America mourns, prays and does nothing to address gun violence
February 16th, 20180 The thunderous hail of bullets is always followed by the silence of a nation that cannot bring itself to do anything besides offer ineffective hopes and prayers. Once again, a place for education and advancement has become a scene of horror and fear in America. It is unacceptable that any American should have to endure the terror and...
The danger facing Lebanon is bigger than Bassil’s loose tongue
February 2nd, 20180 In the last decisive moments, Lebanon avoided the edge of a cliff and perhaps saved fragile peaceful coexistence among its people, which for the past few days has been hovering over that fine edge. A telephone call from President Michel Aoun to Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri was enough to defuse a potential civil war that would have...
Trump’s Jerusalem decision is reckless and dangerous
December 8th, 20170 President Trump's decision this week to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital was reckless, misguided and dangerous. He has legitimized the illegal occupation of East Jerusalem. Let us not forget that the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, along with the occupation and annexation of East Jerusalem, have been condemned by numerous...
Trump unfit to be our leader
December 2nd, 20170 This week, President Trump proved once again, in perhaps the strongest terms to date, that he is unfit to be our leader. The president re-tweeted three misleading anti-Muslim videos, causing a major firestorm in the media. The videos were first tweeted by Jayda Fransen, the deputy leader of an anti-Islam British party named "Britain...
Hariri’s return marks a new era for him and Lebanon
November 23rd, 20170 Saudi Arabia added this week another political downfall to its long list of successive defeats in Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Qatar and Palestine. The last blunder of the immature Saudi Crown Prince was holding the Prime Minister of Lebanon Saad al-Hariri hostage and forcing him to abruptly resign from a discreet place in his fumbling kingdom,...
Reasons to be thankful
November 23rd, 20170 As Arab American and Muslim families gather around the dinner table this Thanksgiving holiday, they will show gratitude for their blessings, but will also be bound to express fear for each other’s safety. Since President Trump’s candidacy and after his election, the country has been deeply inflamed with hate crimes, racism and...
Let’s talk about “Corruption”
November 13th, 20170 In recent weeks and as we drew closer to Election Day, the word “corruption” was and continues to be thrown around and leveled at organizations by members of the community. More specifically, a local candidate has repeatedly accused AAPAC of being corrupt. The dictionary defines corrupt as “guilty of dishonest practices, as...
After the election: Bullying, sectarianism must be addressed for us to move forward
November 10th, 20170 With all the effort our officials, campaigners, volunteers and local organizations have expanded every year to raise awareness on the importance of voting, it appeared that people were slightly more engaged as they voted in the general elections last Tuesday, November 7. Thankfully, Arab American voters came out and made a strong...
Our endorsements for the Nov. 7 general elections
November 3rd, 20171 The November 7 general election is only a few days away and our endorsements have only marginally changed since the primary. When we released our primary endorsements, we said we’d revisit the candidates during the general elections. We chose to rescind our endorsement for Dearborn City Council candidate Sean Green due to his...
Lessons learned from the Fordson Incident
October 27th, 20170 The Fordson High School football team caused an uproar after making headlines two weeks ago when a few of its junior varsity players were busted in an alleged hazing scandal that some students argue was a sexual assault. The administration called it a “rogue hazing” incident and Superintendent Dr. Glenn Maleyko confirmed that it...
There are more reasons to stay in Dearborn than to leave
October 13th, 20171 Arab Americans have been moving out of Dearborn in droves in recent years to nearby cities like Dearborn Heights, Northville, Bloomfield Hills, Livonia or townships like Canton. Dearborn is the eighth largest city in the state. They may have their reasons for leaving, but we believe Dearborn offers more reasons for them to stay and build...
Terrorism apparently foreign to White America’s lone wolves
October 6th, 20170 On Sunday night, Oct. 1, a White terrorist named Stephen Paddock, sadly not branded as such by the president, police or media outlets, shot more than 500 people and killed 59 at a country music concert from his 32nd floor suite of the Mandalay Bay Hotel on the Las Vegas Strip. According to police, Paddock, 64, had 23 guns in his hotel...
At 33, we are growing stronger
September 15th, 20170 On September 7, 1984, The Arab American News was established to purely tell Arab Americans' and the Arab world's untold stories, but instantly developed into something more— an unexpected educational center for thousands to learn what they'd been denied access to elsewhere. Our mission has been and will continue to be to provide a...
Hussein Berry’s lies and destructive behavior could ruin the school district
September 14th, 20171 Last Monday’s meeting of the Dearborn Board of Education necessitated careful attention and study as the issue of overcrowding is still at the forefront and the future of our kids and two important institutions— Fordson and Dearborn High Schools— is at stake. After much evaluation and dialogue on the issue as well as other...
The genocide of Rohingya Muslims must mobilize and unite humanity
September 8th, 20170 The genocide of the Rohingya Muslims became a major global focus this week and yet no official outcry against their massacre or for immediate aid was made. Making headlines should raise awareness about the crisis— immediately outraging humanity as a call for action— not silencing and immobilizing it. According to an op-ed......
Trump steers the wheel to the country’s downfall
September 3rd, 20170 Since his presidential campaign last year, President Trump stirred controversy with his racist and hateful rhetoric towards minorities. Then, his election pulled the trigger on an abysmal spike in racism and hate crimes— making the country’s years of shameful discrimination and bigotry acceptable again. On Wednesday, Aug. 30, Fox...
Winning a battle against opioid abuse doesn’t mean the war is over
August 25th, 20170 The community’s collective awareness and complaints that prompted police to investigate and eventually raid a Dearborn Medical Clinic— which turned out to be a white coat dealer’s opioid prescription hub, as many suspected— should not be a reason to let our guard down, but rather to keep up our unified activism against our......
Clashes among Arab Americans get us nowhere
August 20th, 20170 On any Election Day, be it primary or general, it’s the norm for residents to differ in opinions on particular candidates and their qualifications. That’s why voters have the right to choose their representatives at the ballot box after much debate and discussion. However, that healthy democratic process should not turn into...
Our endorsements for Dearborn, Hamtramck and Detroit municipal elections
August 4th, 20170 One might think that Dearborn prospers businesswise— mainly as home to Ford Motor Company's world headquarters—yet it doesn't, due to the lack of change in the system and in the administration. Many businesses have moved out after Dearborn established restrictive ordinances. Business owners began setting up shops in nearby cities...
The Dearborn Heights 2017 primary elections: Our endorsements
July 28th, 20171 As Dearborn Heights' community and economic landscape transforms to reflect its neighboring city of Dearborn, so must the city's government transform to reflect its constituents. Over the years, many Arab Americans have steadily moved from Dearborn to Dearborn Heights, a bedroom community whose obstacle to tremendous ambitions has...
Hamtramck’s Muslim majority Council proves media wrong
July 21st, 20170 HAMTRAMCK — When the voters of Hamtramck elected four Muslims to the City Council in 2015, it made headlines nationally and internationally on media outlets like the Washington Post, the New York Daily News, CNN, Fox News and more as a seemingly oxymoronic move in an "American city"— as if those public officials' Islamic faith......
Intra-cultural conflicts among Dearborn’s Arab Americans are a concern
July 14th, 20170 It is a known fact that Dearborn has the highest concentration of Americans of Arab descent, some thriving more than others, in part due to their long history in this nation. For many reasons, internal segregation, which tends to stem from religious separation, politics and tribalism, has truly become a community concern. Last week,...
Excessive fireworks put Dearborn residents in a war zone
July 7th, 20170 The Fourth of July has passed, but the community's celebratory faults haven't, as "war zone" sounds persistently reappear over the years. Dearborn's patriotism shines bright on Independence Day. However, community members launch dangerous fireworks in between houses and throughout neighborhoods— disregarding the potential dangers,......
The call to shut down Al Jazeera must be condemned
July 7th, 20170 It has been more than a month since four Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia decided to cut off ties with their neighbor, Qatar. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain and the UAE imposed severe diplomatic and economic sanctions on the tiny Gulf state that heavily depends on imports for its daily consumption of necessary goods. The...
Hussein Berry is to blame for the tension on the school board and in the community
July 1st, 20172 These past few weeks have been filled with political rants, social media gossips and legal threats. It has become hard to find the truth amid the sea of accusations. This is the new age of politics, it is the Trump era. Truth has no place in his White House and it seems that it has no place in Dearborn, either. At the Dearborn Board......
