Arabs

Noun

Arab (plural Arabs)

1. (strictly) A member of the Semitic ethnic group native to the Arabian Peninsula.
2. (broadly) A person from the Middle East and North Africa, whose mother tongue is Arabic.
   • This backlash also fails to take into account that Israel, for all its faults, is a multicultural society where almost half of graduating doctors today are Arabs or Druze.2023 October 29, Thomas L. Friedman, “Please, Israel, Don’t Get Lost in Hamas’s Tunnels”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 11 Nov 2023
3. (uncommon) An Arabian horse.
   • Having taken a very early breakfast, I mounted about eight o'clock my grey Arab, and without anything occurring worthy of note, killed the first three boars in the space of an hour, […]1887, Edward B. Baker, Sport in Bengal: and How, When, and where to Seek it, page 61
4. (archaic) A street Arab.
   • a. 1892, Charles Spurgeon, a sermon
     You Christian people often see the little gutter children — the poor little arabs in the street — and you feel much pity for them, as well you may.

   Synonyms:

   Ayrab, woolly-head, sand nigger

See all 8 meanings of arab