>>How do they build all that without the natural resources to do so?
They bought it. Using money, I would imagine. They got money by doing something that someone else wanted to purchase.
That’s my original point. Use non-Arab oil and starve the 7th century savages back into the 7th century. Without the oil money, there is no reason for anyone to care about them or the region. Without the oil money, they aren’t going to buy MiGs or F/A-18s or tanks or uranium. Without the oil money, they can buy and sell camels, screw sheep, eat figs, and kill each other with swords.