«طُوبَهْ عَلَى طُوبَهْ تِخَلِّي الْعَرْكَهْ مَنْصُوبَهْ»

The image is of bricks hurled one after another in a brawl, not bricks laid in building. Big quarrels rarely erupt all at once. They grow from small blows answered by more small blows, and each minor retaliation keeps the hostility alive and pushes it toward something much larger than its trivial beginning.

The saying works as a caution. Do not answer a petty provocation in kind, because one more thrown brick is often what turns a passing spat into a lasting, full-scale fight. In Arabic, the rhyme of ṭūba with manṣūba sharpens this warning in a way plain English cannot fully carry.

Use it to calm a dispute that is starting to escalate, or to warn someone against answering a minor jab with another. It also fits looking back on a major falling-out that grew from a series of trivial exchanges.