[muawiyah]

If it's Iran pushing anything they're behind reorganizing the ME and Near East as a Persian Empire. If it's the Arabs, they are after a Caliphate (their term for the same thing only it's looser with more warlords 'cause that's what they do). If it's the Turks they want a tax farm so they call it an empire but move the capital to wherever they are!

Each of these groups assumes it is superior to the others and of greater worth. Right in the middle there are the Kurds ~ Salaldin took over the Empire after the Turks had softened it up subtantially. He was a Kurd yet he did nothing for his peeps ~ just left them hanging in the breeze.

[bert]

——they are after a Caliphate——

You assume Arab homogeneity that doesn’t actually exist.

The real Arab power is more concerned with a growing commercial empire than a religious empire. The capital is in Dubai but the financial resources are distributed throughout the Gulf .

The others you mentioned covet that power and money and influence