Arab and Muslim Americans: Get Out There, Get Involved By George S. Hishmeh

Arab and Muslim Americans: Get Out There, Get Involved

By George S. Hishmeh

Gulf News, June 29, 2006

If Americans are upset about their country's bad image among Arabs and Muslims and they seem surprisingly incapable of improving it, the Arabs and Muslims are not much better off when they see how Americans view them. But it is the Arab-Americans and Muslim-Americans who find the treatment by some fellow Americans so obnoxious, despite the horrid consequences of the nearly five-year-old terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 and the actions of suicide bombers and the like which have unwittingly contributed to these misconceptions.

Here's how one American journalist working for Al Jazeera International (AJI), the projected 24-hour English-language network and sister of the Arabic-language Qatar-based Arabic channel that will be broadcasting from Washington and three other capitals, reported on the encounter she and some of her American colleagues had with this repugnant and negative American feeling of "resistance, rejection and racism" while undertaking their daily assignments.

This is how she put it in an Op-Ed column published last Sunday in The Washington Post under the seemingly endorsing headline, Al Jazeera, as American as Apple Pie.

She wrote: "Say that name (Al Jazeera) in the United States and, likely as not, the listener will practically shudder in revulsion. Many Americans automatically think "terrorist TV", or "Osama Bin Laden's network" ? as the Al Qaida leader's mouthpiece, broadcasting his videotaped messages of jihad".

Joanne Levine, executive producer for the Americas and a Jew married to a Jordanian, pointed out that AJI's sister Arabic language channel "is a pioneer of news independence that the US government once lauded for bringing freedom of the press to the Middle East". Yet, she continued, "the doors here are slamming shut, AJI and its employees are being isolated".

AJI's experience is replicated by countless others, be they other Arab media representatives or Arab-Americans of all walks of life. But despite all of this, the Arab-American community remains steadfast. And lately, as witnessed at this month's annual convention in Washington of the respected American Arab Anti- Discrimination Committee, the potential of Arab-Americans in the political system has also gained recognition from key Arab ambassadors who urged them to stand up and be counted against this ugly demonisation of Arabs and Muslims that is underway.

Saudi Arabia's eloquent ambassador, Prince Turki Al Faisal, noted that in his first few months in the US, Arab-Americans were encountering "a complex assortment of emotion frustration, anger and defensiveness (that) has been stifling Arab-Americans as a group" at a time when they are "the only ones who can bridge the gap between the two great societies". He stressed: "It can't be done without you."

He called on the Arab-American community, which numbers a little over three million, "to get out there and get involved". In order to do that, he suggested, the various Arab-American organisations "need to come together more ... (and) coordinate their resources and capabilities to a greater extent". In Saudi Arabia, he continued, "We have adopted a strategy that is focused more on people-to-people contact" encouraging exchanges between citizens of the two countries.

Diverse world

He underlined: "The Arab world is a diverse world. But it does not have to be a diffuse world. Arabs may be from different backgrounds, have different faiths, but they are all Arab in this country. The issue that affect one affect all: the visa issue, the employment issue, the discrimination issue. These weigh heavily on all Arabs, regardless of faith and original heritage."

In turn, the new Palestinian envoy in Washington told hundreds at the convention that Arab-Americans "are the oxygen that our people back home under (Israeli) occupation need, (and) it is here in Washington that our political battle will be won or lost".

Afif Safieh, who speaks English flawlessly, said he believes that "our political battle is winnable and public opinion in America, will necessarily, hopefully soon, listen to our cry for freedom from captivity and bondage."

Whether the Arab-American community can rise to the challenge may depend on their willingness to stick their neck out. There are several areas where they can be effective like others in the community as some have been particularly in the academic and health fields and now in journalism. But there is more room for the new generation to start working as Congressional aides, federal employees, particularly the state department.

Participants at the well-attended convention were surprised to see for the first time advertising booths from various federal agencies attempting to recruit Arabic speakers at high pay, a recognition of how important the Arab world has become to US policymakers.

This is why someone such as Raafat Dajani, executive director of the fledgling American Task Force on Palestine, has called on Palestinian-Americans, whom he described as a highly educated and successful community, to get involved in the political system since "they have exactly the same political tools in the American system at their disposal as any other group". To date, however, he said the community at large has avoided participation.

He said his group was founded with "the specific aim of working within the existing political framework to advocate that it is in the American national interest to establish a Palestinian state living alongside Israel".

Dajani stressed that since the American political system provided Arab Americans the opportunity, "we have a duty to perform the tasks needed to make our voices heard".

George Hishmeh is a Washington-based columnist. He can be contacted at ghishmeh@gulfnews.com

Earth, a planet hungry for peace

Apartheid Wall


The Israeli Land-Grab Apartheid Wall built inside the Palestinian territories, here separating Abu Dis from occupied East Jerusalem. (IPC, 7/4/04).

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank, like a Python. (Alquds,10/25/03).

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