Arab AMerican Pathbreaker

Pathbreakers of Arab America—Justin Amash

June 26, 2024

By John Mason

This is the fifty-first of Arab America’s series on American pathbreakers of Arab descent. The series includes personalities from entertainment, business, sports, science, academia, journalism, and politics, among other areas. Our fifty-first pathbreaker is Justin Amash, a lawyer and politician who has served Michiganders in the Michigan House of Representatives and the U.S. House of Representatives. Contributing writer, John Mason reports that he is the child of a Palestinian Christian father and a Syrian Christian mother, who immigrated to the U.S. Justin is a principled politician who is difficult to pigeonhole by his party affiliation since he roots his support of issues in his understanding of constitutional law. He supports Palestinians in Gaza, where several of his relatives have been killed in the war.

Pathbreakers of Arab America—Elaine Hagopian

June 5, 2024

By John Mason

This is the forty-eighth of Arab America’s series on American pathbreakers of Arab descent. The series includes personalities from entertainment, business, sports, science, academia, journalism, and politics, among other areas. Our forty-eighth pathbreaker is Elaine Hagopian, a retired Sociology professor at Simmons College in Boston and one of this country’s leading Arab American activists. Contributing writer, John Mason, reports how in 1967 Hagopian joined other Arab American intellectuals in founding the Association of Arab American University Graduates (AAUG), according to Elaine, “to change the way the Arab Israeli conflict is perceived in the United States.” Her father was an immigrant from Damascus.

Pathbreakers of Arab America—Linda Sarsour

May 22, 2024

By John Mason

This is the forty-sixth of Arab America’s series on American pathbreakers of Arab descent. The series includes personalities from entertainment, business, sports, science, academia, journalism, and politics, among other areas. Our forty-sixth pathbreaker is Linda Sarsour, a political activist who has led significant liberal movements to improve human rights. Contributing writer, John Mason describes how she has fought for Muslim rights in the context of 9/11 and the Supreme Court ban on Muslim immigration, and then joined the BLM movement, linking Black and Palestinian human rights. President Obama called her “A Champion of Change.” Linda has been outspoken on the horrific results of the Hamas Israel war.

Pathbreakers of Arab America—Huwaida Arraf

May 8, 2024

By John Mason

Our forty-fourth pathbreaker, Huwaida Arraf, an activist and attorney who, as a Palestinian American and a Palestinian Arab citizen of Israel, endeavored to moderate her dual loyalties. Contributing writer, John Mason, writes that Huwaida was born in Detroit, that her mother was a West Bank Palestinian, and her father a Palestinian from northern Israel and thus an Israeli citizen. One motive for their move to the U.S. was to remove Arraf from the violence in the West Bank.

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