I wrote:
Iran is supporting Palestinians, Lebanese, Syrians,… but what makes these countries terrorists?
Should it be:
Iran is supporting Palestinians, Lebanese, Syrians,… but what does make these countries terrorists?
Or
Iran is supporting Palestinians, Lebanese, Syrians,… but what does it make these countries terrorists?
Sometimes I get confused when and with which "wh-words" to use auxiliary verbs to make questions. I thought if I don't use auxiliary verbs, it would be a regular sentence. For example in:
I don't know where he went.
The sentence after where is not in a question mode. So, in my examples above, I was afraid that the first sentence is not a question.
Best Answer
Only the first sentence is correct English:
The reason why only the first sentence is correct and the other two are wrong has to do with the fact that for makes to work (which is the third-person singular form of the verb to make) it needs a subject and what is fulfilling the role of that subject (a complete sentence requires a subject and a predicate). Actually, what in this case is a pronoun no different from any other English pronoun we've all come to love: he, she, it, you, we, they et cetera. The only difference is that it's a special kind of pronoun known as an interrogative pronoun (they're used for making questions while the regular ones are not). So, saying:
is grammatically the same thing as saying:
The only difference as noted above is that what turns the sentence it's in into a question.
But what about the following example you might ask:
Here, the situation is different because now what is no longer the subject of the sentence. this word has stolen the role of the subject and that entailed the necessary changes in grammar.