Hip-hop Meets the Middle East

SAN DIEGO -- An Iraqi-American rap artist is getting headlines for his antiwar song critical of President George Bush and his Iraq War policy, writes Mohamed Kadry in The Arab American News. Tommy Hanna, called “Timz,” generated controversy with the song “Iraq” off his album, “Open for Business.” In interviews with networks like Fox and Al-Jazeera, Hanna has said that he feels the war is destroying the home of his parents. In an interview, Chuck Norris of Fox News asked Hanna if he would have liked to live in Iraq when Saddam Hussein was killing thousands of Iraqis. Hanna responded that the country was relatively safe at that time, whereas today, he said, you can’t walk down the street without fear that a neighbor could kill you. Hanna emphasized that he was born in California, and, contrary to what others have alleged, he is not a terrorist and does not hate America.