Arab-American Miss USA Draws Conservative Criticism

After a lengthy absence, I am pleased to return to DC Exile! I shall begin by giving a few thoughts on Miss USA 2010, also known as Rima Fakih.

Ms. Fakih, a Michigan resident who lived in Lebanon until the age of seven, has attracted the ire of several conservative writers because she is guilty of the twin crimes of being a) Arab and b) Muslim in America today. Commentator Debbie Schlussel accused the newly crowned Miss USA of being an auxiliary member of Hezbollah. According to the Guardian, the author claimed that she received this information from unnamed intelligence sources.

"Mark my word. Hezbollah is laughing at us, tonight," Schlussel raged. And why? Obviously, because "one of its auxiliary members won the Miss USA title without having to do a thing to denounce them and their bloody murder of hundreds of Americans".

I’m not sure what’s more infuriating; Schlussel's blatantly racist assumption that Fakih is a terrorist because she is Muslim or the blatant lack of research that went into writing this blog post. I shouldn’t have to repeat this in writing, but for the sake of this post, I’d like bring the following pieces of information to your attention:

1. Not all Muslims are Arab (The most populous Muslim country is Indonesia)
2. Not all Arabs are Muslim (Lebanon, Syria, Egypt and Iraq all have sizable Christian populations.)
3. Not all Muslim Arabs are terrorists (And please, stop asking them to apologize for every act of political violence committed in the name of Islam).

It’s rather shameful that Schussel doesn’t even realize how ignorant she sounds. But what’s really sad about this blog post is that the author doesn’t provide one ounce of proof that the newly crowned Miss America is a member of Hezbollah, other than the fact that she was born in Srifa, a Hezbollah stronghold. That Hassan Nasrallah and company are in charge of Fakih’s hometown is just a fact of Lebanese political reality. To accuse someone of being a member of Hezbollah simply because she's Arab is not only racist, it's libelous.

On the real, I can’t help but wonder if Schussel’s hate is rooted in some straight up jealously...