What is really the Levant for an Arabic speaker

Submitted by dhimmi no more (United States), Sep 14, 2014 at 11:17

Dr. Pipes

I understand what you are saying

However the word المشرق means this place that belongs to the East and in Arabic dictionaries it really means a place east of the Arabian peninsula

http://www.almaany.com/home.php?language=arabic&lang_name=%D8%B9%D8%B1%D8%A8%D9%8A&word=%D9%85%D8%B4%D8%B1%D9%82

So it really does not fit the definition of the Levant

And al-Mashriq the opposite of the word المغرب or al-Maghrib or the place that belongs to the West as in Morocco

Now here is what the word Levant in Arabic

1. الشرق or the East and i doubt very much that an Arab would associate such word with the Levant

2. بلاد الشرق or the countries of the East which I doubt that any Arabic speaker would associate it with the Levant I suspect such Arabic speaker would be thinking of Japan and China before thinkng about the Levant

3. Now we are left with بلاد الشام or Bilad al-Sham which as per Ibn Manzur and al-Mu3jam al-Waseet is really Damascus and Syria and Lebanon and Eastern Jordan and May be Israel but not the Negev desert

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