According to Fair Muslim in his letter Palestine factor in the rise of terrorism , 'the Holy Quran states that all Muslims are brothers' and 'all Muslims are duty bound to help their brothers and sisters'.

I hope to obtain a higher level of enlightenment from the writer as to the facts and realities of this earthly world.

If his assertion is true, how do we explain the voluntary separation between Pakistan and Bangladesh in the 1970s, the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, the Iraq invasion and occupation of Kuwait in 1990-1991, and Saddam Hussein's genocide against the Shiites and Kurds inside Iraq in the 1980s and 1990s?

How do we explain the animosity among the Sunnis, Shiites and Sufis (in Malaysia, for example, belonging to either the Shiite or Sufi school of Islamic theology could get one detained without trial)? How do we account for the historical distrust among the Turks, Arabs, Iranians, Kurds and Egyptians that caused the fall of the Ottoman Empire?

How do we explain Iranians discreetly helping Americans to dislodge the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2001, or Kuwaitis, Saudi Arabians and Jordanians assisting the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003? How do we even begin to explain Syria and Egypt contributing troops in 1991 in the Gulf War against Iraq?