Prophet and his supporters as the Patriots

The rise of Islam at early 7 century could be considered as a nationalist revolution and movement of the Arabian people, but not just a relious movement.Islam , of course , is a religion, but at the 7 century, it also represented the nationalist feeling of the Arabian people

before the rise of islam, the foreign powers, the Roman Empire, the Persian empire, and sometomes the Ethopian Empire, all extended their influence and political control at the Arabian peninsula, since they wanted to control the commercial routes and the strategic ports of the peninsula,

so they appointed some Arabian tribual leaders as their representatives, actually their political puppets, through these politial puppets, they could extend tehir politcal control , and these Arabian politcal puppets always suppressed their own fellow country men, under the help of the foreign powers, so the Arabian people would build up a strong sense of patriotism and nationalism, they would like to drive away the foreign powers, and under this circumstance, Prophet and his followers were also influenced by the nationalist feeling, and the founding of Islam would represnt such feeling, Prophet wanted to save his people , from the foreign power, and Islam could be the instrument, through Islam, the Ariabian people could be united in a single regime, then they were strong enough to resist the foreign powers and win back their freedom and independence, so the Islam movement at the 7 century could be considered as a nationalist and independence movement of the Arabian people, and Prophet and his supporters were also the Araabian patriots and nationalists, the ultimate goal of Islam movement was to drive away the foreign powers and win back the independence of the Arabian people

Ive studied the figures in the Islamic age a bit and have to say that J.A.W."s post is more closer to what Prophet Muhammed and his Arab followers were about and why they built a empire.  Tommy though you are right that the Romans and Persians both used Arab tribes as puppets for control.