I'm not saying it wasn't a factor, but various movements to 'purify' Islam predate the crusades. And it was the influence on the Saudis that would be historically determinate ( and at that time Britain and the west didn't care much about that whole area, as long as it didn't effect the way the Moghuls behaved in India.)

I just think it is good for us to remember that for the salafi the West is primarily an irritant because it supports apostate regimes in the islamic world.

And Arab nationalism - a product of the 20th century and very secular in its origins - is a completely different thing. Like Saddam Nassar paid lip service to the Islamic angle, but the salafi were not fooled. He was USSR's Ibn Saud.<s>


>>As much as it is fashionable to blame the current state of the Islamic world on western colonialism, Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab at-Tamimi in the 18th century and the salafi movement in Sunii Islam is probably more on point. The apostate is always more threatening than the infidel.
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>From the wikipedia's entry on Wahhabism:
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>"The term was first coined by the British who were worried about the influence this movement was starting to gain in colonised India.[citation needed] At the time, Britain was worried about the rise of movements hostile to its presence and was trying to foster an Islam favourable to its presence in the Indian sub-continent. This is arguably one of the first encounters between the west and Wahhabism.[citation needed]"
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>Seems to me an Arab nationalist movement gaining popularity around the time that white people invaded their territories is still a good theory.