'Arab diaspora' refers to the numbers of
Arab immigrants, and their descendants, who voluntarily or as
refugees emigrated from their native countries and now reside in non-Arab nations, primarily in
Western countries as well as parts of
Asia,
Latin America and
West Africa, particularly in the
Ivory Coast (home to over 100,000 Lebanese),
Senegal (roughly 20,000),
Sierra Leone (roughly 6,000 today; about 30,000 prior to the outbreak of civil war in 1991), and
Liberia. Since the end of the civil war in 2002,
Lebanese traders have become reestablished in Sierra Leone.
Arab traders have long operated in
Southeast Asia, trading in spices, timber and textiles. But an important trading minority in the region that goes largely unrecognised comprises the local descendants of Arabs. Most of the prominent
Indonesians,
Malaysians and
Singaporeans of
Arab descent have their origins in southern
Yemen in the
Hadramawt coastal region. They are the Hadramis. As many as 4 million
Indonesians are of Hadrami descent and today there are almost 10,000 Hadramis in
Singapore.
The
Americas have long been a destination for
Arab migration, with Arabs arriving in some countries as early as the nineteenth century . The largest concentration of Arabs outside the Middle East is in
Brazil, which has over 17 million
Brazilians of
Arab ancestry. Of these 12 million Brazilian Arabs, over 9 million are of
Lebanese ancestry, making Brazil's population of Lebanese three times greater than that of
Lebanon. Most other Brazilians of Arab descent are mainly
Syrian. There are also large
Arab communities in
Mexico,
Argentina,
Colombia,
Ecuador, and
Venezuela.
Palestinians cluster in
Chile and
Central America, particularly
El Salvador and
Honduras. The 300,000-strong Palestinian community in
Chile is the fourth largest in the world after those in Israel, Lebanon and Jordan. In the
United States there are around 3.5 million people of
Arab ancestry. Most Arabs of the Americas are of either Lebanese,
Syrian or
Egyptian extraction and are mostly
Christian.
[2] (Note: The identification of
Egyptians as "Arab" is frequently contested -- see
Egypt#Identity for more information.)
The Lebanese diaspora, while historically trade-related, has more recently been linked to the
Lebanese Civil War and the
2006 Lebanon War. In October 2006, shortly after the war between
Hezbollah and
Israel had concluded, the
Edinburgh Middle East Report ran an article covering the
brain drain from Lebanon's universities.
[3] Increasing numbers of Lebanese students are travelling abroad to further their education in safer environments.
As of November 2006, the U.N. High Commissioner on Refugees estimated that 1.8 million
Iraqis had been displaced to neighboring countries, with nearly 100,000
Iraqis fleeing to
Syria and
Jordan each month.
[4] As a result of growing international pressure, on June 1, 2007 the Bush administration said it was ready to admit 7,000
Iraqi refugees who had helped the coalition since the invasion. According to
Washington based
Refugees International the U.S. has admitted fewer than 800 Iraqi refugees since the invasion,
Sweden had accepted 18,000 and
Australia had resettled almost 6,000.
[5]
In
France, the
Benelux countries,
Spain and much of the rest of
Europe, the Arab communities are of
North African origin, particularly
Algeria and
Morocco, and are mostly
Muslim. In
Marseille, Arabs make up 25% of the total population. About 80,000 Iraqis live in
Sweden, forming
the country’s second largest immigrant group.
[6] There is also a medium sized Arab community in
Australia, where Arabic is the fourth most widely spoken second-language. The number of Muslim and Christian Arab Australians are roughly equal with a slight upper hand to Christians. See Australian population: ethnic origins.
[1]
Challenges
There are no exact figures of how many Arabs live in diaspora (expatriates). There are many challenges facing Arabs in diaspora, especially in the post 9/11 world:
First: Suspicion of Arabs and Muslims has reached almost a paranoid proportion. Racism towards Arabs has reached new heights.
Second: Another delicate issue for the Diaspora Arabs is the relationship with motherlands and/or fatherlands. These challenges depend on which generation of Arab immigrants we are talking about. Usually, the first generation Arab immigrants are caught between a love for the motherland that on hand increased by leaps and bounds following immigration and fueled mainly by nostalgia and a certain degree of “culture shock,†and resentment stemming from feeling driven out by unfavorable circumstances.
Third: After an initial period of “shock,†the first generation Arab immigrants start the slow process of acculturation/assimilation. The Arab in his self-imposed-exile faces the ambivalence associated with the love-hate relationship with the motherland and/or fatherland.
Fourth: Nostalgia: The memory of the Arab immigrant polishes events, people and places and plays “tricks†on his mind. The things that used to irritate the Arab immigrant in the motherland start to seem so trivial after a few months away. Arabs in diaspora start forgetting or minimizing the bitterness that drove them out and remember only the sweet. In a way nostalgia becomes deceptive and memory turns selective. The first generation immigrant Arab is perplexed and his nostalgia leaves him or her with a heavy heart. Even a song that reminds an Arab of his childhood or adolescence puts a lump in his throat. The bond to the motherland becomes like a rubber band the draws the emigrant Arab ever stronger the longer and the farther he stays away.
Prominent members of the Arab diaspora include;
★
Abdalá Bucaram (Lebanese origin), former
President of Ecuador
★
Alberto Dahik (Lebanese origin), former Vice President of Ecuador
★
Andres Dauhajre (Syrian origin), prominent Dominican Economist
★
Antonio Saca (Palestinian origin), current President of
El Salvador
★
Julio Hazim (Lebanese origin), Important Dominican Businessman
★
Jacobo Majluta (Lebanese origin), former President of Dominican Republic
★
Salvador Jorge Blanco (Syrian origin),former President of Dominican Republic
★
André Apaid (Lebanese origin), high profile Haitian businessman
★
Samir Mourra (Lebanese origin), Haitian businessman and
2006 Haitian presidential candidate
★
Antoine Izméry (Palestinian origin), Former wealthy Haitian businessman and pro-democracy activist
★
Paulo Maluf (Lebanese origin),
politician, former mayor of
São Paulo city and former governor of
São Paulo state in Brazil
★
Jamil Mahuad (Lebanese origin), former President of Ecuador
★
Carlos Menem (Syrian origin), former
President of Argentina
★
Said Musa (Palestinian origin), current
Prime Minister of Belize
★
Edward Seaga (Lebanese origin), former
Prime Minister of Jamaica
★
Ralph Nader (Lebanese origin), 2004 US presidential candidate
★
Gilberto Kassab (Lebanese origin), current
mayor of São Paulo
★
Jaime Nebot (Lebanese origin), current
Alcalde of
Guayaquil, Ecuador
★
Edward Saïd (Palestinian origin), US
intellectual
★
Julio Cesar Turbay (Lebanese origin), former
President of Colombia
★
Elias Zerhouni (Algerian origin), current Director of
National Institutes of Health (
United States)
★
Schafik Handal (Palestinian origin), Salvadoran born
FMLN leader
★
Carlos Ghosn (Lebanese origin), Brazilian born businessman, CEO of
Nissan and
Renault, former CEO of
Michelin.
★
Mário Zagallo (Lebanese origin),Brazilian football coach and former player
★
Charles Elachi (Lebanese origin), the Director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).
★
Mohamed Al-Fayed (Egyptian origin), Businessman, owner of London's
Harrods and the
Ritz Palace in Paris.
★
Nadhmi Auchi (Iraqi origin), Businessman, founder and Chairman of
General Mediterranean Holdings.
★
Azzedine Alaia (Tunisian origin), prominent
fashion designer.
★
Tarak Ben Ammar (Tunisian origin), international movie producer and distributor.
★
Carlos Slim (Lebanese origin), Mexican businessman. He was listed as the richest man in the world by Forbes.
★
Shakira Mebarak, (Lebanese origin) Colombian singer and musician.
★
Rachid Taha (Algerian origin)
Raï musician now living in
France
★
Khaled (also of Algerian origin) Raï musician now living in
France
★
Yazid Sabeg (Algerian-born) businessman now living in France
★
Tariq Ramadan (Egyptian origin), Swiss
intellectual
★
Migati Amdjat ( Jordanian origin) member of the SERB part SERBIAN RADICAL PARTY Vojislav Seselj It is the first foreigner of the history to being member of the Serb Parliament, and the first representative with speaking Arab. - Sure that I am Serbe, since my wife is Serbe, and the Serb popular expression was connait: "You are from there - where your wife is."
See also
External links
★
Niger's Arabs to fight expulsion
★
Arabs Making Their Mark in Latin America
★
Fact Sheet: Australian Muslims
★
The Arabs of Honduras
★
The Arabs of Brazil
★
Hadramis in Singapore
★
The world's successful diasporas
★
Latin-American Arabs
★
Out of the Hadhramaut
★
The Arrival Of The Lebanese
★
The Washington Times, Arab-Brazilians
★
Arab Immigrants in Latin American Politics
References
1. http://www.brazzil.com/2004/html/articles/sep04/p118sep04.htm
2. The Dynamics of Identity Reconstruction among Arab Communities in the United States by Al-Sayed al-Aswad. Anthropos Institute. 2006.
3. Lebanon's Brain Drain by Tim May. Edinburgh Middle East Report Online. Winter 2006.
4. "U.N.: 100,000 Iraq refugees flee monthly". Alexander G. Higgins, ''Boston Globe,'' November 3, 2006.
5. US in Iraq for 'another 50 years', The Australian, June 2, 2007
6. Sweden urges EU to take in Iraqis
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