Through the last century there has been a dramatic improvement in the field of transportation. Hence, more people are moving across the world today. Traveling to new places and being exposed to new cultures encourage people to thing about immigration. Since ancient times, people have left their countries for different reasons, for example, to escape oppression, in search of adventure, or simply to avoid military service. Today, most of the people think about immigration to improve themselves economically. Due to the poor economic conditions of less developed countries, like those of the Middle East there is a large number of Arabs who immigrate in search of better jobs and better living conditions in countries like the United States of America. Anayat Durrani, a freelance journalist, explains that there are about three million Arabs living in the United States nowadays. Arabs began immigrating to the U.S. since the late nineteenth century to escape the problems of over population in their native countries and improve their living standards; however, many of them prove to be of great value to the American community in different fields.
The Arabs immigration movement to the United States of America took place over a large period of time. It did not just start recently. Michael W. Suleiman, a University professor, explains that "there have been two major waves of Arab immigration to North America." He adds that Arab immigration to the U.S. started in the late nineteenth century and lasted until World War II and that the second wave started from World War II and continues until our present date. The two waves face different political and economic challenges due to the different political events that occurred during those periods. The first wave of Arab immigrants were mostly Christians who came from the Greater Syrian region, later immigrants were from different parts of the Arab world and had many Muslims among them.