All memes and online racism aside, it's wrong to establish a British "hurr, they're brown, so they're retarded" view of the world. It only will hurt you in the long run, there are MANY MANY muslims and arabs that are wicked smart, the problem is that they are like the Irish, the few that are smart are VERY smart, but the vast vast majority are very stupid, and it doesn't help that since the Israelis destroyed the belief that is Arab nationalism in 1973, the larger arab world has pivoted to Islam to guide them. This means that an entire society is being groomed to unquestioningly listen to the masjid. At the worst, you end up with Afghanistan, where the leaders have a formal Western education and the rest can't fucking read. This is why Palestine doesn't exist as a state despite the world giving it everything. The problem is that if you have a tradition of anything that isn't a complete dictatorial rule, it never actually works. This is why Azerbaijan (although the soviets buck broke the stupidity out of them), Turkey, Bosnia, Iran, Albania, Indonesia, and Kosovo aren't complete messes. They lack the arab tribalism that Islam tends to promote. (which makes sense, it's an Arab supremacist faith). Remember, outside of Ottoman Turkey and Egypt, most of the lands were governed through a system of tribute (speaking in general terms), in most areas, as long as you did what the Sultan asked when he called upon you, the tribe ran the show.
Always remember the tiers of importance in the arab world. The most important is the family (extended family counts here), then comes the tribe, then comes the faith, then comes the state. Aka:
this scene
I don't like to compare things to movies, but Lawrence of Arabia really showcases this. In many ways, large portions of the Arab world haven't advanced.
The full movie is free on youtube, fucking watch it. 
