>>I know we (I'm Jewish too) have co-opted the word for our own use, but just to be correct about it, one cannot be anti-semitic if one likes arabs.
>
>I understand your reasoning. :)
>Let me add to this that officially, 'semites' are those who speak a semite language. So, formally, an anti-semite would be someone who detests those who speak a semite language. Many jews do not speak any of those languages. You and I neither.

Most especially not me. I'm still a bit put out with my parents for never speaking to us in the languages they knew. Both my parents were born in Canada, but growing up, my dad spoke Russian and my mother spoke Yiddish (and English). My mother's parents were from Romania. My dad didn't really speak much English until he started school. Until the day he died, he had a trace of a Russian accent. I like to tell people (without elaborating), that his parents are from Georgia.

But neither spoke to us in other than English. Frankly, I loved the sound of Russian when my dad spoke to friends on the phone. It would have been nice to have been naturally tri-lingual.