Because 100 years ago.. like today, Arabs were dogged by stereotypes. They’re customs and traditions were misunderstood. They did however, find "friendship" or perhaps companionship in the aboriginal people.

Partly because of the British hostility towards them, many of the Afghan cameleers went back to Afghanistan and the rest, put simply, died off.

Not many Arabs arrived in Australia after 1910 despite Australia’s post-war immigration policy which saw many Italians and Greeks migrate to Australia. It was not until very late 1960 that Arab migrants began to come here, mainly from Lebanon. And it was not until mid 1970 early 1980 that the Arab migrant population really began to show.

As I mentioned before, there are many stereotypes of Arab people… most probably because of the misconceptions associated with Islam. Arabs are considered Muslims (despite the fact that many of them are not) and with that, comes the idea that Arabs are religious fanatics, terrorists and most probably have a homemade bomb hidden in their garden shed. This view, to my knowledge, probably really became common thought because of the Gulf War where despite the fact many Arab countries sided with the US, in western eyes Saddam Hussein suddenly represented the entire Arab world. Go Saddam*. Apart from this, Arabs are also considered to be repressive of women, violent and basically really good at being the bad guy. I’m not going to pretend the Arabs are angelic and innocent of all western verdicts but like every country western, asian, or middle eastern there are the good and the bad, unfortunately due to our wonderfully fair and truthful media coverage, we in Australia only hear about the bad stuff otherwise, shock horror.. all our stereotypes might be proven incorrect.. and where would that leave us?

Before I go off on an unrelated tangent, I’d better come back to home base - the Arab migrants. Every year more and more Arabs from many different Arab nations are migrating to Australia they are opening businesses, making a living and lo and behold like most other people - plan on living here for a long time. I’d like to think that Arabs won’t be put through the name calling and pathetic racism that the Greeks and Italians went through, but I think that’s wishful thinking. However, I do believe that Australia’s stance on multiculturalism will prevail - despite the Pauline Hansons of Australia, and so hopefully, everyone will live happily ever after.

Thanks for listening.