Saving non-english text into database problem !!

Hi I have a strange problem that I can not figure out how to solve .. I'm trying to save some data into a regular mySQL database table by using a normal php insertion script but I'm trying to save "Arabic Text" and here comes the problem .. When I'm performing the insertion by writing the actual text directly into the insert SQL statement the insertion performed well, and I can view the data again correctly. But when I'm performing the insertion by passing variables to the insertion SQL statement, the text does not get saved correctly and when I try to view the saved data I see garbage instead. (I was using the same table for both cases) Thanks in advance