nomads – are wandering.

Any fair person who reviews the publication of Persian literature, whether contemporary or modern, may find  that the Persian heritage is based on hatred of the Arab, and that his legacy is purely Persian. You cannot find hatred directed at the “Indian, Sindhi, Afghan, Georgian  or Uzbek” race. Only the Arab is “the stray and he is angry at him.” Some of them have not dared  to offense Islam, which happens to  be assigned to an Arab Prophet to deliver. On the other hand, we find that the Arab conflict with the Persians has ended with extending the Islamic conquests to Persia and including it under its banner, and you can hardly find in any Arab text – Amoy or Abbasi – that expresses the diminution or hatred of Iranians or other peoples.

Iranian thinker, and professor at the University of Tehran Sadegh Zibakalam explains the Iranian relationship with Arabs in a few lines, but it is surprisingly deep, saying: “I think many of us – meaning Iranians – whether they are religious or secular people hate Arabs. Unfortunately, too many of us are racist! If you look at the cultures of other peoples, pertaining the way they perceive other nationalities, peoples and ethnicities, and take the phenomenon of jokes as a measure, you will find that we are more offensive to others by mocking others. Ziba adds: “Many Iranian intellectuals hate Arabs, and many religious people are alienated from them, but this phenomenon is more widespread and lonely among Iranian intellectuals.”

The Iraqi thinker and researcher ” Ali al-Kash” identifies the reasons for the hatred for Arabs in Iranian society, as that it starts from the educated elite in the Iranian society and not from the ignorant and illiterate. Here lies the danger, that is, fearing the influential conscious,  not the ignorant and retarded.

He continues: What is interesting is the hatred of the elite of our clergy for us, the Iranians, even though they live among us, eat from our bounties, build palaces from our money, and control our spiritual abilities! Is it dualism,  populism, conspiracy, or a buried grudge?

The novelist Sadeq Chubak sees the “Arab” as hypocritical, senseless and savage, and considers that the “supreme hypocrisy” – relative to the Sami race – destroyed and defeated the Iranian self. He provides examples in his texts like: “You have to be careful in Basrah and take care of your things there. As soon as you look away, the Arabs will rob you. There are no worse thieves than the Arabs. ”

He does not depart from the legacy of the Shahnameh when he says in one of his writings ” The Patient Stone” lamenting the ancient Persian civilization: “How many writings have been obliterated? How many have been burned and destroyed by Arabs and Mongols? Where are the Sassanid writings? Where are Al-Bayhaqi’s writings? Where are the hundreds of other works whose names we don ‘t even know? The Arabs have not brought us anything, they have destroyed everything for us. ”

In “Shahnameh” itself, is a huge Persian epic made of sixty thousand houses, written by the Persian Abul-Qâsem Ferdowsi depicting the history of Persia from the mythical times until the time of the Islamic conquest and the fall of the Sasanian state in the middle of the seventh century AD. The Persian hatred for the Arabs has reached the point of protesting against the Holy Lord after the defeat of his Persian ancestors in front of the Arabs, saying: “the Arabs who drank camel milk, and ate the hyenas have aspired to obtain the crown of Khosrows. Oh! What an unjust lord. “

When we describe the Iranian-Persian conflict, then, we are not talking about the Persian public, hating the Arabs, but the intellectuals – secularists or clerics – who see the Arab race as an original enemy, destroying their historic opportunity to civilize among nations.

Many Iranian writers, especially contemporary ones, have targeted Arabs and have used the most hideous words and vocabulary when describing the Arabs. The most commonly used phrases revolve around these words: thieves,  bandits,  monsters, strangers, lizard eaters, intruders, destroyers, backward people without civilization,  coming from the desert, Arabs, savages, cruel, blood-thirsty, infected, filthy, ugly, and finally “black- skined.”       

However, the truth says that the Arabs have ruled the entire east for more than 600 years, starting with the mission of Muhammad in Medina and passing through the Umayyad and Abbasid states. They have established a pure Islamic civilization, and have not practised the eradication of other civilizations, but digested them and developed their own civilization. Indeed, they have been the leaders, and this has been their destiny that they have been created for. Haven’t they been the incubators of the message and its precision?!!