HR 530 — A Resolution recognizing the month of April 2026 as "National Arab American Heritage Month" in Pennsylvania.

PRINTER'S NO.   3420

                  THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF PENNSYLVANIA



           HOUSE RESOLUTION
              No. 530
                                                 Session of
                                                   2026

     INTRODUCED BY RABB, KHAN, HOHENSTEIN, WAXMAN, RIVERA, MAYES,
        VENKAT, FRANKEL, McNEILL, SANCHEZ, PASHINSKI AND CEPEDA-
        FREYTIZ, MAY 14, 2026

     REFERRED TO COMMITTEE ON TOURISM, RECREATION AND ECONOMIC
        DEVELOPMENT, MAY 20, 2026


                                  A RESOLUTION
 1   Recognizing the month of April 2026 as "National Arab American
 2      Heritage Month" in Pennsylvania.
 3      WHEREAS, Arab Americans have been present in this
 4   Commonwealth for over 150 years, with a notable and growing
 5   community established since the late 19th century; and
 6      WHEREAS, This Commonwealth is home to one of the 12 largest
 7   Arab-American populations in the United States; and
 8      WHEREAS, The Arab American Institute estimates that more than
 9   180,000 Arab Americans are living in Pennsylvania and that Arab
10   Americans in Pennsylvania reside in all 18 congressional
11   districts; and
12      WHEREAS, The population in Pennsylvania who identified as
13   Arab American on the United States Census grew nearly 73%
14   between 2000 and 2022; and
15      WHEREAS, The Arab American Development Corporation estimates
16   30,000 to 50,000 Arab Americans live in the greater Philadelphia
17   area; and
 1         WHEREAS, The Lehigh Valley, particularly Allentown and
 2   Easton, has a high concentration of Arab Americans and
 3   significant populations in Allegheny County; and
 4         WHEREAS, Several notable Arab Americans have ties to this
 5   Commonwealth, including F. Murray Abraham, the first person of
 6   Arab descent to have won an Academy Award for Best Actor; Samuel
 7   Hazo, a poet, playwright and fiction novelist, named the State
 8   Poet of Pennsylvania in 1993, who is Lebanese-American; and
 9   Richard Kotite, who coached the Philadelphia Eagles from 1991 to
10   1994, and was one of the earliest Arab-American head coaches in
11   the National Football League; and
12         WHEREAS, Arab Americans have been making valuable
13   contributions to virtually every aspect of our shared civic life
14   such as medicine, law, business, education, technology, public
15   service, culture and community organizing; and
16         WHEREAS, Arab Americans have brought to this Commonwealth
17   their diverse family structures, commitment to collective
18   responsibility, rich cultural traditions and pluralistic
19   expressions of faith and philosophy that strengthen our
20   Commonwealth; and
21         WHEREAS, The presence and participation of Arab Americans in
22   Pennsylvania embodies the possibility of a multiracial democracy
23   where people of different origins, faiths and traditions build
24   power together across lines of difference, refusing the false
25   hierarchies and divisions that ethnocentrism seeks to impose;
26   and
27         WHEREAS, Arab Americans from Pennsylvania have served in the
28   United States Armed Forces and in countless other forms of civic
29   contribution and struggle, asserting their full belonging and
30   stake in the democratic project; and

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 1        WHEREAS, Arab Americans have advanced the entrepreneurial and
 2   cooperative traditions that create economic dignity and shared
 3   prosperity; and
 4        WHEREAS, The celebration of Arab-American heritage serves as
 5   an explicit assertion that all people, regardless of origin or
 6   creed, possess equal dignity and deserve full participation in
 7   our political, economic and cultural life; and
 8        WHEREAS, Arab Americans continue to face discrimination,
 9   bias, harmful stereotyping and racialization that seeks to
10   render them foreign, threatening or less-than-American; and
11        WHEREAS, Confronting anti-Arab bias, Islamophobia and all
12   forms of ethnocentric ideology is essential to building a
13   Commonwealth where dignity is not contingent on assimilation,
14   where difference is not treated as disloyalty and where safety
15   and belonging are guaranteed to all; and
16        WHEREAS, A genuine multiracial democracy requires us to
17   actively dismantle the structures and narratives that rank human
18   beings by origin, religion or ethnicity, and to construct
19   instead a Commonwealth built on principles of radical equality
20   and mutual respect; and
21        WHEREAS, The contributions, resilience and self-determination
22   of Arab Americans help us envision and build a society where
23   every individual and community has the power to shape the
24   conditions of their own life; and
25        WHEREAS, In 2017, Arab America established "National Arab
26   American Heritage Month," and in 2021, the White House first
27   recognized the celebration of "National Arab American Heritage
28   Month" in a letter to the Arab America Foundation; therefore be
29   it
30        RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives recognize the

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 1   month of April 2026 as "National Arab American Heritage Month"
 2   in Pennsylvania; and be it further
 3      RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives honor Arab-
 4   American heritage not as an act of tolerance, but as recognition
 5   of Arab Americans' integral role in building a multiracial
 6   democracy that transcends ethnocentric division and asserts the
 7   equal dignity and full citizenship of all people; and be it
 8   further
 9      RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives encourage all
10   residents to participate in celebrating this heritage and in the
11   ongoing work of creating a Commonwealth where no community is
12   diminished, where power is shared across all people and where
13   democracy becomes real.




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