What exactly is Arabic? Who is Arabic, which countries in the ME

[madmunchie]

makes you an Arabic. I read that Iranians consdier themselves Persians, not Arab. What other distinctions are there? A guy last night said that the whole ME is considered Arabic, I wasn't in agreement with him, I thought there were more criteria than just living in the ME, such as Israel are Jews and Iran considers themselves Persian?????

Is being Arab a race?

This friend said that Canadians as well as Mexicans can be called Americans because we all live on North America, but the ME isn't a continent, so that doesn't (as far as I can think) apply to Arabs..... Can somebody help me out? Or, at least point me into the right direction.