Randy, I'm still trying to find the Arabic connection, could you give me the site you are refering to? This is what I've came up with so far:
The Obamas are members of the Luo, Kenya's third-largest ethnic group. They are part of a larger family of ethnic groups, collectively also known as Luo, belonging to the Eastern Sudanic branch of the Nilo-Saharan phylum. The Obama family is largely concentrated in the western province of Nyanza.
Besides Senator Obama, Barack Obama Sr. fathered six other sons and a daughter. All but one live in Britain or the United States.
Barack Obama, Sr.
Main article: Barack Obama, Sr.
Barack Obama's father, born 1936, died 1982. Government economist in Kenya.
Hussein Onyango Obama
Barack Obama's paternal grandfather (c. 1895-1979) who worked as a mission cook. He joined the British Army during World War I. Originally a Roman Catholic, he took the name Hussein when he converted to Islam, a name that he passed on to his children.
Habiba Akuma Obama
Barack Obama's paternal grandmother, and the second wife of Hussein Onyango Obama.
Sarah Obama
Paternal step-grandmother of Barack Obama, born 1922. Also known, through the addition of her late husband's name, as Sarah Onyango Obama,and sometimes referred to as Sarah Ogwel, Sarah Hussein Obama or Sarah Anyango Obama, she lives in Nyang’oma Kogelo village, 30 miles west of western Kenya's main town, Kisumu, on the edge of Lake Victoria.
Sarah Obama was the third wife of Obama's paternal grandfather, Hussein Onyango Obama (c. 1895-1979]). Although not a blood relation, Barack Obama nevertheless calls her "Granny Sarah". She was just 16 when she married Obama's grandfather, an older man who was her father's friend.
Despite living in a small rural village in Kenya, Sarah Obama is well aware of Senator Obama's fame in the United States, and has photographs of his successes on her walls. She recently publicly complained about false reports about Senator Obama's religion. In March 2008, she stated in an interview with USA Today that he is a Christian, just as she is. In a previous interview with the New York Times, however, she had professed to be "a strong believer of the Islamic faith." Initially welcoming reporters, she now shuns media attention, wary that her words and actions could be misconstrued and used against her step grandson.
On July 4, 2008 she attended the Independence Day celebrations in Nairobi, hosted by Michael Ranneberger, the US ambassador in Kenya. Sarah, who speaks Luo and only a few words of English, communicates with Senator Obama through an interpreter.
Kezia Obama
Barack Obama's step-mother, born c. 1940. She is Barack Obama Sr.'s first wife whom he married in Kenya before studying abroad in the United States. Also known as Kezia Grace Obama. She currently lives in Bracknell, Berkshire, England.
Malik Obama
Barack Obama's half-brother, also known as Abongo or Roy, born c. March, 1958, son of Barack Obama, Sr. with his first wife, Kezia. Malik Obama was born and raised in Nairobi, Kenya. He earned a degree in accounting from the University of Nairobi. He met his half-brother for the first time in 1985 when Barack flew from Chicago to Washington, D.C. to visit him. Malik and his half-brother Barack were best men at each other's weddings.[38] Barack Obama brought his wife Michelle to Kenya three years later, and they met with Malik again while Barack was introducing Michelle to many other new relatives.
Although much of the Obama family had dispersed throughout Kenya and overseas most, including Malik Obama, still considered their rural village on the shores of Lake Victoria to be their true home, and felt that those who left the village had become culturally "lost".A frequent visitor to the United States,and consultant in Washington, D.C. for several months per year, he nevertheless settled in the Obamas' ancestral home, Nyang’oma Kogelo, a village of several hundred people that he preferred to the city for its slow pace. He ran a small electronics shop a half hour drive outside of town. All of his father's other surviving children were living in the United States or England.
During his brother's Presidential campaign, Malik Obama was a spokesman for the extended Obama family in Kenya, dealing with safety and privacy concerns arising from increased attention from the press.
Abo Obama
Barack Obama's half-brother (born 1968) International telephone store manager in Kenya.
Auma Obama
Barack Obama's half-sister, born c. 1960.[44] As of July 2008, development worker in Kenya. She studied German at the University of Heidelberg from 1981 to 1987, and graduated with a PhD based on a dissertation about the conception of labor in Germany and its literary reflections. Auma Obama is resident in London, where she married in 1996 to Englishman Ian Manners and they have a daughter named Akinyi (b. 1997).
Bernard Obama
Barack Obama's half-brother, born 1970, son of Barack Obama, Sr. and his first wife Kezia. An auto parts supplier in Nairobi, Kenya, he has one child. Bernard converted to Islam in later life and is quoted, "I’m a Muslim, I don’t deny it. My father was raised a Muslim. But it’s not an issue. I don’t know what all the hullabaloo is about." He currently resides in Bracknell, England with his mother Kezia.
Ruth Ndesandjo
Born Ruth Nidesand, in U.S. c. 1940s, Barack Obama Sr's third wife and a private kindergarten director in Kenya.Ruth's two sons with Barack Obama, Sr., are Mark and David; her third son, Joseph Ndesandjo, was born c. 1980 from a subsequent marriage to a Tanzanian. David and Mark both went by the name Ndesandjo.
Mark Ndesandjo
Barack Obama's half-brother, son of Ruth Nidesand and Barack Obama Sr. He runs an Internet company called WorldNexus that advises Chinese corporations how best to reach international customers. Mark studied physics at Stanford University, and has lived in Shenzhen, China since 2002 and is married to a Chinese woman.
David Ndesandjo
Barack Obama's half-brother, son of Ruth Nidesand and Barack Obama Sr. Killed in a motorcycle accident.
George Hussein Onyango Obama
Youngest half-brother of Barack Obama, born c.1982, son of Barack Obama Sr. and a woman in Kenya named Jael who now lives in Atlanta, Georgia. George was six months old when his father died in an automobile accident, after which he was raised in Nairobi by his mother and a French step-father. He later lived in South Korea for two years while his mother resided there for business reasons. Returning to Kenya, George Obama was homeless for several years ("slept rough"), then was given a home by his aunt in a six-by-eight foot corrugated metal shack in the Nairobi, Kenya slum of Huruma Flats. Today, George Obama is studying to become a mechanic. After the Italian language edition of Vanity Fair quoted George Obama as being "ashamed" of being related to Barack Obama[citation needed], the British Daily Telegraph's contradicted this, with George Obama saying he was "furious at subsequent reports that he had been abandoned by the Obama family and that he was filled with shame about living in a slum" In an interview with CNN, George Obama said that he will have none of the criticism against Barack Obama. He said that he drew inspiration from his famous half-brother and that he "knows that his half-brother will be the next president.... I was brought up well. I live well even now. The magazines, they have exaggerated everything... I think I kind of like it here. There are some challenges, but maybe it is just like where you come from, there are the same challenges."
Zeituni Onyango
It has been suggested that Zeituni Onyango be merged into this article or section.
Main article: Zeituni Onyango
Half-sister of Barack Obama Sr., born May 29, 1952 in Kenya, Onyango is referred to as "Aunti Zeituni" in Senator Obama's memoir, Dreams from My Father. Barack Obama first met Onyango in 1988 in his first trip to Kenya. She worked as a computer programmer at Kenya Breweries in Nairobi during that period. Onyango suffers from a physical disability and uses a walking stick.She claims to have visited the United States multiple times since 1975, and to have returned to Kenya each time.
By 2008, Onyango had been living quietly in a South Boston public housing project, according to Boston Public Housing Authority officials. William McGonigle, deputy director of the Authority, called Onyango a "delightful lady" and "a great resident" who did a "wonderful job" as a public health advocate. He commented that Oyango was "not looking for fame or notoriety, and we were as surprised as anyone to learn she was related to the Democratic nominee."Onyango worked as a volunteer computer systems co-ordinator for the Experience Corps, a program in which adults over 55 mentor children in their communities."
Onyango became the subject of media attention in the final week of the 2008 U.S. presidential election in which Barack Obama was the Democratic candidate. The impetus for the scrutiny was an article by the Associated Press, based on anonymous government sources, which reported that Onyango was living in the United States without valid immigration status, after being asked to leave the country when her request for asylum was denied. Onyango's case resulted in a special nationwide directive within Immigrations and Customs Enforcement requiring any deportations to be approved at the level of ICE regional directors before the U.S presidential election and led to an investigation by the Federal government to determine the source of the leaked information and whether any laws were broken by federal officials in the Bush administration or in the McCain campaign in disclosing information about her immigration status.
Federal Election Commission records show that Onyango donated multiple times to her nephew's campaign; the records compiled by The Huffington Post show she gave a total of $260 to the campaign. Since it is illegal for foreign citizens and immigrants without green cards to make political donations, the Obama campaign announced their intention to return the money.
Omar Obama
(born c. 1950s in Nyang’oma Kogelo) son of Onyango and Sarah Obama and uncle of Barack Obama. Resides in Boston, Massachusetts.
Yusuf Obama
(born c. 1950s in Nyang’oma Kogelo) son of Onyango and Sarah Obama and uncle of Barack Obama.
Said Obama
(born c. 1950s in Nyang’oma Kogelo) son of Onyango and Sarah Obama and uncle of Barack Obama.
Obama's Mother's side:
Ann Dunham
Main article: Ann Dunham
Mother of Barack Obama, born in 1942, died in 1995. Birthname Stanley Ann Dunham. Anthropologist in Hawaii and Indonesia.
Madelyn Dunham
Main article: Madelyn and Stanley Dunham
Barack Obama's maternal grandmother. Born in 1922 and died shortly before midnight on November 2, 2008. She was a bank vice president in Hawaii.
Stanley Dunham
Main article: Madelyn and Stanley Dunham
Grandfather of Barack Obama, born 1918, died 1992. World War II U.S. Army sergeant, furniture salesman in Hawaii.
Charles T. Payne
Great-uncle of Barack Obama, born 1925. Served during World War II in the U.S. Army 89th Infantry Division. Obama has often described his role in liberating Buchenwald concentration camp. He was assistant director of The University of Chicago's Library. There was a brief media controversy over an error made by Obama when he mistakenly said that his uncle had helped liberate Auschwitz concentration camp, when in fact he had helped liberate Buchenwald concentration camp.
Maya Soetoro-Ng
Main article: Maya Soetoro-Ng
Half-sister of Barack Obama, born August 15, 1970 in Jakarta, Indonesia) Married to Konrad Ng, mother of a daughter, Suhaila. Teacher in Hawaii.
Konrad Ng
Brother-in-law of Barack Obama, born 1974. A Chinese Canadian, he is assistant professor at the University of Hawaii's Academy of Creative Media. His parents are from Kudat and Sandakan, two small towns in Sabah, Malaysia and he was born and raised in Burlington, Ontario. Married Maya Soetoro-Ng at the end of 2003 in Hawaii. They have one daughter, Suhaila.
This is all I've been able to find, with no reference to Middle Eastern decent.
~Brian
