Tag: Saudi Arabia

Saudis want to ‘protect’ Iraqi Sunnis

The craziest and most dangerous article I have seen in a long time. If the Saudis really started massively arming and financing Sunni insurgent groups in Iraq, we’d probably have a 20-year Persian Gulf war.

Over the past year, a chorus of voices has called for Saudi Arabia to protect the Sunni community in Iraq and thwart Iranian influence there. Senior Iraqi tribal and religious figures, along with the leaders of Egypt, Jordan and other Arab and Muslim countries, have petitioned the Saudi leadership to provide Iraqi Sunnis with weapons and financial support. Moreover, domestic pressure to intervene is intense. Major Saudi tribal confederations, which have extremely close historical and communal ties with their counterparts in Iraq, are demanding action. They are supported by a new generation of Saudi royals in strategic government positions who are eager to see the kingdom play a more muscular role in the region.

Because King Abdullah has been working to minimize sectarian tensions in Iraq and reconcile Sunni and Shiite communities, because he gave President Bush his word that he wouldn’t meddle in Iraq (and because it would be impossible to ensure that Saudi-funded militias wouldn’t attack U.S. troops), these requests have all been refused. They will, however, be heeded if American troops begin a phased withdrawal from Iraq. As the economic powerhouse of the Middle East, the birthplace of Islam and the de facto leader of the world’s Sunni community (which comprises 85 percent of all Muslims), Saudi Arabia has both the means and the religious responsibility to intervene.

On the upside, this would probably bring down the al-Sauds in the long term. But probably even then, it’s not worth it. One also wonders whether its publication (alongside with that leaked Hadley memo) isn’t meant to scare Maliki for his meeting with Bush.

Holiday snap

People who read this blog will know I am no great fan of Saudis and their morbid culture, or lack thereof.(Yes, not all of them, I know, allow me some artistic license here…)

Do you really need more explanation that their recent attempt to ban women from entering the great mosque at Mecca (cutting with all Islamic precedent) or this man who lingers in a jail because he once joked about Muhammad’s penis?

It’s not only that they are intolerant bigots, but also that they are incredibly stupid. This picture had me rolling on the floor in laughter for a good 10 minutes:

Picturepose

New Saudi opposition group

Never heard of this before:

CAIRO — A Saudi opposition group is set to breathe new life into the kingdom’s dormant political reform movement. But in a sign of changing alliances, its founder hopes for a boost from public anger over government criticism of Hezbollah.
Founded in Paris by the exiled son of the last ruler of part of present-day Saudi Arabia, the Saudi Democratic Opposition Front claims about 2,000 members, mostly in Saudi Arabia.
It aims to provide an umbrella network for secular and Islamist activists both inside and outside the country who are campaigning for the overthrow of the al-Saud ruling family.
“We have founded the Saudi Democratic Opposition Front to push for 100 percent democracy in the country,” said Talal Mohammed Al-Rasheed, the son of the last ruler of the independent Rashidi emirate, which reigned in Saudi Arabia’s northwestern region of Hail from 1835 to 1921.
“If the al-Saud [family] introduce genuine democracy, we will support them. But if they do not, we will push by all peaceful means to make them give up their power,” said Mr. Al-Rasheed, 72, who still likes to be addressed as Prince Talal.

I don’t know what to think of these people. I found this interesting though:

Earlier this month, Mr. Al-Rasheed gave an hourlong interview to the Paris bureau chief of the Pan-Arab, Qatar-based Al Jazeera satellite news network. After announcing the formation of his party and advertising the forthcoming interview with Mr. Al-Rasheed on its news bar at the bottom of the screen, Al Jazeera suddenly removed the information and the interview was spiked.

“My sources told me that after they saw the information on Al Jazeera’s news ticker, the Saudi government called the station more than five times in one hour, pleading with them not to air it,” Mr. Al-Rasheed said, adding that Al Jazeera had “obviously caved in to the pressure.”

Et tu, Jazeera?

Saudi woman ecstatic over permission to ‘marry out’

From Arab News, quoting the Saudi Al-Madinah

Saudi Woman Ecstatic Over Permission to ‘Marry Out’
Arab News

MAKKAH, 15 August 2006 — A court here ruled in favor of a Saudi woman seeking to marry a non-Saudi, causing the forty-something woman to emit thrilling cries of bliss that echoed through the chamber, the daily Al-Madinah reported yesterday. The woman, who had been petitioning the court to permit her to get married to a non-Saudi, was so ecstatic at the decision that she not only screamed in joy but also jumped about embracing her relatives. In Saudi Arabia it can be very difficult for Saudi women to marry non-Saudis, which, to some Saudi women, is a very unfortunate thing — especially to older Saudi women who live in a society where many men taken on younger second wives, or divorce their older wives, often viewing older women as “expired goods.�

ME Politics 101

Here’s an AP story building on the recent news reports about a new initiative whereby Egypt and Saudi Arabia would intervene to try to sway Syria away from its alliance with Iran and Hizbollah–in an very classic exchange for a promise from Washington not to give them any headaches about this annoying democracy thing.
Though the AP story was good quality reporting, the title was rather funny: “Moderate Arabs look to curb militants.� “Moderate Arabs�? AP’s standards for political “moderation� seem to lie in how close the regime is to DC. One regime may sodomize dissidents, the other beheads them, but still according to AP they are “moderates.�

Moderate Arabs look to curb militants

By Steven R. Hurst and Salah Nasrawi

CAIRO, Egypt — Egypt and Saudi Arabia – both with strained U.S. ties – are working to entice Syria to end support for Hezbollah, a move that is central to resolving the conflict in Lebanon and unhitching Damascus from its alliance-of-convenience with Iran, the Shiite Muslim guerrillas’ other main backer, Arab diplomats and analysts said Sunday.

The two Arab heavyweights were prepared to spend heavily from Egypt’s political capital in the region and Saudi Arabia’s vast financial reserves to rein in Hezbollah as well as the Hamas militants now running the Palestinian government. In return, Washington would ease pressure on its moderate Arab allies for broad democratic reform, the diplomats and analysts said.

Continue reading ME Politics 101

CPJ on the state of Saudi media

The Committee to Protect Journalists has issued a rare report on the state of the Saudi press:

Although newspapers are privately owned, the state exerts tremendous influence over what is reported. The government approves the appointments of editors-in-chief, a process that journalists say is done behind closed doors with the oversight of Prince Nayef bin Abdel Aziz, the powerful interior minister. In practice, though not by law, newspapers require the financial or political backing of a member of the royal family. Unlike in other parts of the region, “opposition journalism” simply doesn’t exist in Saudi Arabia. While some columnists have criticized low-level ministers, news coverage is typically devoid of anything reflecting negatively on the royal family, high-ranking officials, and the country’s religious clerics and institutions.

Top editors and most journalists view themselves as defenders of the ruling Al-Saud family, and government officials ensure allegiance by applying behind-the-scenes pressure—issuing directions on sensitive stories, banning coverage of certain topics, and taking punitive actions against journalists. Over the past decade, CPJ research shows, dozens of editors, writers, academics, and other media critics have been suspended, dismissed from their jobs, or banned from appearing in the Saudi press. The actions came by government order, the intervention of religious leaders, or at the initiative of editors. Other journalists have faced detention, questioning by security authorities, and travel bans.

The report goes on to describe how writers get blacklisted, the flux and reflux of censorship, the intervention of religious authorities, and more. This type of information is rare because, while easier than before, investigative reporting is still quite tough in Sadist Arabia.

Via Tatteh Aardvark, who has a summary of the report’s findings.

Help unblock Eve

Sandmonkey writes:

The Saudi female blogger Eve just had her blog blocked in Saudi thanks to the valiant efforts of the Saudi male Blogistanis who really hate to see women expressing themselves over the inetrnet, or like, anywhere. The other saudi female bloggers (Aya and Farah to cite an example) are fuming over it, not to mention afraid that their blogs are next. There is, however, something we can do to help: Go fill this unblock request form . Enough people fill it, and she gets her blog back,thus sending a collective FUCK YOU to any Saudi male asshole who thinks he has the right to tell Saudi women what she can say on her own damn blog.

Form filled.

“The dogs of Ibn Saud”

In what I assume is a response to Monday’s broadcast on Saudi television about the five star treatment inside Saudi penitentiaries, I found this statement on a Saudi Islamist message board today. It is purportedly from prisoners in Alisha Prison in Saudi Arabia, and was posted to Al Qalaa Web site by a group or an individual, called “The Beast of the Peninsula” (Wihish Al Gezira). Here is a partial and very rough translation of their complaints about the conditions inside a Saudi prison, which they say is filled with “oppression, torture, and terror”:

– Sleep deprivation for periods of up 10 to 20 days.
– Prolonged detentions without any investigation, or knowing why they were arrested, or what the charges are against them.
– Forcing prisoners to confess to crimes that they have no connection to, and that there is no evidence of, or any witnesses to. Confessions are extracted under the threat or practice of psychological and physical torture, sleep deprivation, denying visitation rights, or any communications with the outside for months and sometimes over a year.
– Interrogating the wives of wanted men without her male custodian being present, and using bad manners and behavior with them.
– Being beaten, and insulted with dirty words, being bound and blindfolded for upwards of two weeks and not even being allowed to go to the bathroom or pray.
– Putting prisoners in a black box 1.85 m x .90 m, bound and blindfolded, forbidden to say a word. Sleep deprivation to the point of insanity where people actually have had to be transported to the hospital as a result. Some people have spent nearly a year in these cages in order to force confessions.
– Cameras on the prisoners 24 hours a day.
– Bad lighting which hurts the eyesight and causes depression.
– Prisoners in bad health are deprived medical attention.
– No change of clothes or bed linens for long periods of time.
– The prisoner does not get any of his requests no matter how minor unless he carries out prolonged hunger strikes and sit-ins, and then come only empty promises.
– If the prisoner asks to have his case reviewed, or requests to contact his family, he is insulted and intimidated.
– Inmates are terrified with random transfers to other prisons and solitary confinement.

Prisoner Demands:
– Taking action on our cases that have stagnated for a long time without any judicial rulings.
– Allowing us to contact our families to inform them that we are in prison so they can stop worrying, and to allow visits.
– Improve the living and health conditions of the prisoners, and better treatment of the prisoners.
– The investigation of those who have not had their cases examined, and no longer ignoring them in a cell without any access to legal procedures.

A follow-up comment on the same message board reads: “The prisoners of Tel Aviv are better off and there is more concern for them than the dogs of Ibn Saud.”

This jail is so cosy!

Brian Whitaker has a funny story about how Saudi Arabia had broadcast a documentary about its most famous jail to convince Islamist rebels to turn themselves in:

“I swear to God, they [the jailers] are nicer than our parents,” said Othman al-Amri, once No 21 on the kingdom’s list of most-wanted terror suspects.

The programme, broadcast on Saudi television late on Monday, included brief footage from inside the jail, showing clean facilities and beds lined next to one another.

It signalled a new effort by the authorities to encourage militants to give themselves up and to allay suspicions that they would be ill treated if they did so. But persuading them to opt for al-Haer may prove difficult.

In September at least 67 prisoners died and 20 others were injured, along with three guards, when fire swept through part of the jail.

I think they might not be so easily convinced.

ICG on two strands of Saudi Islamism

The International Crisis Group has a new report out on “Who are the Islamists?” It makes some important points about making a distinction between the types of Islamist groups operating there, a particularly important thing in a country where everybody, including (or rather especially) the regime claims to be Islamic. There are also some interesting thoughts on the need to nurture a more progressive Islamist strand that has been overshadowed by the Al Qaeda types.

Beneath the all-encompassing Wahhabi influence, Saudi Islamism developed over several decades a wide variety of strains. These included radical preachers, who condemned what they considered the regime’s deviation from the principles of Islam and its submission to the U.S.; social reformers, convinced of the need to modernise educational and religious practices and challenging the puritan strand of Islam that dominates the Kingdom; political reformers, who gave priority to such issues as popular participation, institution-building, constitutionalisation of the monarchy, and elections; and jihadist activists, for the most part formed in Afghanistan and who gradually brought their violent struggle against Western — in particular U.S. — influence to their homeland.

By the late 1990s, the Islamist field was increasingly polarised between two principal strands. Among the so-called new Islamists, political reformers sought to form the broadest possible centrist coalition, cutting across religious and intellectual lines and encompassing progressive Sunni Islamists, liberals, and Shiites. More recently, they have sought to include as well elements of the more conservative but highly popular sahwa, the group of shaykhs, professors and Islamic students that had come to prominence a decade earlier by denouncing the state’s failure to conform to Islamic values, widespread corruption, and subservience to the U.S. Through petitions to Crown Prince Abdallah — the Kingdom’s de facto ruler – they formulated demands for political and social liberalisation. Their surprising ability to coalesce a diverse group prompted the government — which initially had been conciliatory — to signal by the arrests cited above that there were limits to its tolerance.”

ICG reports tend to be well-balanced and insightful. Don’t miss this one if you’re interested in Saudi Arabia, especially because information about that country is scant enough already.