Do you consider the Maltese to be Arabs?

[Berahthraban]

You don't have to look like one to be one. Arab is a linguistic based identity. People from Sudan have in terms of features less in common with Middle Easterners than the Sardinians do, but they're still considered Arab.

Nope, it is an ethnic identity too. Maltese and Yemenis are Semitic in the way Swedes and Indians are Indo-European.

[Tacitus]

If they are not Arabs then neither are Levantines. Since Levantine Arabic, especially the Lebanese variety, has more Aramaic influence than Maltese has Sicilian/Italian.

False. The majority of words in Maltese are of Italian/Sicilian origin, and has a lower rate of Quranic Arabic roots than Lebanese Arabic:

An analysis of the etymology of the 41,000 words in Aquilina's Maltese-English Dictionary shows that 32.41% are of Arabic origin, 52.46% are from Sicilian and Italian, and 6.12% are from English.

Żammit (2000) found that 40% of a sample of 1,820 Quranic Arabic roots were found in Maltese, a lower percentage than found in Moroccan (58%) and Lebanese Arabic (72%).[40]

[Thunder_shock]

Nope, it is an ethnic identity too. Maltese and Yemenis are Semitic in the way Swedes and Indians are Indo-European.

So you believe that Sudanese and Saudis are off the same ethnic stock?

[Myanthropologies]

Technically speaking they're as arab as syrians are, but they're not interegrated to the Arab world at all. I still think they share more with Italians than with anyone else, but they definitely are closer to arabs than to most Europeans.

[Bezprym]

Technically, they are. They speak Arabic.

That's the place where I stopped reading further.

[Seya]

You don't have to look like one to be one. Arab is a linguistic based identity. People from Sudan have in terms of features less in common with Middle Easterners than the Sardinians do, but they're still considered Arab.

this is true! to be an Arab today means mostly to be an Arab speaker. people from North Sudan consider themselves of being Arabs although they are black (or some hamitic-black mix but definitely not Arabs).

[Numidia]

to be an arab ONE MUST BE FROM ARABIAN PENINSULA and genetically be from this region. they dont. they only have neolithic farmer ancestry and at best some berber blood which doesnt make them arab at all .

the people of arabian peninsula are immigrants or arabized bedouin they are not arab racially because arab has never been a race
arabs were some tribes living in south west arabia before islam. It is know that they are ancestors are abraham and hajar

[LoLeL]

No. The same reason why I don't consider French/English-speaking Africans as French/British. Plus, Maltese people are just classified as a Semitic group not Arab.

[ioan assen]

its depends in what sense are they Arab:
linguistically: yes, the base/core of the language is Arabic, I guess from that point of view they are as Arabic as the English are German
culturally: definitely NOT, they represent everything the Arabs do not; they helped Western Europe in their fight against the Turks, who themselves were very much Arabic influenced, culturally Maltese are everything BUT Arabs, although the architecture of their houses may beg to differ
genetically: NOT, some influence cant be ruled out as the islands aren't big and practically anyone that came and stayed has left their mark but they seem most similar to Southern Italians

[Bobby Martnen]

If they are not Arabs then neither are Levantines. Since Levantine Arabic, especially the Lebanese variety, has more Aramaic influence than Maltese has Sicilian/Italian.

Maronites are White, Levantine Muslims are not.