Today in the Middle East there are many conflicts that stem from the boundaries of the countries. Many boundaries either include groups that have historically opposed each other or split groups with commonalities into different countries. This problem is largely a consequence of:

The way Europe divided the region after the fall of the Ottoman Empire

Explanation:

The realm of North Africa and Southwest Asia is large and expansive in terms of physical area, but its regions share a number of common qualities. The physical area of this realm is divided into three regions: North Africa, Southwest Asia, and the countries of Turkestan (the geographic region of Central Asia). The countries in the North African region include the countries bordering the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea from Morocco to Sudan. The realm borders the Atlantic Ocean, the Sahara Desert, and the African Transition Zone. Egypt has territory in both Africa and Asia through its possession of the Sinai Peninsula. The second region, Southwest Asia, includes Turkey, Iran, the Middle East, and the Arabian Peninsula. The land on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea is frequently referred to as the Levant and is often included as a part of the Middle East. Technically, the term Middle East only includes the five countries of Israel, Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, and Iraq, but in common practice Middle East refers to all of Southwest Asia. Central Asia, also referred to as Turkestan, includes the “stan” countries from Kazakhstan to Afghanistan in the region between China and the Caspian Sea. The suffix stan, meaning “land of,” is a common suffix for country names in Central Asia. Afghanistan is the only country of Central Asia that was not officially a part of the former Soviet Union.

The Middle East—a European term that bridges the Near East and the Far East—can also be defined as the area between the Mediterranean Sea and the Persian Gulf. Turkey, with its focal point of Istanbul, has been considered part of the Near East by Europeans. The famous Agatha Christie novel Murder on the Orient Express was about a train that traveled between Paris and Istanbul. The word orient refers to the east; occident refers to the west. Because Turkey was referred to as the Near East and India and China were the Far East, the region in between became the Middle East. This term is not entirely accurate but is widely used to refer to Southwest Asia.