United States Secretary of Health and Human Services RFK Jr. was speaking at a campaign event in Michigan when he claimed that the Arab community doesn’t produce award-winning scientists and literary figures. RFK Jr. stated:“There are five hundred million Arabs in the world. And yet they don't produce science. They don't win the Nobel Prize. They don't win the Fields Medal. They don't win the Wolf Prize. They don't produce literature.”RFK Jr., whose full name is Robert F. Kennedy Jr., continued to say:“They used to produce; they were the first to make books, and they, in the 13th century, typical Muslim princes had books in their libraries that existed in all of Europe. Oh, and all of that tradition has been destroyed by the Muslim Brotherhood. They have created stagnant societies that do one or two things: hatred, war, and victimization.”It was a dig at the Arab ethnicity of Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, who was born to Egyptian immigrant parents in Rochester Hills, Michigan.RFK Jr.’s claim is false. Several Arab scientists have won the Nobel Prize over the decades, including Dr. Omar M. Yaghi in chemistry in 2025. Dr. Yaghi, 61, was born to Palestinian refugees in Amman, Jordan. The chemist, affiliated with the University of California, Berkeley, shared last year’s honor with Susumu Kitagawa of Kyoto University, Japan, and Richard Robson of the University of Melbourne, Australia, for the development of metal-organic frameworks.Dr. Yaghi also won the 2018 Wolf Prize in Chemistry for pioneering reticular chemistry and his contribution to developing MOFs.Exploring Arabs who have won prestigious awards amid RFK Jr.'s claimsIn the aftermath of the October War between Egypt and Israel, Egyptian politician and military leader Anwar al-Sadat proposed a peace treaty to then-Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin. In 1978, the two nations signed the Camp David Agreement, putting an end to the Israeli occupation of the Sinai Peninsula. Later that year, both men won the Nobel Peace Prize.Egyptian author Naguib Mahfouz was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for his contribution to:“Works rich in nuance, now clear-sighted realistic, now evocatively ambiguous, have formed an Arabian narrative art that applies to all mankind.”In 1994, Israeli politician-statesman Shimon Peres, then-Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, and Palestine Liberation Organization head and Palestinian National Authority chairman Yasser Arafat were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their “efforts to achieve peace in the Middle East.”RFK Jr. gets reminded of Arab Nobel Prize winners. (Image via Threads)Egyptian-American chemist Dr. Ahmed Zewail was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1999. Regarded as the “father of femtochemistry,” Dr. Zewail won the prestigious award for the “study of transition states arising during chemical reactions using femtosecond techniques.” He also won the 1993 Wolf Prize in Chemistry for his work in developing laser femtochemistry.Former Interim Vice President of Egypt Mohamed El Baradei jointly won the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize with the International Atomic Energy Agency for efforts “to prevent the use of nuclear energy for military purposes” and “to ensure its safest use for peaceful purposes.”Yemeni journalist, politician, and human rights activist Tawakkol Karman was awarded the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize together with Liberian politician Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Liberian peace activist Leymah Gbowee for the “non-violent struggle for the safety of women” and for the “full participation of women in building peace.”Omani writer Jokha Alharthi became the first Arab author to win the Man Booker International Prize for her 2019 novel Celestial Bodies.British-Lebanese mathematician Sir Michael Atiyah won the 1966 Fields Medal.RFK Jr. campaigned with Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers and gubernatorial nominee John James in Michigan. Elsewhere, RFK Jr. has been paying attention to the potential health effects of radio frequency radiation and electromagnetic fields, according to a September article by Scientific American.