Skip to content
  • Image
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Youtube
  • Podcasts
  • Email
  • Subscribe to Ray’s Columns
  • Contact
The Arab Daily News

The Arab Daily News

Original news, features, opinions from Chicago to Jerusalem

  • About
    • About
    • Our Writers
    • Subscribe to Ray’s Columns
    • Book Store
    • Contact
    • Submit Book Reviews, Press Releases
    • Advertise
    • Privacy Corrections Policy
    • Profile on Ray Hanania
    • Submit Press Release
  • Features
    • Food
    • Book Review
    • Humor
    • Movies
    • Travel
  • Arab Stores Targeted
  • Arab Community Network Page
    • Arab Community Network Page
    • Arab Heritage America resources
    • Directory
      • Groups & Organizations
      • Mosques, Churches
      • Restaurants
      • 2008 & 2014 Arab Media Directories
    • National Arab Heritage Month
    • Video: Chicago Arab History
    • Video: Photo Array of Chicago Arabs
    • Overview of Arabs in America
    • Hanania standup comedy
    • Arabs on the Titanic
    • Obituaries
  • Podcasts
    • Ray Hanania on Politics Podcast
    • Arab News Ray Hanania Radio
    • Arab Radio Podcast intro
    • Radio Baladi Detroit
  • Hanania on Tiktok
  • Subscribe to Ray’s Columns
  • Toggle search form
  • photo credit author Nehemia Gershuni-Aylho www.NGPhoto.biz and Wikipedia
    Emergency Court Motions to Stop Elbit Drone Parts Shipment via Frankfurt Airport  Activism
  • American Journalist Shireen Abu Akleh murdered by Israeli soldiers May 11, 2022
    Documentary names soldier it says killed Shireen Abu Akleh in 2022 American Arabs
  • Committee to Protect Journalists, CPJ
    Jordan bans 12 news sites for ‘spreading media poison’ following corruption report Arab World
  • CAIR Logo. Council on American Islamic Relations
    CAIR Condemns MIT for banning Class President from Graduation Ceremony over Anti-Genocide speech Activism
  • ADC creates emergency fund to defend people who are being punished for expressing views on the American-sanction violence by Israel in the Gaza Strip. Photo courtesy of ADC
    ADC Condemns ADL, Rep. Torres’ Defamation of Dr. Lara Sheehi Activism
  • UN Special Committee on Israeli practices in occupied territories warns of a second Nakba  Arab World
  • Arab American community liaison Hassan Nijem, Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas and Bolingbrook Mayor Mary Basta at the Arab American Heritage Month event hosted by Pappas’s office.
    Pappas honors Arab American business and community leaders for Heritage Month Activism
  • 04-28-25 Pappas Arab Heritage Month
    Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas recognizes Arab American Heritage Month by honoring business and community leaders American Arabs
  • Stuffed Grape Leaves. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania
    A recipe on how to make Stuffed Grape Leaves with lamb, ox tail and rice American Arabs
  • Andrew Boutros, interim US Attorney Northern District of Illinois. Photo courtesy of the US Attorney's Office
    Andrew S. Boutros Takes Oath of Office as United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois American Arabs
  • Israeli massacres of Palestinian civilians March 18 2025
    Palestinians demand investigation of Israeli war crimes in Gaza Strip Arab World
  • Illinois Muslim Action Day April 9 2025
    Illinois Muslim Action Day Policies at April 9 Statehouse News Conference American Arabs
  • Investigation demanded in March 23 massacre of 15 first responders by Israel's military in Rafah
    Investigation demanded into Israel slaughter of First Responder in Rafah on March 23, 2025 Arab World
  • More than a dozen candidates running for various local offices in the Chicagoland suburbs attended an Ifatr dinner Thursday, March 13, 2025 hosted by the Arab American Chamber of Commerce at the Jerusalem Banquet Hall in Bridgeview.
    Candidates promise fairness and engagement at Arab Chamber Iftar event March 13 Activism
  • Orland Fire Protection District, Fiscal Voices, receive endorsement of the Arab American Democracy Coaliton
    Independent candidates for Orland Fire receive Arab and Muslim American endorsement Activism

Tyrant: Anti-Arab American hate TV offers new program this summer

Posted on May 29, 2014August 20, 2019 By rayhanania 7 Comments on Tyrant: Anti-Arab American hate TV offers new program this summer
SHARE ...
          
 
  

  • Tweet

Tyrant: Anti-Arab American hate TV offers new program this summer

By Ray Hanania

tyrantpromoOne of the most vicious and anti-Arab and anti-Muslim programs on television was Homeland. It replaced the equally anti-Arab hateful program 24, which returned to television last week. Both had one thing in common: The fictional heroes in Homeland (on the notorious anti-Arab cable channel Showtime) and 24 (on the equally notorious anti-Arab cable channel FOX) mainlined into the warped love affair that Americans have with the ugly truth of their wars like crack cocaine.

Americans paint over the horrors that the war in Iraq and Afghanistan created with sanitized fictionalized narratives. They bury the war crimes and play themselves up as victims, always exploiting the fact that 19 terrorists killed nearly 3,000 Americans on Sept. 11, 2001 — some of those Americans were Arab and Muslim. Tens of thousands of Muslims and Arabs who had nothing to do with the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks were killed, murdered and tortured in order to satiate the American hunger for vengeance. Nothing justified the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorism. But nothing justified the invasion of Iraq and the killing of hundreds and thousands of innocent Arabs and Muslims during the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld campaign of vengeance and greed.

The unjustified wars were pretty sad to watch in real life. But to justify the real life hatred that fuels public support of those unjustified wars, television and the movies had to step up to the plate and provide “cover,” justifying the atrocities against innocent victims in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and Egypt, all places where the official American wars and the secret American wars continue to be prosecuted. Homeland and 24 were two of the most notorious, but not the only ones, for sure.

Being an American military veteran of the Vietnam war, I recognize how hatred drives the anger and hunger for revenge among Americans who served int he U.S. Military but more so the Americans who did not serve in the military but seem to enjoy cheering for war and conflict more than many others.

GideonRaffThe latest addition to this Hate the Arabs and Hate the Muslim TV programming is a series called Tyrant which will premiere on the FX TV Network on Tuesday June 24.

I haven’t been able to get FX to provide a screener copy so I can precisely evaluate the content of the new series, but from what I have seen so far in the teasers, the emphasis is on hating Arabs, hating Muslims, and especially hating Palestinians. The anti-Palestinian narrative comes from the anti-Arab producer Gideon Raff, the Israeli writer and producer of the anti-Arab hate program Homeland who was born in occupied Jerusalem in 1973.

Knowing how the Israelis love to always play the victim, while pretending that they have never done worse to the Palestinians, Raff has done a great job of spinning the truth through TV fiction to make the Arabs, Muslims and Palestinians appear to be the bad guys, while glorifying the Israelis and Americans, a clever strategy to create a bond with American audiences. There is nothing like fan the flames of hatred against someone else to build a close and tight bond with someone like an American. The Israelis as masters of the PR spin.

What are the Arabs doing to counter this “entertainment” garbage? Absolutely nothing, of course. The one truthful narrative of all of these programs is that the Arab World is run by tyrants and dictators and autocrats and monarchs who care more about the profits they get from the Western countries for their oil production (Saudi Arabia, Iraq) and for their military support (Jordan, Egypt, Yemen). But while these hate programs on American TV portray all Arabs are murderers and blood thirty anti-Semites and terrorist killers of babies, the truth is that the majority of Arabs are more moral and principled than even the most honorable American.

The Arab World doesn’t produce this kind of hate entertainment because they don’t embrace hatred as easily as do Americans and Israelis.

Here are some trailers from Tyrant, published on YouTube:

 

Tyrant offers the creative talents of David Yates, the director of the “true-to-life” (sarcasm, of course) Harry Potter series. Yates knows more about embellishing and fabricating narrative and making it compelling to the gullible American audiences better than anyone.

It’s a fascinating American world we live in.

On the one hand, many Americans argue that the violence on video games and on television seen by children, teenagers and young people may in fact be a major cause of why so many young Americans pick up guns and then go to their local schools where they try to murder and massacre other American school mates. It happens more often in American schools than it does in schools in any other foreign country.

Yet, if you argued that the television-hate broadcast on Showtime, FOX and FX has the same kind of impact on Americans but even more destructive and threatening, Americans laugh at you. They just refuse to believe that they somehow are capable of being worse than the terrorists who attacked this country on Sept. 11, 2001.

But clearly, the American TV hate programs are a narcotic that fuels that anger, hatred, stereotypes, racism, discrimination and bigotry against Arabs, Muslims and Palestinians. And that must make Raff very happy.

He has done his job to help Israel. I’m sure that maybe next year, Jay Leno will present him the $1 million Genesis Prize in Israeli occupied Jerusalem, which once was the capitol of Christianity but today is a battle ground between Jews and Muslims. (I doubt any TV producer will make a movie about that reality, or that the Arab dictators in the Middle East and the Islamic World would ever think that putting a few million into the movie industry instead of on the Baccarat tables at the world’s most lavish casinos — the “Arab Hypocritical Houses of Haram.”)

(Ray Hanania is an award winning former Chicago City Hall reporter and political columnist and managing editor of The Arab Daily News www.TheArabDailyNews.com. Selections of his columns are also distributed by Creators Syndicate.)

Related articles
  • Campaign to silence Christians who challenge Arab World discrimination
  • Racism in the US entertainment industry
  • Hating the Jew you’ve never met
  • Spying on Arabs and Muslims in New York violates civil rights
  • Muslims must be more supportive of Christian Arabs
  • Israel criticized for helping Christians, but what are Muslims doing?
  • The nexus of the Stevens killing and anti-Muslim hate speech
  • The American fixation with race and Arabs
  • Chaldean Times Exclusive: Israel isn’t only oppressor of Christians in Middle East
  • Norman Podhoretz and the face of modernday hate

[subscribe2]

newswire info
  • About
  • Latest Posts
rayhanania
rayhanania
Op-Ed writer, author, radio host, podcaster at The Arab Daily News
Ray Hanania is an award-winning columnist, author & former Chicago City Hall reporter (1977-1992). A veteran who served during the Vietnam War and the recipient of four SPJ Peter Lisagor Awards for column writing, Hanania writes weekly opinion columns on mainstream American & Chicagoland topics for the Southwest News-Herald, Des Plaines Valley News, the Regional News, The Reporter Newspapers, and Suburban Chicagoland.  

His award winning columns can be found at www.HANANIA.COM Subscribe FREE today

Hanania also writes about Middle East issues for the Arab News, and The Arab Daily News criticizing government policies in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Hanania was named "Best Ethnic American Columnist" by the New America Media in November 2007, and is the 2009 recipient of the SPJ National Sigma Delta Chi Award for column writing.

Email Ray Hanania at rghanania@gmail.com.

Follow RayHanania at Twitter
rayhanania
Latest posts by rayhanania (see all)
  • Israelisnipers shooting and killing hospital workers in Gaza - December 11, 2023
  • CAIR Condemns Israeli Executions of Wounded, Unarmed Palestinian in West Bank   - December 11, 2023
  • Arab and Muslim American voters face a “simple choice” between Biden’s inhumanity and Trump’s edgy politics - December 9, 2023

  • Tweet

SHARE ...
          
 
  
 
          
 
 Tweet 
American Arabs, Bloggers, Commentary, Entertainment, Ray Hanania, Video Tags:Arab, Arab people, Arab World, FOX TV, FX Network, Iraq, Israel, Middle East, Ray Hanania, Saudi Arabia, SHOWTIME, Television, Tyrant

Post navigation

Previous Post: Gaza-Palestine Photojournalist Focuses on the Children
Next Post: Tyrant: hate TV series coming this summer reveals more about Hollywood than Arabs and Muslims

Related Posts

  • USS Liberty Survivor of Six-Day War’s RX for PTS and RE: Anti-Semitism and White Nationalism #ReportHate Arab World
  • Nelson Mandela, Courtesy of AHRC
    Rising extremism is not a mental health issue, it’s a political and public health issue American Arabs
  • Anti-Arab anti-peace U.S. Senator Robert Menendez who has led the fight to censor American who criticize the brutality and human rights violations of Israel
    Racist Arab Hater Senator Bob Menendez demands answers on Khashoggi Arab News
  • Update: Slaughter of Muslim students by American Christian American Arabs
  • image from vandalism targeting the Muslim Chaplaincy house at Rutgers University (A.K.A. CILRU, Center for Islamic Life at Rutgers University) on Wednesday April 10, 2024. Phot from CAIR video
    CAIR-NJ Condemned Vandalism Targeting Rutgers Muslim Chaplaincy House, Welcomes Hate Crime Probe  American Arabs
  • Israel’s Security, Palestine’s Liberation and All that Jazz Arab World

More Related Articles

Podcast: Trump’s Travel Ban and its Effects Activism
Former City Hall reporter Ray Hanania, ShawnTe Raines-Welch and Nick Kantas, candidates for Judge in the 4th SubCircuit, and Cook County Commissioner Frank Aguilar. Nearly 100 candidates, officials address Arab Democratic Club forum Sunday American Arabs
Will controversy follow sale of Church to Muslims? American Arabs
Role of Muslims to confront terrorism American Arabs
A virtual visit to the birthplace of Christianity, Bethlehem Activism
Foreign Land, the film that Israel's Cultural Ministry doesn't want you to see. Photo courtesy of filmmaker Shlomi Eldar Controversial Israeli film “Foreign Land” in U.S. in March Arab World

Comments (7) on “Tyrant: Anti-Arab American hate TV offers new program this summer”

  1. The Radio Jihad Network says:
    May 30, 2014 at 12:00 pm

    I find you playing the victim card with the adeptness of a skilled propagandist steeped in emotion but short on facts and evidence.

    The Rand Corporation states that between 2000 and 2010, 96% of terrorist attacks in the UK and United States were linked to the followers of Islam.

    Mr. Hanania – Islamic terrorism is problem your community must fix internally. If the Umma is unwilling to dismantle and take responsibility for the terrorist networks operating in the name of Islamic doctrine and theology then your attacks on the messengers are a part of the Problem and NOT part of the solution.

    You, Mr. Hanania, are like the old parable of the boy who kept crying wolf over and over so many times he was no longer believed.

    So please stop your incessant whining because it brings shame on you, your family, and the Umma.

    You need to join with true Muslim reformers like Dr. Zuhdi Jasser and become a part of the solution.

    Thank you

    Log in to Reply
    1. rayhanania says:
      May 30, 2014 at 12:16 pm

      Islamic extremism is a problem, but it has nothing to do with Islam as a religion. The hatred of Islam by Americans like you is unjustified and driven by racism and pure hatred. It’s an excuse. The majority of serial killers are White men who are Christian, yet we don’t launch a campaign to persecute Christian White men. Treat the terrorists as criminals that they are who make all kinds of claims including the ridiculous posture that they represent Islam, which in fact they do not. Using stereotypes and profiling to attack terrorism and crime is a reflection of an emotional campaign of hatred not a strategic methodology to fight terrorism or crime. You are driven by hatred and nothing more. Your hatred empowers the Islamic fanatics, and it also clouds the Christian extremist terrorist who murder people all the time at High schools, universities, Post Offices. Wake up. The end result is the crime, not the religion of the criminals.

      Log in to Reply
  2. The Radio Jihad Network says:
    May 30, 2014 at 12:00 pm

    I find you playing the victim card with the adeptness of a skilled propagandist steeped in emotion but short on facts and evidence.

    The Rand Corporation states that between 2000 and 2010, 96% of terrorist attacks in the UK and United States were linked to the followers of Islam.

    Mr. Hanania – Islamic terrorism is problem your community must fix internally. If the Umma is unwilling to dismantle and take responsibility for the terrorist networks operating in the name of Islamic doctrine and theology then your attacks on the messengers are a part of the Problem and NOT part of the solution.

    You, Mr. Hanania, are like the old parable of the boy who kept crying wolf over and over so many times he was no longer believed.

    So please stop your incessant whining because it brings shame on you, your family, and the Umma.

    You need to join with true Muslim reformers like Dr. Zuhdi Jasser and become a part of the solution.

    Thank you

    Log in to Reply
    1. rayhanania says:
      May 30, 2014 at 12:16 pm

      Islamic extremism is a problem, but it has nothing to do with Islam as a religion. The hatred of Islam by Americans like you is unjustified and driven by racism and pure hatred. It’s an excuse. The majority of serial killers are White men who are Christian, yet we don’t launch a campaign to persecute Christian White men. Treat the terrorists as criminals that they are who make all kinds of claims including the ridiculous posture that they represent Islam, which in fact they do not. Using stereotypes and profiling to attack terrorism and crime is a reflection of an emotional campaign of hatred not a strategic methodology to fight terrorism or crime. You are driven by hatred and nothing more. Your hatred empowers the Islamic fanatics, and it also clouds the Christian extremist terrorist who murder people all the time at High schools, universities, Post Offices. Wake up. The end result is the crime, not the religion of the criminals.

      Log in to Reply
  3. Ayman Fadel says:
    May 29, 2014 at 2:00 pm

    Reza Aslan tweeted this about FX’s Tyrant: https://twitter.com/rezaaslan/status/471722867227238400. Showtime’s Weeds was one of the most racist shows ever seen on TV.

    Log in to Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Ray Hanania's 4 times a week columns at https://RayHanania.com at Substack

Enter Your Email to Subscribe to Ray Hanania’s Columns

  • OPINION COLUMNS
  • Photo courtesy of Journalist Abdennour Toumi
    France: Political Compromise vs Political Instability
    August 28, 2024
  • Zakia Restaurant in Atlanta, Georgia
    Arabs eat Middle East food like they are making love
    June 27, 2024
  • Zwar lamb kabob and kufta with white and yellow rice
    Zwar ranked the Best Middle East restaurant in Chicagoland suburbs
    June 8, 2024
  • Pictured: Rahm Emanuel, Afghan activist Salman Aftab who was co-chair of the Iftar dinner, and several non-Arab Muslim leaders. Also pictured is Ald. Joe Moore. Photo courtesy of Ray Hanania for Arab News
    Comprehensive look at the failings of former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel
    January 18, 2024
  • NEWSWIRE
  • CAIR Logo. Council on American Islamic Relations
    CAIR Condemns MIT for banning Class President from Graduation Ceremony over Anti-Genocide speech
    June 1, 2025
  • Arab American community liaison Hassan Nijem, Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas and Bolingbrook Mayor Mary Basta at the Arab American Heritage Month event hosted by Pappas’s office.
    Pappas honors Arab American business and community leaders for Heritage Month
    April 29, 2025
  • 04-28-25 Pappas Arab Heritage Month
    Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas recognizes Arab American Heritage Month by honoring business and community leaders
    April 27, 2025
  • Mike Ghouse
    Celebration of 500th Interfaith Marriage Ceremony
    February 14, 2025

Creative Commons License
All work on this website is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Do not edit original work. Give credit to the original source.

  • NEWS
  • photo credit author Nehemia Gershuni-Aylho www.NGPhoto.biz and Wikipedia
    Emergency Court Motions to Stop Elbit Drone Parts Shipment via Frankfurt Airport 
    June 7, 2025
  • American Journalist Shireen Abu Akleh murdered by Israeli soldiers May 11, 2022
    Documentary names soldier it says killed Shireen Abu Akleh in 2022
    June 1, 2025
  • BOOK REVIEWS
  • Faisal Abbas Book Anecdotes
    Book Review: Arab author shares his anecdotes living in the United Kingdom
    October 22, 2024
  • Columnist Ray Hanania at the ADC Convention in Dearborn with the author Susan Abulhawa
    Book Review: Mornings in Jenin bySusan Abulhawa
    September 14, 2024
  • ENTERTAINMENT
  • Television set and remote. Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash
    MBC GROUP unveils MBCNOW, its brand-new groundbreaking entertainment service aggregator
    February 24, 2025
  • ArabCon 2024 Gala Program features Dr. Cornel West, Macklemore, and more
    September 6, 2024
  • New-iTunes-1400-x-1400-The-Ray-Hanania-Show-Podcast-Icon-300-x-300.jpg
  • powerpr300x300ad.jpg
  • The-Kings-Pawn-Book-300-x-300.png
  • Podcast-iTunes-Logo-Chi-City-Hall-1985.jpg
  • terroristbookcover-300-x-300.jpg
Arab News Newspaper Logo
Read the Arab News, the leading English language newspaper in the MIddle East

Follow Ray Hanania at
Twitter
Facebook
TitkTok
BlueSky
RayHanania Columns

Click here to get information on The Ray Hanania Radio Show and its podcasts

Copyright © 2025 The Arab Daily News.

Powered by PressBook Premium theme