Hate is a WMD (exit zero)
Mary Madigan
Number of people killed by Wahhabi-inspired hatred: 1 million +
Number of people killed in European concentration camps: 11 million
Number of people killed by Atomic bombs: 240,000
I visited New York a few weeks after the 9/11 attacks. Streets in Chinatown and the Village were still guarded by soldiers. The sewers of downtown New York were still clogged with the ashen remains of the dead. The air was still acrid with smoke.
Back then, I wondered what kind of culture could inspire this act of pure hatred. What culture could hold such contempt for human life? What culture could believe that this was a valid expression of their beliefs?
I did some research and learned about the hate that inspired 9/11. We call it terrorism, but most people around the world call it Wahhabism.
Before 9/11, I didn't know much about Wahhabis. I thought Saudi princes were civilized, cosmopolitan types who looked cool in their kaffiyehs and sunglasses. Of course, the only news I cared about then was stocks and tech news. It was 'peacetime'.
According to Former Ambassador to the United Nations, Dore Gold:
Islamic scholars, in particular, have traced the underpinnings of the assault on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon to a very specific creed of Islam practiced in Saudi Arabia, known in the West as Wahhabism...In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, Wahhabism revived the Islamic idea of jihad as military expansionism - a concept that had fallen out of favor with traditional Islam. Wahhabism also broke with Islamic tradition by legitimizing jihad against other Muslims. Puritan Wahhabis believe that non-Wahhabis are less than human, and that they derve to be slaughtered. They have held these beliefs for hundreds of years.
The Saudi Royal family, the mullahs, and most of the population are Wahhabis, and as such they all hold these extremist beliefs.
In the name of Wahhabism, its adherents were extraordinarily brutal toward noncombatants, including women and children, delegitimizing them as mushrikun, or polytheists, who did not have any right to live. Most notably, in 1802 Wahhabi armies slaughtered thousands of Shiites in their holy city of Kerbala.It's traditional for Wahhabi warriors to destroy shrines and graveyards as an expression of contempt.
Such brutality is, in fact, at the core of modern terrorism, for the early Wahhabi warriors acted on - often based on the imprecations of mainstream Wahhabi clerics in Saudi Arabia - is precisely how Osama bin Laden's mass terrorism works.Wahhabism inspired the Muslim Brotherhood, which in turn inspired various extremist/terrorist groups throughout the Middle East. I talk a lot on my blog about Wahhabism. In general, I'm not in favor of their pro-slavery version of Islamic law, and their way it has inspired the current genocidal jihad. I've talked about the contempt that Wahhabis have for those who don't share their beliefs, their belief that our lives are without value, the Arab way of War, possible strategies for fighting it and the fact that Wahhabism has inspired the current Islamist war against the world. But I haven't talked about the weapon that they use - hate.
Saying that hate can be a weapon sounds awfully touchy-feely, and no, I'm not going to say 'all we need is love.' In Rwanda, hundreds of thousands of people were murdered by hate. Hate, inspired by traditional European prejudices and the Thousand Year Reich, was responsible for the deaths of millions. History proves that love, peace and understanding do not stop hate-inspired genocidal warfare.
Our Wahhabi allies and their philosophy slaughtered thousands of innocent Americans during a time of peace.
Our Wahhabi allies and their philosophy are killing innocent people every day. Our response to this has been the application of soft diplomacy, the expressed hope that our Wahhabi allies will change and the implied threat that we will retaliate if our they use some sort of scary weapon (nuclear, biochemical, etc..) to slaughter more thousands of Americans.
We ignore the fact that the hate spread by Wahhabism has already claimed the lives of more than a million innocent people.
We (well, some of us) know how an atomic bomb works, but we don't pay enough attention to the Wahhabi weapon. How do they spread hate? How has this been done before?
According to the House Committee on International Relations' Rwanda Report:
In three short, cruel months, between April and July 1994, Rwanda experienced a genocide more efficient than that carried out by the Nazis in the Second World War. The killers were a varied bunch: drunk extremists chanting "Hutu power, Hutu power;" uniformed soldiers and militia men intent on wiping out the Tutsi inyenzi, or "cockroaches;" and ordinary villagers who had never themselves contemplated killing before, but who decided to join the frenzy.Saudis have been dehumanizing non-Wahhabis for hundreds of years. They call themselves `human beings', to set themselves apart from the rest of the world's cockroaches. Extremist Muslims around the world (even, strangely enough, extremist Shi'ites) cooperate with and are inspired by Wahhabis.The murderers, and their ebullient abettors, were turned into ghastly marionettes, consumed by a manic wrath. Men and women, young and old, religious and agnostic, became killers. They killed with radios in one hand and machetes in the other. They killed in churches, at traffic lights, in supermarkets, and in homes. They killed after taunting, after savage beating, and, often, after raping.
In Rwanda, the Hutus spread hate by radio, the Saudis spread hate through mosques, universities, political donations, diplomacy.
The Hutus used whatever weapons were at hand, as the Wahhabi-financed mujahideen do.
Diplomacy, love and a belief in human rights did not stop the Rwandan genocide. But it could have been slowed by an application of military force - and by stopping the radio broadcasts at the source.
We don't have to worry about what will happen when the extremists are in charge of Saudi Arabia - they already are. We don't need to worry about what will happen when the extremists get their hands on a WMD. They're already using one, and it's killing people every day.
We need to stop the broadcasts at the source.
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- Hate is a WMD (exit zero)
Injustice is something that all civilizations agree justifies violence. The idea of creating a "social injustice" is to support the use of violence against it. It is usually not so difficult to turn a feeling of opposition to injustice, to a hate for that injustice, to a hate to a "people" who support or commit that injustice -- usually including demonizing them to the point of them not being considered human.
See my Bush hate, Jew hate, Success hate.
While Wahabi hate is a little more general against all non-Wahabis, the demonization is there.
May I present the Iconoclasts?
In the Old Testament, we have a few rather strong admonitions:
Exodus 20:2-4 - "I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself any idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them..."
Judges 6:25-26 - That same night the Lord said to Gideon, "Take the second bull from your father's herd, the one seven years old. Tear down your father's altar to Baal and cut down the Asherah pole beside it. Then build a proper kind of altar to the Lord your God on the top of this height. Using the wood of the Asherah pole that you cut down, offer the bull as a burnt offering."
Jeremiah 1:9-10 - The Lord reached out His hand and touched my mouth and said to me, "Now, I have put my words in your mouth. Today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant."
This is not to mention the other citations in which pagan temples were torn down, local worshipers given the option of conversion or death.
In the New Testament, we find
2 Corinthians 10:5 - We demolish arguments and every lofty thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
Practically from the very beginning of the Christian era, we find repeated instances of iconoclasm wherein the sacred objects of some were deemed works of the devil by others. The results were churches, relics, artwork, and shrines being destroyed. The historical record was not very good on body counts, but we can safely assume that revered icons were protected at the cost of lives.
Later in the history of Christian Europe, we come to the Reformation and the consequential Religious Wars. Oh, and let us not forget the Crusades! Not only were Muslims on the receiving end of Christian might, but also Jews and Eastern Christians. I guess we shouldn't neglect what was happening in Spain around 1492, either, as the country was cleansed of both Muslims and Jews. Europeans, being a thrifty bunch, I guess, tended not to tear buildings down to their foundations, but instead to repurpose them. But plenty of mosques and synagogues were destroyed.
But let's not pick on Christians. Let's also include Hindus. The destruction of the Babri Mosque in the early 1990s should serve as a pretty good example of how religions don't always respect the practices and properties of other religions. Nor should we neglect the killing of Muslims and Christians by extremist Hindus that continues to this day in India.
My point is not to say "see, these guys are just as bad as those guys." It is rather to say that people do vicious and violent things in the name of religion.
But on to Wahhabism...
Ibn Wahhab was, in fact, a reformer in the manner of the Protestant Reformation. He saw that Islam had been degraded by corrupt practices. Folk traditions from various parts of the Islamic world had crept into the daily life of Muslims and many in Arabia were simply no longer following any sort of recognizable Islam. He believed that people needed to straighten up and do what the Quran told them to do. He was, in every sense of the word, a fundamentalist, going back to the original and "incontrovertable" text of the Quran. And, along the lines of the Reformation and Counter Reformation, was willing to use force in accomplishing his ends.
This, by the way, is not so terribly out-of-synch historically. The Religious Wars of Europe had ended only about 150 years before the sacking of Karbala.
When it comes to discussing matters such as heresy, there are always two sides to the story. There is the "orthodox" view and the "heterodox" view. In comparing the various religious practices within Islam, Wahhabism must be considered on the orthodox side of the coin. The Quran is pretty clear—at least as clear as the Bible—on its admonitions against idolatry and image-making. It is also adamant on its view of the one-ness of God. The Muslims' main complaint against Christianity, in fact, is that they interpret the concept of the Trinity as a sharing of godhood.
Sunni Islam is considered, as a whole, the Orthodox realm of Islam. Shi'ism and Sufism are heterodox.
So, if you are going to call the Wahhabis on their "deligitimization" of
Shi'ism, then realize that you are making the judgment to turn things on their heads. I know that the Shi'a don't consider the Sunnis to be orthodox, but what would you expect? The Popes didn't have many good words for Martin Luther or John Wycliff, either. As the Religious Wars prooved, the feeling was reciprocal.
The Muslim Brothers did not, in fact, rise from Wahhabism. They came from the fruitful mind of Hassan Al-Banna, a 20th C. Egyptian. In his youth, Al-Banna is reported to have dabbled in Sufism. But by 1928, when he founded the Muslim Brotherhood, his views had radicalized and narrowed.
On my website Crossroads Arabia (still being developed), I try to trace the various lines of extreme fundamentalism that combined to create the terror of 9/11. Part of it should be laid at the feet of Wahhabism. But more than two-thirds of it, I believe, lies at the feet of the Muslim Brothers of Egypt and the Deobandi sects of India and Pakistan, both outgrowths of nationalistic political movements in the respective regions.
Finally, just as a hint for scholarship. When you read a text written by a sworn enemy of the subject, it is prudent to exercise caution. Dore Gold, the Israeli Ambassador to the UN, just might have a particular position to sell, a set of axes to grind. There are very few members of any Israeli government who have anything positive to say about Arabia. By the same light, I don't consider Arab sources particularly authoritative when they're talking about Israel.
And no, the extremists are not already in charge in Saudi Arabia. You might want to check my blog to see just how untrue that is. It might do damage to your stereotype machine, but that's not a bad thing....
Here you present the standard pointless argument – yes, Wahhabism is currently responsible for the deaths of millions of innocent people, and they're killing more every day, but - other religions have done bad things.
People do bad things in the name of politics and religion. So what?
National socialism was responsible for the deaths of millions, and yes, other political systems had some bad elements, but that didn’t change the fact that the Nazis and their philosophy of hate were genocidal.
Wahhabis are spending millions to spread their philosophy and terrorism around the world. People are dying as a result. Nothing you’ve said here changes that documented fact.
From an essay on Wahhabi-sponsored Jihad Factories:
"Most kids here go for jihad, and I will too, God willing," said 14-year-old Obeidulla Anwer, speaking in Urdu through a translator. "Jihad is to fight for Islam and the pride of Islam."
"Like most of his classmates, he will leave the school at about age 18 and go to a military training camp in Pakistani-controlled Kashmir, Afghanistan, or some other secret location. After that training, he said, "We go to fight in Kashmir, Chechnya, Palestine, Afghanistan."
....
The students of those Saudi-sponsored 'schools' go to fight in Kashmir, Chechnya, Palestine, Afghanistan.’ It seems that Saudi sponsorship of the Madrassas and world wide terrorism are somehow connected. Funny thing.
You say When you read a text written by a sworn enemy of the subject, it is prudent to exercise caution. Dore Gold, the Israeli Ambassador to the UN, just might have a particular position to sell, a set of axes to grind.
Oh really? Now, why would an Israeli Ambassador consider himself to be an “sworn enemy” of Saudi Arabia? According to the Saudi press kit, they came up with a peace plan for the Saudi/Israeli (oops..I mean Palestinian/Israeli) conflict.
Why would an Israeli consider those peace-loving Saudis to be a sworn enemy?
Maybe it’s because the Kingdom is currently waging war against Israel by funding the Hamas paramilitaries who have been slaughtering Israeli civilians.
From the Hamas Covenant:
The Prophet, Allah bless him and grant him salvation, has said: "The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.'"....There is no solution for the Palestine question except through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors. Palestine is an Islamic land.
Sounds like that old-time Wahhabi religion. You know, a lot of our problems could be solved if we just told the truth about what we’re fighting. Terrorist groups like the ‘militants’ in Kashmir, the Hamas ‘militants’ and Saudi Arabia are all working together, and they are our enemies. Israel isn’t just fighting the Palestinians – they’re fighting the Arab States that finance terrorism.
The US isn’t just fighting al Qaeda – we’re fighting the Arab States that finance terrorism. And it’s true that the Russians aren’t just fighting the Chechens – they’re fighting the Arab States that finance terrorism. India isn’t just fighting the Kashmiri ‘militants’. – they’re fighting the Arab States that finance terrorism.
..including those peace-loving Saudis.
So, you worked for the State Department. Like most of your co-workers, I’m sure you were disappointed by the fact that the Saudi visa express program, which let Saudis into the country without a background check - was cancelled. The State Department fought the cancellation of that program, but they lost the fight.
I’m sure the Saudis were disappointed too.
A little-known fact about the reporter who exposed the fact that State Department employees are Feeding at the Saudi Trough. Did you know that he is the only reporter who was ever detained by our government for the crime of asking questions?
From the NRO:
Would that the State Department were as tough on the Saudis.
NRO contributor Joel Mowbray was detained this afternoon at the State Department after an acrimonious exchange with top Foggy Bottom press flack Richard Boucher...
...Mowbray read from a classified cable that had been leaked to him and that contradicted Boucher's spin (both Mowbray and the Washington Post quoted from the cable earlier this week). State Department officials were not amused.
Very not amused
When Mowbray began to get the feeling that he couldn't leave even if he wanted to, he asked, "Am I being detained?"
When a diplomatic security official — who had showed up on the scene — told him "no," Mowbray announced that he was leaving.
At which point, the guard stepped in front of Mowbray and said, "Now, you're being detained."
...
Wow. The State Department plays tough when they’re threatened, don’t they?
You drank deeply of the anti-Saudi Kool-Aid.
Joel Mowbray is a jerk. Clear and simple. He has consistently misrepresented facts, taken as given the suppositions provided by AIPAC, and doesn't really care to report facts inconvenient to his theory.
He was detained at State because during a press briefing he was waiving around in his hand a document he claimed was a classified report. Well, it may come as a surprise, but reporters are not authorized to have classified reports.
State Security stopped him after the briefing and asked to see the document he claimed was a classified report. His having a classified document is, in fact, a felony. Turned out he didn't have one after all and was just showboating. And got called on it.
Mowbray, his dignity offended, got on his high horse and blubbed.
That may make him heroic in your book, but that's a comment on your ability to evaluate information more than it is a critique of State's security policies. Unless, of course, you believe that as a journalist he had the right to control classified documents. Is that the argument you're making?
Mowbray has nothing useful to say on the subject of Saudi Arabia as he's too busy grinding his own ax to do honest reporting.
I'm greatly amused by the way Mowbray cites examples of former State officers working in Saudi-related organizations and institutions. Care to take a guess how many former diplomats work in country-related organizations globally? Pick a country and do your own homework.
After 20-30 year careers that, according to the OMB, consistently pay 30%-60% less than equivalent private sector jobs, many former State officers cash in on their expertise as best they can. Is that either surprising or morally reprehensible? Personally, I draw the line at working directly for a foreign government, your line may lie elsewhere.
So what do you think a person should do with a high level of area expertise, post retirement? Some people just give it up and do things like go fishing, drive Coca Cola trucks, or become teachers. Others want to stay in the political fray—and actually have a more powerful political voice. They go to work for organizations that deal with the matters they know best: the countries and regions that they've worked in.
Not terribly amazingly, former diplomats who served in the Middle East tend to work in organizations that focus on the Middle East. The same thing goes for those who've worked in Europe, Africa, Latin America or Asia. For some reason, expertise in, say, Japan, doesn't have a high market value for an organization focused on Brazil.
Mowbray, however, focuses only on those diplomats who have worked in Saudi Arabia. He refuses to acknowledge that this is common practice for all countries and regions of the world.
Oh, and I find it both personally and professionally insulting that you and Mowbray would believe that a former officer—one who had put his and his family's lives, health and safety on the line for decades, one who has sworn to defend and protect the Constitution—could be "bought off" by working for a non-profit that receives 13% of its operating budget from a single country. Next thing you know, you'll be wondering about how Halliburton corrupted Cheney, right?
Again, you may not like this fact, but fact it remains. If you don't like the practice—and I do see that there can be conflicts of interest—then you can do something about it. But to single out one country and libel officers who have worked in that one country, is dishonest in the extreme.
It may surprise you to learn that I actually know a little bit about Visa Express. It's not what Mowbray portrays it to have been—big shock there.
Visa Express was part of a global effort on the part of INS and State Dept. to ease the process of applying for a visa. It in no way changed the vetting of applications, but only changed the process of submitting an application.
The concerns were two-fold:
First, there was worry that as American embassies were becoming frequent targets of terrorist activities, it might not be a grand idea to have visa applicants standing in lines outside the embassies when a bomb went off.
In London, lines daily wrapped around the corner. The UK, of course, is a country whose nationals don't even need visas for tourist or business travel. In India, the lines formed by 0600 and didn't end until the visa office closed. There were thousands of people in line every day.
The issuance of visas is done on a variety of grounds, as established by Congress. The principal concern—up until 9/11—was that a visa applicant had to prove that s/he would return to his/her own country at the end of his/her travel. Membership in terrorist organizations was a factor; there's even a question on the application asking whether or not one is a member of such an organization. The question, though, is to provide legal ground for litigation after one enters the country; no one expects a terrorist to say "Shucks, guess I can't go!" The actual membership in such an organizations (State is smart enough to realize that people do lie), was to be determined by checking the names of applicants against databases run by INS and FBI.
A second worry about long visa lines was one impressed upon State by Congress: applicants did not like waiting in lines for days just to get a visa. Congressional constituents complained that Uncle Kumar and Aunt Margo were being inconvenienced.
Under pressure from Congress, Consular Affairs (the section of State responsible for visas) was told to institute a "customer-friendly" process. In brief, "move 'em out faster."
Visa Express did exactly that.
Instead of having people wait in lines, a variety of alternatives were developed in every US embassy in the world. In the UK, applicants went to banks to pay the various visa fees. In India, they submitted their applications through courier/delivery services that the embassy had qualified.
In Saudi Arabia, certain travel agencies were authorized to accept applications to be submitted to the embassy.
In all instances, in all countries, the visa applications were then handled in exactly the same manner as if the visa applicant had delivered the paperwork in person. If there were questions, if there were inconsistencies, if something didn't look right, the applicant had to appear in person.
There was no shortcutting the vetting system. All applications were run through anti-terror databases.
It has become clear that those databases and cross-checks were inadequate, but they had nothing to do with Visa Express or similar programs.
Every Consular officer who issued a visa to the Saudi 9/11 terrorists was summoned before Congressional committees to explain how and why those visas were granted. Congress has found none of them to blame, nor has it found the Visa Express culpable for 9/11.
And there's an unusual fact about Saudi Arabs and visas. Unlike many countries, where visa applicants have a tendency to disappear, overstay, or seek change of visa status, Saudis—prior to 9/11—were excellent candidates for visas.
Saudis went to the US and they returned when their business/holiday/studies were done. They didn't clutter up INS offices with paperwork. They didn't get into serious trouble in the US. They brought significant money to the entire US economy. Everybody mostly liked Saudis—or at least Saudi money.
Khaled Sheikh Mohammed, the Pakistani planner of 9/11, has stated (and is reported saying so in the 9/11 Commission Report) that Saudis were picked for 9/11 because it was much easier for them to get visas. Several would-be participants in 9/11 were excluded because they were coming in from Yemen, a country with a bad history of visa fraud.
Having Saudi participants in 9/11 also served Osama Bin Laden's purposes well. He wanted to damage the US-Saudi relationship. By having Saudis taking part in 9/11, he would be able to drive a wedge into what had been an essentially good relationship. He succeeded beyond expectations there, as your post proves. I'm sure UBL thanks you.
Wahhabism is actually an interesting topic, and it's a pity you haven't taken the time to actually read much about it from non-hostile sources. (Non-hostile, by the way, includes neutral, not just pro-Wahhabi.)
Wahhabism isn't my particular favorite when it comes to versions of Islam. I personally tend toward the concept of an individual relationship with a deity rather than a communal one, and one that lets the individual decide where the moral lines are.
Wahhabism is narrow-minded and intolerant. It certainly provides a ground from which extremism can spring. I dislike it because it leads to stupidity and uninformed thinking. But it is not the ravening den of snakes you seem to believe.
An issue arose about the content of Saudi textbooks. The Saudi Foreign Minister, Saud Al-Faisal, stated that 10% of the materials were questionable and 5% truly objectionable. He swore that the problem would be addressed. The Saudi Minister of Education, who had been trying to reform education since he got the job eight years ago, has done so. Saudis are now saying that the transformation of the texts is remarkable, but of course they would say that, wouldn't they?
The Saudis have had a very serious problem with teachers, more than the texts, I think. It has been difficult to see just what goes on in an individual classroom. This is an issue that has bothered many Saudi parents and is one that the Saudi government is working to control. But if you'd like to suggest that the tendency for parents to not be particularly involved in what goes on in the classroom—other than that the kids pass exams—is unique to Saudi Arabia, then you've got your work cut out for you.
Islam as a religion has a mandate to proselytize. As do many other religions. Wahhabism takes it seriously and much of the charitable donations made in the name of proselytizing goes to the construction of mosques and schools. In some of these, Saudis are sent out as missionaries. In most, the money is donated for local use with broad stipulations on how it is used.
You may note from the examples you cite, that the real problems with madrasas is in Pakistan. Saudi money was given for local use and was abused. The madrasas of Pakistan are under Deobandi control. The Deobandis dislike the Wahhabis because they're a) rich, and b) soft in their interpretation of Islam. The Deobandis, by the way, had their greatest politicdal success when they formed the Taleban in Afghanistan. You might want to look into that. You might also note that your "World&I" cite doesn't mention "Wahhabi" once.
I am not saying that there are no problems in Saudi Arabia. I am not saying that the narrow, bigoted interpretation of Islam that predominates there is not a problem.
I am saying that to accuse Saudi Arabia of being the font from which all terrorism flows is dead wrong. I am saying that it is important for the US to work with Saudi Arabia constructively to fix the problems.
There is nothing wrong in keeping pressure on the Saudis. But there needs to be an awareness that that pressure can become counter-productive when not applied wisely. The reformist Minister of Education has to defend every step he takes because he's accused of "bowing to American pressure". When the NRO and Mowbray bleat ignorantly about Saudi Arabia, it provides the reactionaries with ammunition to fight all reform.
The US-Saudi relationship is important. Far too important to let knee-jerk reactions destroy it.
Thank you for calling me a traitor to my country. I'll be sure to remember that when I meet you.
You say: Oh, and I find it both personally and professionally insulting that you and Mowbray would believe that a former officer—one who had put his and his family's lives, health and safety on the line for decades..
yet you personally and professionally insult the good name of Ambassador Dore Gold: Finally, just as a hint for scholarship. When you read a text written by a sworn enemy of the subject, it is prudent to exercise caution. Dore Gold, the Israeli Ambassador to the UN, just might have a particular position to sell, a set of axes to grind
And you imply that Mowbray was influenced by AIPAC. Gee, what do Dore Gold and AIPAC have in common. Why don't you trust them?
Then you say this to another commenter: Thank you for calling me a traitor to my country. I'll be sure to remember that when I meet you.
Threats, intimidation, judging people according to their religious preferences... It seems you've learned a lot from the Saudis.
Does it not seem obvious that the word of A, who represents the policy of a country antipathetic to Country X, might have a bias when reporting on Country X? Do you read the NY Post to get accurate reporting on the Boston Red Sox? Do you think a Cuban newspaper is a good source for reporting on America?
I find it hard to believe that you would, but if that's indeed the case, then it makes it very easy to dismiss what you have to say.
Dore Gold presents Israeli positions (actually, Likud Party postions). That's his job. That's what he did as their ambassador to the UN. His salary (100%) was drawn for doing that.
There's nothing wrong with that at all. I most certainly do not insult him. I certainly do not call him traitor for representing his country and party.
But there's something very wrong if you consider what he has to say as completely disinterested or objective.
I can read Dore Gold to learn what he, as an Israeli government official, thinks about things. That is interesting, but it should not be confused with objective reporting.
Joel Mowbray, on the other hand, I believe to be an out-and-out liar. I know the facts that he distorts and misrepresents. I hold him in utter disdain. But I do not call him a traitor. Just a foul excuse for a journalist. He, using the same tactics as Michael Moore, picks the facts to support his arguments, not let the facts lead him to something approaching truth. He takes the anecdote and makes it the universal truth. He's scum.
I do have problems with AIPAC. Not because they're Jewish, not because they lobby for a foreign country, but because they portray Likud Party policy as the all-encompassing truth. I happen to share my antipathy with people like Rabbi Michael Lerner, who vehemently objects to the radicalization and extremism of Likud.
I believe that a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian situation is the only possible way to end 50+ years of violence. But reaching that solution requires honest and able politicians on both sides. Arafat has demonstrated time and again that he's not the person to do it on the Palestinian side. I think Sharon is equally flawed. There will be no solution while either of them holds any sort of office. They both have to go.
I judge no one by his/her religious "preference". I judge people by their words and actions. So you can give up on the anti-Semite thing. It doesn't apply.
Was that a threat I offered to Steven? What, please, was I threatening him with? Or was it "intimidation?" Will my words prevent Steve from speaking again? If they stop him from calling me a traitor, then perhaps it was intimidation. But all I actually meant by it was to caution him that he was quickly joining my shit-list. What do you do with people on your shit-list? I'm sure you have one.
And it really is a pity that you try to shut down an argument against poor Israeli policy with a cry of "anti-Semite!" That's what lots of people do when they start losing an argument concerning Israeli politics. It does nothing for discourse or debate, of course. Oh, and that happens to be a favored tactic of AIPAC. Just ask Rabbi Lerner.
In the past, Saudis did fund Hamas. That's a fact. It is also a fact that since 2001, the Saudis have not/not funded Hamas activities. I am accepting your disinclination to separate the different wings of Hamas that are involved in social works and military action. I also do not make that distinction. The Saudis claimed that they were sending money to support schools and clinics. Perhaps. But money is fungible and can easily be diverted. I have exactly the same problem with the supposed difference between Sinn Fein and the IRA.
Since 2001, however, Saudi Arabia has channeled all of its contributions through the Red Crescent Society (Muslim equivalent of the Red Cross). There have been no complaints from Israel or others that this money has gone astray.
Your over-reaching claim that "Saudis fund terror" is unsupported by facts or documentation. The 9/11 Commission was unable to support that allegation. More recently--last week, in fact--the US Dept. of the Treasury went so far as to praise Saudi anti-terror financing controls.
So, unless you have a source more reputable than the Dept. of the Treasury you'd care to proffer...
Yes, I know it fills an emotional need to single out a unitary cause for all that's wrong with the world, but it just doesn't fit the facts. I'll take facts over emotion.
This is for the Congressional Record on Saudi reforms. It's long and it tells a very different one from that being pedaled by Mowbray. But then, it's only a congressman.
Mary, Sorry you're bailing out of your losing arguments
Hatcher, you have a habit of making undiplomatic claims that are not based on fact. I'm not surprised that you used to work for the State Department.
I had no time at that moment because I was trying to find a doctor for my son, who injured his knee when he fell down the stairs.
Having Saudi participants in 9/11 also served Osama Bin Laden's purposes well. He wanted to damage the US-Saudi relationship. By having Saudis taking part in 9/11, he would be able to drive a wedge into what had been an essentially good relationship. He succeeded beyond expectations there, as your post proves. I'm sure UBL thanks you
On what facts do you base that assumption? Saudi-financed terrorism existed before 9/11, and, as always, the larger proportion of al Qaeda members are Saudi. That’s why most of the prisoners in Guantanamo are Saudi.
Terrorism experts call al Qaeda a Saudi operation. Saudis call al Qaeda their ‘brothers’.
Remember Kenya? Saudi-financed paramilitaries slaughtered hundreds of innocent people and wounded thousands in 1998. This is your idea of ‘what had been an essentially good relationship’?? My God.
Dore Gold presents Israeli positions (actually, Likud Party postions). .. But there's something very wrong if you consider what he has to say as completely disinterested or objective.
Dore Gold’s description of Wahhabis is similar to Thai descriptions of the Wahhabis, which are similar to Sufi descriptions of the Wahhabis..which are similar to Uzbek descriptions of the Wahhabis, which are similar to Filipino descriptions of Wahhabis, which are similar to Shiite descriptions of Wahhabis…
Thai Buddhists, Shiite Muslims, Filipino journalists, Jews and Sufis all agree – Wahhabis are responsible for the terrorism that is killing people around the world. Is this because all of these groups represent Likud Party positions?
The only people who think that Wahhabis are NOT dangerous are Wahhabis …and the US State Department. What a coincidence.
It must all be Joel Mowbray’s fault.
It is also a fact that since 2001, the Saudis have not/not funded Hamas activities.
Again, you insult our intelligence. From a press release issued by Congressman Gary Ackerman, September 24, 2003:
"U.S. Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-Queens/L.I.) today challenged the Bush Administration to confront Saudi Arabia over its continued unwillingness to block the transfer of funds to the Palestinian terrorist group HAMAS. Ackerman, speaking at a hearing of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, warned Administration officials that failure to stop Saudi funds from reaching HAMAS could obstruct U.S. efforts to settle the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians."
While the US department of Treasury was praising Saudi Arabia, they were also issuing this statement:
U.S.-Based Branch of Al Haramain Foundation Linked to Terror
"Treasury Designates U.S. Branch, Director
The Treasury Department announced today the designation of the U.S. branch of the Saudi Arabia-based Al Haramain Islamic Foundation (AHF), along with one of its directors, Suliman Al-Buthe. In addition, the AHF branch located in the Union of the Comoros was also designated today..."
"..The investigation shows direct links between the U.S. branch and Usama bin Laden. In addition, the affidavit alleges the U.S. branch of AHF criminally violated tax laws and engaged in other money laundering offenses..."
"..Information shows that individuals associated with the branch tried to conceal the movement of funds intended for Chechnya by omitting them from tax returns and mischaracterizing their use, which they claimed was for the purchase of a prayer house in Springfield, Missouri."
Is Al Haramain part of the Red Crescent? I didn’t think so.
Our Saudi allies did not stop funding Hamas in 2001, Wahhabism is recognized as a threat by most of the world’s population, and you are lying to us. Can you explain why?
Can you explain why the State Department continued the Visa Express program for almost a year after 15 Saudis slaughtered thousands of Americans in an unprovoked act of war? Was that also Joel Mowbray’s fault, or can you blame it all on the Likud?
I base my statement (not assumptions) that UBL was particularly interested in recruiting Saudis to take part in 9/11 on the 9/11 Commission Report. Page 232, in Section 7.3 states:
also, Footnote 91 to Chapter 7, page 524:
I further base it on conversations with Saudi nationals, with FBI agents assigned to Riyadh, and by noting the ease with which ordinary Saudis could obtain visas.
I do not, for a minute, dispute that Saudis were involved in the 9/11 attacks, or with Al Qaeda in general.
I do remember Kenya. Two colleagues of mine were among the Americans killed there. I've also had friends and colleagues killed in bombings in Beirut, on PA-103, and at the WTC and Pentagon. I am not looking for reasons to excuse terrorists.
I won't grant Mowbray the credit, but will note that again you cite individuals and organizations that have many reasons to dislike Saudis beyond any linkage with terrorism. You may do so, of course. And I am aware of the instances you cite. They are not persuasive, however.
Sufis do not like Wahhabis because Wahhabis demonize Sufis. Why, then, would you expect Sufis to have positive things to say about Saudis? Are you going to get favorable reviews of Castro from Miami Cubans? Are the Albanians going to speak well of Milosovic?
Similar circumstances pertain to the Uzbeks (predominantly Sufi) and the Shi'a: Wahhabis have told them that their form of Islam is illegitimate. You can't reasonably expect even neutral commentary to come from them.
About the Thais? That's new to me. I'll have to look into that.
You are not accurate in your assumption that State Dept. backs Wahhabism. State, in fact, doesn't want to discuss theology at all. Some State officers think that there's more to the story; some agree with you. Your cheap-shot demonization is again based not on fact, but on what you guess.
Rep. Ackerman is excellent at telling his constituents what they want to hear. His constituents are strong supporters of Israel. Ackerman, therefore, strongly supports Israel and Israeli interpretations of the Middle East.
Rep. Ackerman's comments are based on a report, out of Israel, that says there are documents claiming that the Saudis support Hamas. That's the only evidence of the claim.
I'm not accusing him of wrong doing, just wrong thinking. (See, now that I'm no longer in State, I can have a public political opinion!)The US view of the Middle East should be independently drawn. The Ackerman quote you provide is taken from over a year ago. The Treasury and Cong. Record quotes I cite are less than two weeks old. Newer information trumps older information.
Ackerman's quote offers opinion, with no documentation. The Rep. Cunningham citation from the Cong. Record is full of outside documentation. I'll take the documentation over opinion.
You're partially right about Al-Haramain. Starting in 2002, the US and Saudi Arabia, jointly, have identified different branches of Al-Haramain Foundation as corrupt, as financiers of terrorism. They have jointly asked the UN and member countries to seize bank accounts belonging to Al-Haramain. This started, in fact, with Al-Haramain branches in Bosnia and Somalia in 2002. Earlier this year the USG was able to collect enough evidence to satisfy legal requirements in order to shut down the US-based branch. Last week, the Saudis were able to find sufficient evidence to meet their legal standards to close down the headquarters.
You may note that it took two years for the US government to shut down the branch of Al-Haramain operating out of Oregon. Allegations were out there, but proof was not. The US legal system requires that government have proof before it takes action. Saudi law requires the same.
Please note, too, that it was Treasury, State, the FBI, DHS, and the CIA, and Saudi financial and security services as well, who shut them down. Interestingly, none of these cases have actually gone to trial yet.
I regret that you think I'm lying to you. I've provided documentation to support my claims. If you'd like to provide an example of a "lie", I'll certainly provide support for my claim. If it's a matter of your not agreeing with my opinion, you need to check a dictionary for the word "lie". I have not knowingly misrepresented anything I've said. I may certainly be wrong, but I'm not lying.
On your question about why State continued Visa Express for a year post-9/11. That's easy. Visa Express had nothing to do with terrorists entering the US. As I stated earlier, Visa Express did not compromise the existing security screening process. I know that inconvenient fact annoys the hell out of Mowbray, but it remains the fact. Mowbray, however, was able to make enough noise to make it politically impossible to continue a time- and money-saving process that had no bearing on national security. So you can lay that little bit of government waste at his doorstep.
What was not working was the screening process instituted by INS/FBI/CIA back in the States. Data were incomplete, databases did not talk to each other, and there was simply too much garbage in the databases to make accurate decisions. This, too, is covered in the 9/11 Commission Report.
You know, I think the real problem here is that you have a mental equation:
Saudis=Terror
My mental equation is
(Small number of)Saudis=Terror.
The CIA estimates that Al Qaeda may have
as many as 3,000 members (that's an outside number). The population of Saudi Arabia is about 22 million. That means that if all Al Qaeda members were Saudi, they would represent 0.000136% of the population.
I am not prepared to condemn an entire population on the basis of the actions of that small a percentage of them.
I know many Saudis whom I respect in all regards as human beings. They are no more sponsors of terror than you are. So I resent your trying to put them into a pigeonhole in which they do not belong.
I know that it is in the long-term interest of the United States to maintain a good relationship with Saudi Arabia.
I know that Saudi Arabia is going through major reforms to get away from the problems that led to Saudis being involved in 9/11 and other terrorist actions. Your refusal to acknowledge those efforts is not based on facts.
Sufis do not like Wahhabis because Wahhabis demonize Sufis. Why, then, would you expect Sufis to have positive things to say about Saudis? Are you going to get favorable reviews of Castro from Miami Cubans? Are the Albanians going to speak well of Milosovic?
Sufis, Uzbeks, Hindus, Buddhist monks, Shiites, Americans, Russian schoolchildren and Israelis oppose Wahhabis because Wahhabis slaughter them en masse, without remorse.
Most of the world opposes Wahhabism because it encourages more mass slaughter.
(Small number of)Saudis=Terror
Bullshit.
Almost half of all Saudis said in a poll conducted last year that they have a favorable view of Osama bin Laden's sermons and rhetoric
Bin Laden promised to slaughter Americans and to murder their children by the millions.
If more than half of all Saudis support bin Laden’s rhetoric, they support the mass slaughter of Americans.
They may not all be trained paramilitaries, but the nation is our enemy.
Rep. Ackerman is excellent at telling his constituents what they want to hear. His constituents are strong supporters of Israel. Ackerman, therefore, strongly supports Israel and Israeli interpretations of the Middle East.
Oh, for pity’s sake. You were lying when you said that Saudis stopped supporting Hamas in 2001. What on earth makes you think that blaming Israel for your lies and Saudi crimes is a convincing argument??
The more I read of your pompous, transparent lies, the more I regret that my taxes have paid your salary. What a waste of money. The American people employ you and your ilk in the hopes that you will defend our people and our constitution.
You don’t.
The State Department has a very long history of favoring the needs of Saudis over the needs of Americans. We are your last priority.
And no, I don't think you support Wahhabism. I think you support wealthy, generous princes.
You defend the enemy. The ‘blame Israel’, blame-everyone but-the-Saudis blather comes so naturally to you, you’re barely even aware of what you’re saying.
I know that it is in the long-term interest of the United States to maintain a good relationship with Saudi Arabia.
Tell us why it’s important to maintain a "good" relationship with a nation that wants to slaughter us by the millions.
Saudi terrorism has cost us many billions of dollars. It almost destroyed our economy in 2001. Tell us why our economy could never survive a break with this weakened, formerly powerful member of OPEC that has recently tried and failed to influence oil prices.
Tell us why we should allow our Saudi allies to keep killing us. And try to pretend that American lives mean something to you. You haven’t done that so far and it might make your argument more convincing.
You claim Wahhabis slaughter millions. Your proof? I don't mean somebody saying "ooh, they must have done". I mean give me a citation from a reputable, non-interested source. Can do that, can you. Pulled it right out of your hat full of hate-Arab canards. Next thing you know, you'll be using "Front Lines" as a source.
More than half of the Saudis do support the ideas of what UBL wants. That is not at all the same as saying they support his methods. They do not support his attempts to bring on a war of civilizations--though you seem to share that particular one. They do not support the use of terror. They do not support the killing of civilians. They do not support the forced conversion of the world to Islam. If you think otherwise--and clearly you do--you quite simply do not know what you're talking about. You may feel it's true, but when it comes to bullshit, you must own half of Montana.
No, I am not lying. Ackerman has his "facts" wrong because they are not facts. They are claims supported only by documents provided by Israeli Intelligence. Did you hear the White House, the FBI, the CIA support the allegation? No you did not. And the reason is simple: the allegation is false. You may choose to find alternative sources for your information, but I think the last flying saucer may have warped your antenna.
Oh, you can add Bill McGurn to the list of people like Mowbray who can't let facts get in the way of a good story. I've worked with McGurn personally and will state absolutely that he has no interest in the details of a story that might ruin his theory. Take it leave it honey, but I don't buy shit from guys who write there stories and then go looking for facts, ignoring the inconvenient ones.
And why would you think I support rich Saudi princes? They don't pay me. In addition to my thanks for your taxes that paid my salary, I'll also thank you for the taxes you pay that take care of my pension. It's not a great pension, but I'm not starving.
You have incredibly selective vision. I blame Saudis for getting themselves into the mess they're in. I blame them for letting religious zealots take control of their education system. I blame Saudis for being criminally negligent in not seeking accountability for the billions they have given in charity. I blame Saudis for having a culture that makes it almost impossible to criticize people in the ruling family who thrive on graft. I blame Saudis for producing terrorists. I blame Saudis for acting from emotions rather than reason.
Well Honeycakes, that last one applies to you in spades. The Saudis I blame are individual Saudis, not the entire population. I blame callous Ministers who don't/won't do their jobs. I blame Ministers who have such bad reputations as reprobates that they need to look the other way when some members of Saudi society kill in the name of God.
I don't blame Israelis for Saudi Arabia, not at all. I blame Israelis for continuing a situation that inflames nearly a third of the world's population while doing damned little to fix the problem. I blame Israelis for disinformation campaigns that make it even more difficult for people who are really looking for peace to be heard.
I blame certain journalists for not being professional. I blame certain journalists for out-and-out lying because their story is too good to be complicated by truth.
Why is a good US-Saudi relationship important? If you could shut down your hate-motor and think for a little bit, it might become obvious.
Over 1.3 billion people look to Saudi Arabia for moral guidance. They don't look to them as Wahhabis, but as custodians of Mecca and Medina. You may think that unimportant, but you're clearly not Muslim. When the Saudi government approves of something, it becomes much easier for other Muslims--and Muslim governments--to approve it. When the Saudis condemn something, it becomes easier to condemn it. Saudi Arabia plays the dominant role in political leadership in the Arab and Muslim worlds. You certainly can't like that fact, but you're once again going to have to fly in the face of incontrovertable fact to do so.
Talk to a US military logistician sometime, preferably one involved in air transportation. Ask him or her how important Saudi Arabia is. Ask what happens if the Saudis decide to cancel overflight rights. Ask what happens to US operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, Central or South Asia when they can't fly over Saudi Arabia.
The answer is "we're fucked." The unfortunate fact is that the US does not have the means to mount any sizeable operation east of Saudi Arabia without also having the ability to overfly the country. We don't have the tankers to fuel flights around the Arabian Peninsula. We don't have the political leverage to fly over Syria. We won't ask the Jordanians because to do so would put their ruling family in immediate jeopardy of revolt.
And then we can come to oil.
The US imports only about 15% of its oil from Saudi Arabia. It's the source of exceptionally high-grade and inexpensive petroleum, but we could probably live without it. But Saudi Arabia exports 25% of the oil that the rest of the world needs. Without that oil, you're going to need to create a new word to define the extent of the global economic collapse that will follow.
I'm sure it rots your socks, but Saudi Arabia has played a constructive role in controlling the price of oil over the past 70 years, with the exception of the oil embargo of '73. It has countered other countries' attempts to increase the price while incurring great political and economic damage while doing so. Don't take my word--as I'm sure you won't--ask any petroleum expert. Ask any knowledgeable writer on oil markets. Hell, write a letter to ExxonMobil. The facts are out there and they're amazingly easy to find. But I forgot. Facts get in the way of your hatred.
Our "Saudi allies" are not trying to kill us. A group of people, some of whom are Saudi, some of whom have distorted fundamentalist religios beliefs as practiced in Saudi Arabia want to kill us. That's a pretty damn big difference that you're trying to ignore.
Your last comments are really beyond the pale. What do you know of my patriotism? Do you know how many friends I've buried, killed by terrorists? Do you know how many times I've had guns to my head during my career? I don't mean metaphorical guns, I mean AK-47s. Do you know how many times my family has been caught in crossfires between Syrian security forces and Kurdish protesters? Do you know how many times I, my wife, my son have come close to dying simply and exclusively because of the job I was trying to do, in your name? Again, your emotions get in the way of reason.
Don't forget our tinfoil hat on the way out.
Department of State: Department of Making Nice to Every Country on Earth (Except Israel), Including Our Sworn Enemies
To be fair, let me also state:
Department of Defense (formerly and more accurately, Department of War): Department of Destruction, Dismemberment, and Death
As long as we are at War (i.e., until we have completely destroyed our sworn enemies), we must see to it that we get the former Department in line with the latter rather than vice versa.
You are call Mary "Honeycakes"? You are brave.
bob
"You are calling Mary "Honeycakes"? You are brave.
Hatcher, quick question:
Did you look over the MEMRI links that Mary posted. You know the "man-on-the-street" interview about Jews? Is this attitude representative of a large segment of the Saudi population?
I have a couple of qualms about them, though. First, as with any editorial service, they have to be selective. Until recently, I've found that they selected exclusively those articles that slammed Israel and Jews. Over the past few months, however, they have provided what I consider a more balanced view. They are translating articles that show some positive developments in the region.
MEMRI has a tendency to mischaracterize things. As an instance, they consider all Saudi (and most other Arab) media "official". That is simply not true. The relationship between Arab media and the states they operate from vary from country to country. Some, as in Syria, are most certainly government controlled, from top to bottom. Others, as in Jordan, Bahrain, Kuwait, and even Saudi Arabia, are not.
Those governments exercise no prior restraint on articles published in their local media. The governments do, however, exercise various levels of control in who gets to be editors, or even who gets to own the media. And some of those countries--including Saudi Arabia--have put editors and publishers in jail (or at least had them fired) for stories that embarrased certain government individuals or agencies. But that happens after the stories ran.
I certainly would not claim that Saudi media is "free" in the same sense that American media is free. But neither is it absolutely controlled. It is not--with the exception of the government-run Saudi Press Agency--"official".
And even the SPA has been told they're being privatized in the short-term future.
MEMRI has also made mistakes in its translations. Because I do read Arabic, I can go to the original sources and see for myself if a translation is accurate or not. Most users of MEMRI cannot.
Also because I read Arabic, I know how difficult that language is to translate. Mistakes do happen, so I'll certainly cut MEMRI some slack on that account.
But the problem is that the mistranslations always cut in one direction: the one that makes Arabs look worse.
I do not consider MEMRI an objective souce, even if it remains valuable. It's run by a former senior Israeli intelligence officer. They refuse to disclose the source of their funding. That may be completely innocuous, but due to the lack of transparency, it raises question marks.
Saudis have been polluted by two generations of inferior and destructive education. Religious extremists have been permitted to take control of the classroom. The result is that Saudis are very anti-Semitic. That's a fact. I have no reason to question the veracity of those interviews.
I would add something to them, though.
A public interview almost guarantees that the person being interviewed will say what the questioner wants to hear and what peers standing near by want to hear. Were the interviews conducted privately, there could be different answers.
Saudis are vehemently against the state of Israel. They question the legitimacy of establishing a country on top of a population that was already living in the area. They see, constantly, pictures and images of dead and wounded Palestinian civilians. This drives them crazy.
On the other hand, when Saudis meet Jews in person, they don't automatically grab a dagger and slash away. They're usually interested in meeting them--as long as word of the meeting doesn't get spread around too much in public. They do engage in reasoned discourse. They can actually becomes friends.
Contrary to current wisdom, there are Jews in Saudi Arabia, though all of them are foreigners. Foreign companies and governments staff their operations within the country with the best people available, including Jews.
One officer I supervised during my assignment at the US Embassy in Riyadh was a Jewish woman. She was married to a Muslim not from Saudi Arabia. She was extremely effective in her job and liked it so much she stayed in the country for six years. She did not hide her religion. When a Saudi made an idiotic, anti-Semitic remark, she called them on it. And they apologized, sincerely.
The average Saudi does not know the differene between an anti-Semitic remark and an anti-Zionist remark. This is something that is slowly changing. No one of us can legitimately complain about antipathy toward another country. We can, should, and do complain when the antipathy is spread over an entire religious or ethnic group.
I complain because Mary spreads her hatred for particular--and hateful--individuals to 22 million people in Saud Arabia. How is that qualitatively different from anti-Semitism?
I am aware of the fact that the nation of Saudi Arabia is responsible for 9/11.
The Port Of New York/New Jersey Authority and the law firm that lost more than 700 employees in this Saudi-sponsored act of war are also aware of this fact. That’s why they’re suing Saudi Arabia for their losses in the attacks.
I recognize the fact that this Saudi sponsored attack was an act of war. Apparently, a majority of Saudis also recognize the fact that they are at war with us.
I’m opposed to terrorism, Wahhabism, and the unprovoked mass slaughter of innocent people.
I’m not anti-Saudi, any more that the men who sought to stop Ted Bundy were anti-Ted Bundy. They recognized that a crime had been committed, they identified the enemy and they stopped him from committing more crimes. That’s what I hope our nation can do. I just wonder why we haven't done it already.
We are at war with KSA. They are our enemies. It’s a simple fact. Refusing to admit that fact will cause more innocent Americans to die. It will eventually destroy our economy and it will cause us to lose respect and influence in the world.
Most of the world already recognizes these facts, but again, the US State Department does not.
Thanks very much for your detailed response.
Here’s some feedback.
According to you, fundamentalism (and by this I assume you mean radical Islamic fundamentalism) has the following origins: one third Wahhabism, one third the Muslim Brothers, one third Deobandi sects.
Interesting, but as my 19 year-old daughter succinctly says: Whatever.
In your attempt to educate the huddled masses about what is going on in Saudi Arabia and the Middle East you too quickly dismiss the overarching point that I gleaned from Mary’s essay. Specifically, that American’s are preoccupied with the effects of terrorism and the geopolitical conflicts at the expense of educating themselves about the nature and origins of the underlying fundamentalist ideology that has permeated the Middle East. We have endless debates on homeland security and the war in Iraq, but virtually no discussion about dealing with the spread of fundamentalist ideology within civic institutions (e.g. schools and mosques) either here or in other countries. And the ideology is the real WMD.
Perhaps because you worked at State these discussions are too pedestrian for you, but for a lot of Americans who are clueless about the Middle East, these points can’t be emphasized enough. They sure haven't been well communicated by MSM.
Despite all that has happened 9/11 and subsequent atrocities the MEMRI “man-on-the-street” interview was a shock to me. If it is at all representative of the Saudi’s and the Middle East, and I defer to your experience on this, I know it would be a shock for many folks I either work or live with.
Some more responses to your previous reponse:
You claim Wahhabis slaughter millions. Your proof?
Above, I provided a link "Number of people killed by Wahhabi-inspired hatred: 1 million +."
The link, in case you don’t want to follow it, is from Bat Yeor’s Culture of Hate.
"The imperialism of jihad consists of appropriating the whole history and identity of the peoples who were conquered and thrown into the nonexistence of dhimmitude. This is a total negation of the other, a refusal to acknowledge him as an equal."
From Meta Religion:
"Wahhabism has influenced the Islamist regime in the Sudan, and their drive to establish Shariah law there has resulted in the deaths of millions."
"The violence inflicted because of Deobandi and Wahhabi religious ideology has been substantial. Among the thousands of discussions of Islamic fundamentalism since September 11, one statement sums up the religious connection: "Not all Muslims are suicide bombers, but all Muslim suicide bombers are Wahhabis." There is no debating the violence that this belief system has inspired and continues to inspire."
You said: More than half of the Saudis do support the ideas of what UBL wants
UBL wants to slaughter millions of Americans. That’s a goal that more than half of Saudis share.
Ackerman has his "facts" wrong [about Saudi support of Hamas] because they are not facts. They are claims supported only by documents provided by Israeli Intelligence.
From the International Herald Tribune: Wednesday, September 17, 2003
"At least 50 percent of Hamas's current operating budget of about $10 million comes from Saudi Arabia, according to estimates by U.S. law enforcement officials, U.S. diplomats based in the Middle East and Israeli officials. After the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the Saudi portion of Hamas financing grew larger as donations from the United States, Europe and other Gulf region countries dried up, U.S. officials and terrorism analysts said."
I didn't include these links for the same reason I don't include links to statements like 'the sky is blue'. It's common knowledge that Saudis support Hamas.
Oh, you can add Bill McGurn to the list of people like Mowbray who can't let facts get in the way of a good story.
Just as I can add all Sufis, Shiites, and other moderate Muslims to the list of people who say bad things about Wahhabis because they’re upset that Wahhbis (as you said) “demonize” them.
I can add them to the long list of people whose opinions you do not trust.
You said that you have a ‘shit list’ Wahhabis demonize, or dehumanize most of the non-Wahhabi Muslim world. They have a ‘shit list’ that consists of several billion people.
You are willing to admit that much of the Muslim world dislikes Wahhabis. I’ve heard Muslims call the Saudis ‘parasite usurpers to the throne’. They are not happy about Saudi control of Mecca and Medina.
So why on earth do you expect me to believe this:
Over 1.3 billion people look to Saudi Arabia for moral guidance. They don't look to them as Wahhabis, but as custodians of Mecca and Medina.
You’ve already admitted that this is not true.
I agree that the world depends on Saudi oil, and their land has strategic value. That’s why Americans and everyone else who is threatened by Wahhabi violence has to confront the fact that we are at war with the KSA.
Do you know how many friends I've buried, killed by terrorists?
Do you know how many friends of mine almost died in the 9/11 attacks? Do you know how many funerals my uncle, retired FDNY, went to in the weeks after the attacks? Do you know how long the smell of death lingered downtown?
I don’t blame any branch of the US government for the 9/11 attacks. But I do blame the State Department for their reaction after the attacks. When they continued to support the Visa Express Program for almost a year afterwards, they showed their true alliance. Their first priority was not to protect the American people.
Their first priority was, and is, to maintain the Saudi/American ‘alliance’.
I realize that you know more about Wahhabism and Islam than I will ever know.
I also know that you are not being honest. Your first priority is not to share knowledge.
Your first priority is to maintain our alliance with the Wahhabis.
Was not a direct quote from Meta Religion, although they do mention the Wahhabi influence in the Sudan.
The Port Authority suit is not going anywhere. The suit if fatuous on so many grounds that no court will accept it. It'll certainly earn some lawyers money, but it will not come to any trial.
The Port Authority suit is a civil suit. It's a civil suit and not a criminal suit because no US Attorney will take the case seriously. It's sort of like my suing France for 9/11. You need to show a direct line of responsiblity.
You may well see a direct line of responsiblity. Your view, however, is unsupported by any government entity, from the Dept. of Justice through the White House.
The US government as a whole does not blame Saudi Arabia for the 9/11 attacks. It blames bad practices in Saudi Arabia that provided a philosphical/religious framework that was too easily distorted into terror.
You seem to believe that the Saudi government directly funded terrorists. In three years of investigation, no element of the US government has come forward with evidence to support that allegation. I do not believe that the entire US government has been "bought and sold" by the Saudis. I find it far easier to believe that there is no evidence to support the claim. Were there evidence, we would surely have heard about it.
I don't speak for State Department. I left them five months ago. Colin Powell speaks for State. He has been complimentary about the role the Saudis have played in the war against terror.
But he doesn't set foreign policy, he helps to form it, but foreign policy is set in the White House. If you don't like the way the USG deals with Saudi Arabia, your beef is with Pres. Bush and the NSC. Oddly enough, the White House has been complimentary about Saudi efforts as well. As have FBI, Treasury, and CIA. But I'm sure ou know better.
John Kerry offers an alternative, at least on the campaign trail. He wants to "get tough on the Saudis" at least as far as oil prices are concerned. Perhaps you should vote for him?
The US government, with the exception of a handful of Congressmen, does not believe us to e in a state of war with Saudi Arabia. The US government, from Treasury through FBI and CIA, believe that Saudi Arabia is providing great help in the war against terror. Did the Saudis buy off every individual working for Uncle Sam? If so, I sure didn't get my check.
Bob,
I've truly tried to put things as simply as I can. I've certainly not meant to presume readers are "unwashed". My father started out driving a laundry truck, moved to buses, then into the unions. I went to a CC for a year before transferring to a 4-yr university. I think I do have a perception that is not generally available, but that's because, in part, of who I am, but mostly because of what experiences I've had, what books I've read, and what people I've met. And a lot of luck.
I think my perspective is valuable because I truly believe that the US-Saudi relationship is too important to piss away through not much more than anger. See my reasons above.
The Saudis are guilty of many things, anti-Semitism among them. I don't try to excuse that. It's simply wrong. But I can understand how they got to where they are. I can also understand--and try to help them understand--what they need to do to get out of there.
I was able to achieve certain things while I was in Saudi Arabia. I couldn't achieve others. Sometimes it was because the Saudis weren't ready or able to take a necessary step. Sometimes it was because they disagreed that it was necessary. Sometimes it was due to a lack of adequate resources in my office. Sometimes, I'm sure, it was because I wasn't sharp enough to pull it off.
One thing I did notice though was that unreasoned criticism of Saudi Arabia from the US, and particular elements of the US media, were counterproductive. I noted above, I believe, the problem the Min. of Education had in trying to push through reforms. There was so much screaming and yelling coming from the US that it slowed down--and sometimes prevented--what he was trying to do. He ended up covering his back from domestic criticisms that he was doing the US bidding.
There is a role for US pressure. There is not a role for US stupidity, or for people running around yelling "Nuke Mecca," "kills the Saudis," or "Riyadh delenda est." That kind of talk really upsets people for some reason.
I don't know that I'd do a three-way split of culpability. In fact, I've never really tried to apportion blame. All three work in concert. I will note, though, that Wahhabis tend toward the non-political. They'd prefer to shut the foreign and new outside their countries. The Muslim Brothers and Deobandis are political: they want to make the world conform to their views.
The Wahhabi idiology, in itself, is not a WMD. But I think it is too intolerant to be workable in a global 21st C. It needs to change.
I ask, not rhetorically, if you can name a single religion that changed due to outside pressure. There are a few which disappeard or were destroyed by military pressure, but I mean political pressure. I don't know what religion you follow, but how welcoming would that religion be to religious outsiders demanding reform?
Wahhabism has to change internally, I believe. I also see efforts to make that change. I try to report them on my blog.
I see that the Saudis have pulled several thousand imams out of mosques and put them back into theological school to get their orthodoxy correct. I see that they have arrested thousands in trying to put terrorists out of business. I see them trying to create political reform and taking steps to develop a popularly elected government.
I see ordinary Saudis writing letters to Saudi papers complaining about the abuses of religious leaders. I see ordinary Saudi women writing letters complaining about spousal abuse, child abuse, the lack of women's rights and demanding change.
I see a government that is actually at the forefront of reform that has to go slowly lest it be overthrown like the Shah of Iran, for getting too far ahead of the population. Ten years ago, the Crown Prince himself suggested that women be permitted to drive. He had to take it back in the face of popular rejection.
I most certainly think that the country is going through a period of major change, but the outcome is not at all clear.
Rather than making it harder for the reformists, I think it more useful to help them. I try to help them by showing that Americans are generally openminded enough to understand that they don't know everything about every country and culture, but are willing to give it a chance.
I'm not trying to apologize for Saudis; they have big enough PR budgets to do that. But I firmly believe that it is the interest of the US to try and make the relationship work by helping the Saudis find solutions to the problems that threaten to drag them down.
If you're interested in just what goes on there, there are two books I can recommend (sorry, I'm not taking time for the links, but you can find them on Amazon, though one is only available as a used book.)
Robert Lacey wrote "The Kingdom" in 1980. It misses everything since then, of course, but provides an excellent critical background history.
More recent is Thomas Lippman's "Inside the Mirage", published earlier this year. Lippman gets it. The problem with his book is that the most recent information is from 2002, prior to the 2003 bombings and the accellerated reform that taken place since then.
The State Dept. has just received final authorization to conduct and publish an annual report on Anti-Semitism. The report will cover the status of Jews and anti-Semitic practices on a country-by-country basis.
This joins other annual reports such covering
Human Rights
Religious Freedom
Trafficking in Persons
These reports discuss the situation in Saudi Arabia. They're pretty damn blunt, too.
John Kerry’s plans should have an economic effect on the Saudis – in about 30 years. How many more innocent people can they kill in 30 years? A lot.
Otherwise, Kerry’s plans to continue our “special relationship” with KSA are, apparently, the same as Bush’s. Democrats and Republicans have always benefited from this special relationship, and they won’t change until public pressure forces them to do so.
Oddly enough, the White House has been complimentary about Saudi efforts as well. As have FBI, Treasury, and CIA. But I'm sure ou know better
I, and more than 70% of the American population know better. According to polls, more than 70% of Americans (including the hardworking members of the Port Authority) know that the Saudis are not our allies.
Americans have known this for years. We know who our allies are, and we know who our enemies are. You may not be aware of this, but things have changed.
Who do you think you're fooling? The State Department did everything they could to avoid publishing that report. They're only doing it because they were forced to do so by members of congress and concerned Americans.
Of course, Wahhabi groups like CAIR joined the State Department in opposing the report. From the San Francisco Examiner:
"Really, hate crimes and hate incidents aren't mutually exclusive to one group of individuals," said Helal Omeira, executive director of the local chapter of the Council for Arab-American Islamic Relations. "The precedent could be misinterpreted around the world, as in, 'What about everyone else?'"
"The State Department issued a response earlier this year saying it strongly agreed that anti-Semitism was a global problem, but that a special office would send the wrong message and would duplicate many of its existing efforts at tracking anti-Semitism."
...
You've said that you don't trust Jewish sources, but there's also this from Israel National News:
"The State Department at first stalled the bill, by arguing that Lantos’s proposal would extend exclusive status to one religious or ethnic group. But the legislation moved forward in recent weeks after the David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies and former Congressman Stephen Solarz organized more than 100 prominent Americans to sign a letter to Secretary of State Colin Powell, protesting the State Department’s position."
I did, indeed, mischaracterize the position State took on this legislation and correct it here, now. I stated it more accurately over at my blog earlier.
State fought it because it did not want to start down the path of Europe, where any statement offending any group becomes actionable. They thought it was a bad precedent. I think they have a valid argument.
But I think there is a larger purpose that can be served by an annual anti-Semitism report. I think that establishing a baseline of just what constitutes anti-Semitism and how and why it surfaces around the world is probably a good thing. I like the end, I don't particularly like the means.
I also think that singling out Jews for a special report is redundant to the annual Religious Freedom Report, which already reports on anti-Semitism. It carries the danger of further isolating Jews as a single, separate, and powerful group that can jerk American political chains. I don't believe that they do, but millions think so.
I'm at least consistent: I don't think repeating anti-Semitic charges makes them true, even if "40 million Frenchmen" repeat it. Same with your "arguments" about Saudi Arabia.
And I'm going to have to call it that you started it Hatcher. I'd have interfered before now but I've obviously been away.
This is a good discussion but if you two would actually talk to each other rather than hurl accusations at each other it would be even better.
Hatcher: Thanks for presenting your arguments in a more civilized manner. I don;t necessarily agree with you, but I'm thinking.
Mary: Your arguments would go much farther if people didn't get the impression that you were hurling things at your computer in anger while trying to type.
Steven: If you have nothing to contribute besides foolishness...
This is hardly an opening sally inviting coolheaded response.
As I say, the discussion is good but I wish the two of them would try harder to understand each other. Perhaps a lost cause. Normally I'd have stepped in sooner but there's this whole pesky idea that I was on vacation. ;-)
It's still a marvelously informative debate, so I'm not trying to offend either party.
It really doesn’t work when I’m having a discussion with someone who was professionally involved in diplomacy.
That may be the problem. Hatcher knows a lot more about Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism, Islam, etc. than I do. When I’m talking to someone who is honest about his/her opinions, who tells the truth about what they know, then I appreciate the time they’re spending trying to explain things – even if I don’t agree with them.
But when someone is extremely knowledgeable, and when they say things that even I know are lies..umm..falsehoods..um..diplomatically phrased misrepresentations, it’s disappointing.
When that knowledgeable person tells me, with great authority, things that I know are false, that does tend to make me angry. I have the same problem when I read Chomsky or Juan Cole.
Being called Honeycakes or even being called ignorant doesn’t bug me as much as diplomatically phrased misrepresentations. But there’s no reason why anyone else should have to get their ears blown out. In the real world, I tend to be fairly quiet, so I’ll try to bring some of that quietude to the web.
I will not, however, take kindly to remarks that challenge my patriotism. That will always receive a heated reply. I am deeply resentful, as well, of challenges to the patriotism of State Dept. employees--because they worked for "a traitorious agency"--who have given their lives as the results of terrorist acts.
I have not misrepresented, pace Ms Madigan, any of the points I've made about Saudi Arabia. When you have cited examples that support your argument, I've tried to show why those examples are flawed. You may certainly disagree.
Your not agreeing, however, does not mean that I am lying. Your disagreement with the way the entire Federal government views Saudi actions concerning terrorism--after three years of intense investigation--does not mean that I am lying, or that they are lying. The most likely conclusion is that your "facts" are wrong.
I am certainly open, too, to the possibility that I am in error. But there is a difference between being wrong and lying.
The largest problem that I identify in Ms. Madigan's citations is that they uniformly come from sources who should be suspect--or at least read cautiously--from the start. Those sources have reasons, outside of the arguments they make, to reach negative conclusions.
I rate Israeli commentary on Saudi Arabia just about as strongly as I rate Syrian commentary on Israel, i.e., not very much at all. Each country has myriad reasons to despise the other. Do you go to Kerry to get an objective reading of Bush? People and countries do have biases that color their opinions on matters concerning other countries.
I consistently downgrade critics of Saudi Arabia who have never been there. This is not because they don't love their children or are talentless writers. It's because they do need first-hand experience if they are to write on current affairs factually rather than simply offering an opinion. I do not find it strange that people who have been there, have actually worked with, or even spoken to Saudis reach different conclusions from those who have never been there.
I think I've made it clear that Saudi Arabia has made serious mistakes, some going back 50 years, whose consequences have become apparent only recently. I've criticized their religious structures and inadequate educational systems that create minds ripe for being perverted into the ways of terror. Their civil rights records are abominable by American standards. The country in general is anti-Semitic. The Saudis are culpable for a lot of things.
But I do not accept--nor does anyone who deals with these matters professionally accept--that the Saudi government or Saudi society as a whole, supports terror, is an enemy of the United States, has bought off anyone who doesn't hate Saudis.
There are certainly individual Saudis who have and continue to support terror. They are not the majority and they are not the government.
I most particularly do not accept the dehumanization of 22 million people based on the actions of a tiny fraction of them. When that's done with adherents of Judaism, it's called "anti-Semitism"; when it's done about Blacks, it's called "racism". Whatever it's called, to judge any group by the acts of some of its members is intellectually weak and morally reprehensible.
You say: I consistently downgrade critics of Saudi Arabia who have never been there
and
I rate Israeli commentary on Saudi Arabia just about as strongly as I rate Syrian commentary on Israel
yet, on your site, you consistently link to Arab News.
Do you consider Arab News to be a better source of information than any Israeli source? Is it better than the International Herald Tribune?
Most Americans would give more weight to the Herald Tribune.
I would like to visit Saudi Arabia, (and Libya, Italy and Isreal) Unfortunatly, I would also like to visit friends in Israel before I visit KSA, and we all know that Saudi's won't allow me into the country with an Isreali stamp on my passport.
Again, I recognize the humanity of the Saudi people. I wish they would recognize my humanity too. Like 70% of all Americans, I'm also aware of the fact that they are not our allies.
My blog is focused on providing context about Saudi Arabia. It is not about Israeli opinions about Saudi Arabia, nor British, Fijian, or Canadian opinions (though I do sometimes cite an occasional Canadian blog). I'm not writing about the Global War on Terror, nor am I writing about the Palestinian issues other than how Saudis view those issues. My focus is very narrow.
I most frequently cite Arab News because it is one of the Saudi media most accessible to Americans, mostly because it's in English. There are equally good--if not better--Saudi papers. Al-Watan, Ash-Sharq Al-Awsat (a sister paper of Arab News) and Okaz are certainly worth reading. Saudi Gazette isn't bad, but it's generally a day late in its news coverage and analysis isn't its strong point. It's a fascinating paper to read, though, for its daily columns on Islam.
When it comes to reporting on Saudi Arabia, yes, I most certainly do give greater credibility to almost any Saudi paper over a paper from any regional rival. Equally, I do not look to Saudi papers for good analysis of Israel, though Arab News does in fact publish articles written by Israelis.
But Islam--or any of its interpretations--is not my point, either. I try to cover the social and political developments. I try to put them into historical context, in regional contexts, and in global contexts. Again, my focus is narrow.
I wouldn't worry too much about the "Israeli visa in passport" problem. Because many Arab governments, as a matter of politics, do not recognize Israel as a state, they don't like Israeli visas. That's a fact. I've spent many a midnight at various airports in the Arab world issuing new passports to Americans who tried to enter those countries with Israeli stamps.
The government of Israel is cognizant of this fact. That is why they usually print their visas and stamp entry/exit on separate pieces of paper. When they insist on doing it in the passport, it's because they're not sure about you, your reasons for visiting Israel in combination with visiting Arab states.
The US government is also cognizant of this issue. You may apply for--and receive--a separate passport restricted for use only in entering/exiting Israel. That way, you do not present your documents with a problematic stamp. At one time, I held four passports, my personal tourist one, my diplomatic one, and Israel-only variations of each. It's a little unusual, but not very.
I'm trying to put together a group of bloggers to visit Saudi Arabia. The purpose is for them to see with their own eyes, hear with their own ears, what the country is about. I have a bit of trouble raising funds for this because I don't want anyone to think that they're being "bought off" by Saudi government for the price of the trip. Equally, I don't want US gov't money because that could similarly be conceived as "tainting" the visit. I'll certainly keep you in mind if I can identify the money.
I'd put you on the blogroll but I can't seem to find your link.
You can delete my White Sky Diary blogroll entry as I've shifted the operation over to xrdarabia.
I've sent you a message (through your message link) asking a couple of other questions.
I don't want to go into the public fundraising yet as I'm still working to figure out how to legally structure my organization. There are some issues on 501(c)3. organizations I need to resolve. I'd much rather tax-free donations. If it's not tax-free, then there are certainly tax consequences! I need more time on that.
From what I’ve heard of Al-Watan, it would be a much better source of information than Arab News. Although I’d hardly call it liberal, in the ultraconservative KSA Al-Watan is less conservative than other publications.
About a year ago, I was involved in a letter writing campaign to reinstate editor Jamal Khashoggi, who was fired at the behest of the Saudi Information Ministry for speaking out against the ‘extremists’.
From Instapundit's post:
"RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, May 27 — An editor whose newspaper was in the forefront of a campaign against Muslim extremism was removed from his post Tuesday, managers at the paper said.
No reason was given for the dismissal of Jamal Khashoggi, who joined the Al-Watan newspaper in March, one manager said on condition of anonymity.."
"Many Saudis who had hoped that their country was on a path toward change following the terror attacks against three compounds housing foreign workers were disappointed by the news of Khashoggi's dismissal."
"This is a bad sign," said Turki al-Hamad, a prominent writer. "This will be considered a victory by the extremists. It's like an invitation for more attacks."
When he reported on this, Glenn Reynolds said:
"The firing was at the behest of the Saudi Information Ministry, which means the Saudi royals' fingerprints are on it. They're not our friends, they're major supporters and exporters of Islamic terrorism, they're almost certainly incapable of reform, and sooner or later they're going to have to go."
I'm trying to put together a group of bloggers to visit Saudi Arabia. The purpose is for them to see with their own eyes, hear with their own ears, what the country is about. I have a bit of trouble raising funds for this because I don't want anyone to think that they're being "bought off" by Saudi government for the price of the trip. Equally, I don't want US gov't money because that could similarly be conceived as "tainting" the visit.
That is a problem when two nations are maintaining an alliance that’s basically an undeclared state of war.
Despite the fact that, as a woman, Saudis believe that I’m de facto filthier that dirt, I would want to take advantage of any opportunity to visit the Kingdom – mostly out of curiosity. If you’re going to put something like that together, I’d be happy to help with publicity, etc.
He, his staff, and office buildings were being threatened with death and bombings. He felt it wiser to step aside. Proof that he did not leave in bad odor can be seen where he ended up next: as public affairs advisor to the Saudi Ambassador to the UK. That job can hardly be considered punishment.
I think the story shows several things, though. First, the Saudi gov't did not get in his way in publishing those articles.
Second, Saudis felt in enough control to actually attack--in print--what they saw to be a major problem.
And third, of course, that there are Saudis who will kill, or at least threaten to kill, those who challenge religious authority.
While the third point is the one that made headlines in the US, I find the first two of great interest as well. If nothing else, it demonstrates that there are Saudis who want to make changes, identify the problem as religious oppression, and don't get slapped down by the government.
But the US coverage--and I'm certainly not throwing bricks at Instapundit: he writes about what's published--makes my point that US reporting on Saudi Arabia is context free. Large parts of the media seem to feel it's a free fire zone when it comes to the Saudis.
Most assuredly, there are some Saudis who consider any non-veiled woman questionable, but not the majority. The religious police can be a pain, for Saudis as well as foreigners, but they've actually been knocked back by the gov't since 5/13/03. Some parts of the country are more welcoming of foreigners than others, certainly. I found no trouble going out for coffee with single Saudi women--with their heads uncovered and faces unveiled--in Jeddah, to public restaurants or coffee houses. There are cities were I wouldn't even think of that, of course. I also modify my behavior depending where--for instance--I go in Washington, DC, at what time of day or night.
Some parts of Saudi Arabia have been cosmopolitan for over 4,000 years; others have still to deal with xenophobia. But the country is as big as Western Europe, entirely large enough for there to be a wide variation in attitudes. It's a serious mistake to assume that if you've met one Saudi you've met them all, particularly if he one you met is Osama bin Laden. You'd be equally wrong if the only Saudi you met was Amb. Pr. Bandar, too, but for the opposite reason.
Well, it’s nice to know that Mr. Khashoggi is doing well. But he’s not publishing anything that will upset the state-supported homicidal clergy.
When death threats are made, the government’s reaction to their homicidal clergy is not to prosecute the offenders – it’s to export the problem.
I found no trouble going out for coffee with single Saudi women—with their heads uncovered and faces unveiled—in Jeddah, to public restaurants or coffee houses. There are cities were I wouldn't even think of that, of course. I also modify my behavior depending where—for instance—I go in Washington, DC, at what time of day or night.
In every city, you have to modify your behavior to avoid crime – true, Washington is more dangerous than New York – it’s probably almost as dicey as London – but otherwise, Saudi society and Western society are not in any way comparable.
In Saudi society, women have fewer rights than dogs. We’re talking about a society that recently outlawed slavery – where the introduction of television produced a revolution, where Bibles are forbidden, where the presence of homicidal clergy is not the exception, it’s the rule. Doesn’t this seem a bit unusual to you??
It’s true, I’ve never been there, but when you view things from a distance, you gain some perspective. From your comments, I’m beginning to wonder if spending too much time in Saudiland causes the loss of perspective.
The reason Saudi society is not comparable to Western society – their laws.
Here are some of the basics of the Islamic sacred law that’s practiced in Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Iran (and that was practiced by the Taliban)
(this is based on a Muslim-authored text,
Reliance of the Traveller: The Classic Manual of Islamic Sacred Law)
- A free Muslim man may marry up to four women;
- Non-Muslim subjects (Ahl al-Dhimma) of a Muslim state are subject to a series of discriminatory laws – "dhimmitude"
- The penalty for an initial theft is amputation of the right hand. Subsequent thefts are penalized by further amputations of feet and hand;
- A non-Muslim cannot testify against a Muslim in court; a person who is “without respectability” cannot give legal testimony; a woman’s legal testimony is only given half the legal weight of a man’s (and is only acceptable in cases involving property); to legally prove fornication or sodomy requires 4 male witnesses who actually saw the act;
- Musical instruments are unlawful;
- Creating pictures of animate life is forbidden;
- Slavery is permitted;
- The establishment and continuation of the Islamic Caliphate (by force, if necessary) is a communal obligation;
and - Lying is permissible in a time of war (or jihad).
..
Slavery continues in the Kingdom, violent, genocidal ji