Quote Originally Posted by Kralizec
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/

Egypt: 57.7
Morocco: 51.7
Syria: 76.9
Iraq: 40.4 (my guess is that literacy must be pretty bad among Kurds)

That's actually a whole lot worse then I expected...
Literacy numbers don't even tell half the story of Arab backwardness. Arabs who can read have very little that is worthwhile to read, very little that informs them about the outside world, current affairs, sophisticated subjects, free newspapers. Almost no books are translated into Arab, almost no scientific literature. And almost no media are free; outside news and occasional translations or foreign sources are 'adapted' to Arab audiences by the authorities, etcetera. It is sickening.