Yeah, and in some sense it actually is Orientalism - a vague exotic reference. And crucially it will have registered completely different for the original audie

Yeah, and in some sense it actually is Orientalism - a vague exotic reference. And crucially it will have registered completely different for the original audience than it would today - most people in the 60's in western Europe and America had never seen a Muslim, and their knowledge of Islam and Middle Eastern culture could probably be summed up in less than a paragraph. Especially a word like jihad is infinitely more loaded than it was 50 years ago to western ears. (I'd actually wager most people who read it in the first decade or two learned that word from the book.) Personally I read Dune in my first year of university, when I was doing a course on the Middle East, so it all hits very different to me, and the Arabic in Dune is very important to my personal appreciation of it - but I can see how it's hard to introduce to a contemporary audience due to all the regrettable events of recent decades, so perhaps it makes sense. It seems impossible to make neutral references to Muslim/Arabic culture or history these days, everything becomes some grand political statement for or against Bin Laden or Salman Rushdie...