For the past 28 years, the Arab American community has gathered on the second weekend of June in our nation’s capital to ensure that Arab Americans and their concerns, as diverse as those may be, are seen and heard in Washington, DC.  This has always been the intent and these are always the goals of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee’s (ADC) Annual National Convention. By attending this annual tradition, which is consistently the largest Arab American event in Washington, community members and their friends have routinely accomplished those goals.

Unfortunately, hard facts that we as a community and a nation have encountered over these past 28 years have sometimes forced us to develop out of necessity and in very quick fashion; but we did develop and we did answer the call to protect what at some times was a vulnerable community that was ill-prepared to protect itself in the aftermath of the horrific 2001 terrorist attacks on our nation.

Those same hard facts have caused many of our elected officials to ignore the obvious and make the wrong decision not to participate, in any form, during the ADC Convention.  For example, during this year’s event which concluded this past weekend, while several seasoned members of Congress, including current and former presidential candidates, those familiar with ADC and its grassroots base, made sure they either attended, sent representatives, delivered video messages, or sent letters of congratulations, others were advised by their political campaigns not to do so. 

To those respected, and in many cases very popular, leaders we say, “You have disappointed us, you have disappointed our passions, you have disappointed our hopes, you have disappointed our enthusiastic youth, and you have disappointed our hopeful veterans.  But, we understand and we will continue to support your message.  We believe in your message and we believe that you represent the positive change in which we all believe and for which we all stand.”  We understand the realities of politics in this great nation and the sometimes difficult decisions and sacrifices that some have to make in order to be elected and others have to accept in order to be protected.

Those of us who are active in our community should not, and dare not, claim to represent everyone as that is an impossibility.  However, and as ADC has done for the past 28 years, we will do everything in our power to stand up in defense of our country’s values, everyone’s core rights, and our diverse community’s best interests.

As our community gathered in Washington during this historic presidential election campaign, where our country looks at the possibility of electing our first African American president or a veteran war hero, I remain hopeful that our community improves upon its already unprecedented engagement to make sure that our collective voice is not only heard, but is listened to by Senator Barack Obama and Senator John McCain.  I am hopeful that we will educate, inform, and ultimately make Senator Obama and Senator McCain terminate the shameful and discriminatory government policies that have plagued our nation since the horrific terrorist attacks in 2001; policies such as the National Security Entry Exit Registration Program (NSEERS), visa delays, background check delays, the various watchlists that have impacted our community’s basic rights, the wirless spying on our telephone calls back to our family members and friends in the Arab World, and the periodic “voluntary” interviews and border scrutiny that we encounter each time we elect to visit our countries of heritage in the Arab World.

The challenges sometime seem immense, however, despite these challenges we should always continue to speak up, to participate, and to allow our community to grow, prosper, and meet these obstacles without hesitation and regardless of difficulty.

To Senator Obama and Senator McCain we say this: We are Arab Americans and as proud and patriotic Americans we are here to represent a complex, hospitable and sophisticated persona in which we all believe and for which we have all made and continue to make sacrifices in order to serve; for the betterment of our nation and of humanity.  We will not allow others to stereotype us; we are here to define ourselves.  We ask you to hear us — we ask you to listen to our concerns.  As a prominent community leader and respected veteran scholar closed his remarks at the recently-concluded ADC National Convention in Washington, he quoted Senator Obama, and told those who choose to engage and attend this year’s ADC Convention: “YES WE CAN!”