Most people in the West have never met an Arab Christian.
They assume "Arab" means "Muslim".
It doesn't.
Myriam Charabaty is one of them — a Lebanese Christian, a journalist, and someone who has lived the story the media keeps getting wrong.
She joined me to talk about her personal journey into journalism, and the intricate ties between Christianity and Islam in the Middle East.
Christianity was born there
Christianity is a Middle Eastern religion.
Jesus wasn't a European; he was a Semite from Roman Palestine (the Roman Empire).
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The church spread from Antioch (modern Turkey), to Damascus (Syria), to Alexandria (Egypt) — long before it reached Rome or London.
Consider the following:
- Christians were about 13.6% of the Middle East's population in 1910; by 2010 that had collapsed to roughly 4.2%.
- By 2025, they'll likely make up around 3.6% of the region.
- Egypt still has the largest Christian community in the region — roughly 9 to 10 million Copts.
- Lebanon, Turkey, Syria, and Palestine saw Christian populations fall by at least 10 percentage points during the 20th century.
So the story isn't "Christianity arrived in the Middle East"; it's "Christianity is leaving the Middle East" — and, as Myriam argues, not for the reasons we're told.
The real threat is imperialism
This was the heart of our conversation.
Myriam underscored the shared values of Christianity and Islam, and dug into the historical context — including the Crusades, which continue to shape the region's dynamics centuries later.
The wounds are old, but they haven't healed.
Her argument is simple: the real threat to the Arab world is not religion.
It's imperialism and hegemony, often fuelled by Western influence that has deeply affected Arab identity. Drawn borders, installed dictators, backed coups, and then lectured Arabs about their "backwardness". It doesn't make sense to me, though. I've been to the UAE, for example, and it's anything but backwards.
Meanwhile, look at the following photo:
Saint George Maronite Cathedral standing beside the Mohammad Al-Amin Mosque in downtown Beirut — is, in a single picture, what coexistence in the Levant actually looks like.
Christians and Muslims have lived side by side for centuries; often peacefully.
The relationship is complicated, yes — but it's a local story, not the clash-of-civilisations cartoon the Western media sells.
Zionism is driven by Christians
Here's where it gets uncomfortable for Western folks.
Myriam critiqued the negative role of Zionism, pointing out that it is largely driven by Christian Zionists rather than Jews.
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- There are an estimated 20 to 50 million Christian Zionists in the US.
- That's more than the total number of Jews worldwide.
- The largest pro-Israel organisation in America — Christians United for Israel (CUFI) — claims millions more members than the entire American Jewish community.
So when someone says "the Israel lobby is a Jewish project", they're missing most of the picture.
A huge chunk of the political muscle comes from American evangelicals who want Israel for their own end-times theology. Myriam, as an actual Middle Eastern Christian, finds this bizarre — and dangerous.
I think she's on point.
After all, there is nothing in the Bible about modern Israel, which was created by British Empire in 1948, and is actually a secular state.
She also highlighted how events like October 7 have reignited the Palestinian cause, bringing renewed focus to what's really going on.
What is Takfirism?
Another concept Myriam unpacked was Takfirism.
Takfir is when a Muslim (or someone else) declares another Muslim a non-believer or an unbeliever.
It's essentially excommunication with weapons. Groups like ISIS (which was created by the US) built their entire strategy on it — declaring whole populations apostate and therefore fair game.
Another word for it might be "Islamism"; but "Takfirism" is more precise, because it describes a method, not just an ideology. Which ties into what's happening in Europe with the mass immigration problem. The typical narrative is that Muslims are taking over and destroying Europe. However, it's a Western-backed political agenda (Takfirism) disguised as Islam.
In other words, the extremists flooding social media aren't representative of Middle Eastern Islam.
They're often products of Gulf-funded, Western-tolerated ideologies — exported to European cities and then used to scare Europeans. (To be clear, the Gulf states are all in bed with Israel.)
The whole thing is a psyop.
Why I enjoyed this one
I talk to a lot of people about the Middle East. Very few of them are actually from the Middle East, and fewer still are Christians from it.
Myriam is both.
Three takeaways that stuck with me:
- Christians and Muslims in the Levant share far more than the media admits — culturally, historically, and morally.
- The destabilisers of the region are empires, not religions.
- The loudest Zionists in the world aren't even Jewish.
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