The problem is Islam. It is impossible to have a secular government in the ME that is NOT a harsh dictatorship, because Islam - which is as much a political as a religious system - is always seeking to take it over.
And as for corruption...the Islamic dictatorships are about the most corrupt you can have.
There are some civilizations that can’t handle a democratic form of government. It’s sad, but true. The survival of what we have here in America depends on the worldview, lawfulness, and due diligence of the people who live here. What we have here in America has traditionally been the rule of law through a representative form of government with guarantees on individual liberty through a supreme law, the Constitution.
Muslims will always have sharia as their supreme law. That means no guarantees of liberty and no rule of law.
It scares me to think of Islamic fundamentalists setting the Middle East on fire.