Arkan was born in Lebanon in 1945. When he was two years old, his family immigrated to Brazil and settled in the city ofAnápolis nearBrasília.[1] The1964 Brazilian coup d'état overthrew the government ofJoão Goulart just as Simaan had begun studying physics at theUniversity of São Paulo. In response to this, he became a student activist.[2][3][4][5] Sought by the political police and sentenced to jail in absentia, he went underground.[6][7] His name was then cited in several prosecutions. Forced to flee Brazil, he arrived in Paris in 1970.
After a few years in France, Simaan refrained from activities that were connected with his prior political involvement. In Paris he resumed his studies in physics at theUniversity Paris Diderot. He then attended theInstitut Supérieur des Matériaux et de la Construction Mécanique from which he received an engineering degree. Following a short spell in industry, he realized that he wanted to teach,[8] so he obtained theagrégation in physics.
In 2012 he was one of the founders ofPlanète Amazone,[9][10] a French non-governmental organization defending indigenous peoples.[11] He took part in the travels in Europe of the chiefRaoni.[12]
All his books were originally written in French, and many of them have won awards.
(With Joëlle Fontaine) "L'Image du Monde des Babyloniens à Newton" (Adapt Editions, Paris, 1998)
"Cette sentence vous fait plus peur qu'à moi-même :Giordano Bruno" (Cahiers rationalistes, 2000)
"La science au péril de sa vie – les aventuriers de la mesure du monde" (Vuibert / Adapt, Paris, 2001.) In 2002 this book was awarded Prize of Special Book in Astronomy (Prix Spécial du livre d'astronomie)
"Vénus devant le soleil – comprendre et observer un phénomène astronomique" (Vuibert / Adapt, 2003). This book concerns thetransit of Venus across the Sun.
"L'Image du Monde deNewton àEinstein" (Vuibert / Adapt, Paris, 2005)
"Le paradoxe de la science:Fritz Haber" (Cahiers rationalistes n° 579, November 2005)
"Un marin en Terre des perroquets", (Ancre de marine éditions, Saint-Malo, 2024), 156 p.ISBN978-2841414789
Viens, on s’en va ! – Immigration, dictature, exil, Éditions Zinédi, 2025 (Born in Lebanon, the author recounts his immigration to Brazil, his political commitment against the Brazilian dictatorship, his arrest and his exile in France, where he became an associate professor of physics, then an activist for the defense of forests and indigenous peoples).[14][15]
^https://www.historia.uff.br/stricto/td/1730.pdf |Reorganização do movimento trotskista no Brasil– a formação da Organização Socialista Internacionalista (1968–1976). Um capítulo da IV Internacional no Brasil. Uma contribuição à história do trotskismo no Brasil |Tiago de Oliveira
