Canaanism never had more than around two dozen registered members, but because most of these were influential intellectuals and artists, the movement had an influence far beyond its size.[3] Its members believed that much of the Middle East had been a Hebrew-speaking civilization in antiquity.[4] Kuzar also says they hoped to revive this civilization, creating a "Hebrew" nation disconnected from the Jewish past, which would embrace the Middle East's Arab population as well.[4] They saw both "world Jewry and world Islam" as backward and medieval; Ron Kuzar writes that the movement "exhibited an interesting blend of militarism and power politics toward the Arabs as an organized community on the one hand and a welcoming acceptance of them as individuals to be redeemed from medieval darkness on the other."[3]