The national IBGE census has not questioned the ancestry of the Brazilian people for several decades, considering that immigration to Brazil declined almost to 0 in the second half of the 20th century.

In the last census questioning ancestry, in 1940, 107,074 Brazilians said they were the children of a Syrian, Lebanese, Palestinian, Iraqi or Arab father.

According to a 2008 IBGE survey, 0.9% of the white Brazilians interviewed said they had a family background in Western Asia, which would give about one million people.

Arab immigration to Brazil started in the 1890s as Lebanese and Syrian people fled the political and economic instability caused by the collapse of the Ottoman Empire; the majority were Christian but there were also many Muslims.

When they were first processed in the ports of Brazil, they were counted as Turks because they carried passports issued by the Turkish Ottoman Empire that ruled the present day territories of Lebanon and Syria.

Arab immigration to Brazil grew also after World War I and the rest of the 20th century, and concentrated in the states of São Paulo, Mato Grosso do Sul, Minas Gerais, Goiás, and Rio de Janeiro.

Most Arab immigrants in Brazil have worked as traders, roaming the vast country to sell textiles and clothes and open new markets.

[12] Many important Brazilians are of Arab descent, including important politicians such as Paulo Maluf, Geraldo Alckmin, Gilberto Kassab, former President Michel Temer, José Maria Alkmin, artists, writers (for instance Raduan Nassar) and models.