Rima Fakih,Lebanese Miss U.S.A

A Lebanese immigrant has become the first Arab woman to be crowned Miss USA.Rima Fakih, who moved to the United States as a baby, beat contestants from every American state to win the 58-year-old beauty pageant.Delighted members of the Arab-American community gathered near Miss Fakih’s home in Michigan to celebrate victory by dancing and singing late into Sunday night. Zouheir Alawieh, 51, said: “This is the real face of Arab Americans, not the stereotypes you hear about. We have culture. We have beauty. We have history, and today we made history.”
 The 24-year-old, who moved to the United States from her native Lebanon in the early 1990s, was understandably proud to become the crowned figurehead of American beauty for a year. She, her family and many Arab-Americans also hope her victory will give her embattled and distrusted community a much-needed facelift....This calls for a wake-up call, who said Arabic girls are all about niqabs and all that.

The western image of Muslim women is largely shrouded in the veils – in the form of hijabs, niqabs and burqas – of a grand patriarchal cover-up. This partly explains the mirth and amusement derived from stories of Arabs organising beauty contests for their camels and goats, or crowning Miss Beautiful Morals.

Conservative commentator Debbie Schlussel pulled out all the stops, using Fakih's Shia Lebanese background to brand her a terrorist "Miss Hezbollah" and dismissed the colourful business magnate Donald Trump, who is one of the sponsors of the event, as an Islamic "dhimmi".

"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".Schlussel does not provide details of Fakih's alleged Hezbollah connection, except to quote unnamed "intelligence sources" who apparently confirm that some of her family members are linked to it...i find it rather disturbing that they will go all lengths to prove all Arabs are the same....its just getting a bit irritating about now, the jokes over and aint funny.This beautiful girl won and that's that...