Are Arabs and Other Muslims Portrayed Unfairly in American Films?

“In Hollywood’s view, I’m a gun toting terrorist bent on killing innocent people” (Hanania 1). These were the words of Ray Hanania, a Palestinian American reporter and columnist commenting on the general representation of Arabs and other Muslims in American films. Even though this is clearly unfair and irrational, this depiction has not changed despite the efforts of various Arab American and Islamic rights groups. And what is strangely overlooked in such films is that these representations are a major contributing factor to hate crimes against such minorities and to the personification of all Arabs and other Muslims as “anti-American” and as being engaged in “terrorist activities”.

Hollywood’s role in perpetrating mistaken notions of Arabs and other Muslims to its audience has long been recognized by critics. As Hanania aptly describes,
As a child in the 1960’s, i [sic] thought my relatives were famous. It seemed like they were in many Hollywood movies, often p...