Environment
The #1 environmental problem in this region.
What is water (and associated desertification)?
TFR is generally ____________ in countries with oil and __________ in other countries.
What is low and high?
Belief in one god.
What is monotheism?
Name of the two Palestinian territories.
What is Gaza strip and West bank.
Proportion of the world's proven petroleum reserves in this region (+/-1%).
What is 69%?
Major problem with soils in this region.
What is salinization?
The mean population density in this region skews the picture because there is a large _______________ in population density here.
What is imbalance or unevenness (with most people living in high density settlements near water and almost no one in deserts)?
World’s most carefully planned and energy-efficient city in the world (built as a demonstration project)?
What is Masdar City (near Abu Dhabi, UAE)?
Name of group that seized power in Gaza strip in 2007.
What is Hamas?
OPEC stands for ________________________.
What is Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries?
International organization formed in 1960 that attempts to influence the global prices and supplies of oil. OPEC does NOT control global oil and gas prices but does influence the cost and availability of these key products.
What are earthquakes?
This area is known as the _____________ crescent.
What is fertile?
Book of teachings received by Muhammad from Allah which for Muslims represents God’s highest religious and moral revelations.
What is the Quran?
Name the country whose highlands supply more than 85 percent of the water that flows into the Nile River and who is arguing it has the right to utilize its natural resources to address widespread poverty.
Who is Ethiopia?
Built Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam to the consternation of Egypt who depends on the Nile for most of its freshwater (drinking + ag).
Proportion of Saudi Arabia's workers who are foreign born.
What is more than 75%?
They don't see benefits of oil production. Large inequalities.
What is an exotic river?
Three elements of city structure.
What are 1) Medina (walled urban core) 2) Central Mosque 3) Bazaar (Suq)?
Traditional Middle Eastern Architectural Element that allows for passive cooling (environment adaptation) and privacy (religious adaptation).
What is a mashrabiya or mashrabiyya?
Series of protests and uprisings in late 2010 and early 2011 after self immolation of a merchant and which challenged some of the Middle East and North Africa’s entrenched dictatorships. Starts in Tunisia but spreads to Egypt, Yemen, Lybia, Syria, Bahrain.
What is the Arab Spring?
A system of government in which priests rule in the name of God or a god.
What is a theocracy? Ex: Iran.
Two of the four unintended consequences of Egypt building the Aswan High Dam on the Nile in the 70s.
What are: 1) Reliance on fertilizer (no more flooding of banks). 2) Increased salinization (no more flushing of fields). 3) Med fishing industry collapse at Nile Delta (area previously nourished by river's nutrients) 4) Schistosomiasis (snail fever explodes because river no longer flushed).
Pros: generate electricity and provide reliable water supply year round
Two environmental adaptations for city structure.
What are narrow streets and white buildings?
Branch of Islam that advocates passing down power through established clergy.
What is Sunni branch of Islam?
Shiites, favored passing on religious authority within Muhammad’s family. Predominant branch in Iran and Iraq, rest of the region mostly Sunni.
Fallout from Arab spring.
What is Arab Winter (growing instability in the region except for Tunisia and somewhat Lybia where some political rights and civil liberties have improved post Arab Spring).
Rallying cry of “women, life, freedom” was first chanted in ______________ to protest the death of ___________________ at the hands of the morality police.
What is Iran and Mahsa Amini?