Context:

He heard it a few times when he was a teenager in Jordan. According to him, someone trying to “break up the fight or reconcile the parties” would use this saying to calm the people down.

Text:

Original Script: امسحها بلحيتي

Transliteration: Imsa-ha bi lihiti

Translation: Wipe it on my beard

Thoughts:

This saying intrigues me because it does not sound like anything meaningful at first, but it starts making some sense when given some thought. The mediator, by telling the two people/groups to “wipe it on [his] beard,” is saying to leave their grievance there with him. When you wipe dirt from your hand onto another surface, the dirt is no longer on your hand, and it stays on the wall. The fact that there is saying for this shows that Arabs, like many people, commonly act as mediators.