Hello Friends,
I read this article a few days ago written by Phyllis Chesler and decided to share it with you. For those that are not familiar with Phyllis and her works you can read her bio here.
The topic is why is America still allied with Saudi Arabia. A good question when you consider it is one of the most oppressive of regimes and it's human right violations are to numerous to mention here. Under the veneer and facade of being a moderate nation it is one of the worst and has a history of supporting terrorism world wide.
One of the reasons that the US is still allied with them is B Hussein's love for all that is Islam. Remember his infamous speeches in Cairo and Istanbul where the theme was respect all that Islam stands for? Yep, that sort of gives you an inclination of this mans blindness, love and belief in Islam. Oh yes, let's not forget his famous bow to his liege the Saudi King.
Phyllis's article is an important read especially for woman since it touches on the violations of woman's rights under Islam and in the Saudi Kingdom.
Shalom,
Peter
– by Phyllis Chesler
Saudis: Exporters of Radical Islamic Propaganda, Torturers and Rapists at Home
The Saudi mutawas (“morality police”) are terrifying. Like vultures,they swoop down on their vulnerable prey, especially women, and thensend them straight to Hell. The “long beards” curse and beat theirfemale prisoner, totally terrify her; then, they throw her into a dark,medieval dungeon, (assume the worst here). They remove her only inorder to gang-rape and torture her—all presumably in the name of Islam.Her crime? In one instance, although the woman was a foreign national,she dared to take a taxi downtown without a male escort.
Riskingthe wrath of the religious police, a woman in Mecca, Saudi Arabia,loosens her veil to eat an ice cream HASAN JAMALI / AP
Remind me: Why are we still allies with Saudi Arabia? Why didPresident Obama bow to the King who presides over such Hell? Can wefind no oil elsewhere, no other sources of energy? Do Americans reallyunderstand what goes on in Saudi Arabia? Have we forgotten that theSaudis have single-handedly exported Wahhabi fundamentalism andpropaganda that has poisoned both westerners and those in the east—andhave funded western universities and media as well? Does anyoneremember that 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers came from Saudi Arabia? Orthat Osama bin Laden is a Saudi? Do we not understand that the Kingdomhas funded bin Laden? And that they have funded many influentialIslamic “charities” in North America? Please read Stephen SuleymanSchwartz’s excellent piece on this here.
Yes, I know: The Saudi rulers oppose Al Qaeda who would overrun thesands were the House of Saud to ever quit the desert. And yet: Are weaware, even dimly, of how very barbaric the Saudi rulers themselvesare—despite all their suave, smooth, westernized, glitzy exteriors? Dowe understand what it means to live in the 8th or 9th centuries?
Prometheus Books is about to publish a book by Sami Alrabaa which is called Veiled Atrocities: True Stories of Oppression in Saudi Arabia.Once I picked it up, I literally could not put it down. Alrabaa is aprofessor of anthropology and sociology who, for five years, chaired adepartment of European Languages and Translation at King SaudUniversity.
Mary Laurel Ross has also just published a very good book about Saudi Arabia. Veiled Honor (Father’sPress) is based on Ross’s having lived in the Kingdom for nearlyfifteen years as the wife of an American military officer. The book isbased on the many letters she sent her mother-in-law, who carefullykept them all. Like Alrabaa, Ross’s book does not whitewash thenormalization of atrocities in the Kingdom as so many of the earlierbooks about Saudi Arabia once did.
I will review both books at a later date. The atrocities are visitedupon both men and women, and definitely upon foreign workers andforeign nationals.
However, today, I want to focus on one story only which concernswoman’s inhumanity to woman—which is also the subject and title of my book, which has just been reissued with a new introduction. This story is contained in the opening chapter of Alrabaa’s book.
Al Rabaa tells the story of Karin (presumably a pseudonym), a Germanwoman who took a taxi downtown and got arrested for doing so. Throwninto a dungeon, beaten, raped, traumatized, no one knew where she was.Finally, a married Saudi man (alas, one to whom she was alreadyattracted), moved heaven and earth to rescue her. He got her releasedafter having her German husband deported and after marrying her withoutKarin even being present. A well connected Saudi man can rescue hiswife from prison. Satam moved Karin into the home he shared with hisfirst wife Fatima and their children. Satam soon lost interest in Karinand spent long hours away from home. But Karin was already pregnant.Here’s how Fatima handled the situation.
First, around midnight, while Karin was sleeping, Fatima put on loudArabic music, came into Karin’s room and “slammed a massive stick downonto my stomach…I screamed for help. ‘No one is going to hear you,Gahba (whore)!’” The first wife kept swinging the stick at her. Karinfled. Finally, Satam got Karin her own apartment. Whereupon, Fatimastarted calling her to “harass and terrorize me…she spread rumors thatI had a boyfriend who secretly came to visit me.” In fact, Fatimaenlisted relatives in an elaborate scheme to entrap Karin and to reportall such concocted suspicious doings to Satam.
But here is the most evil thing that Fatima did. Because Mimi, theirhousemaid, was helpful to Karin, Fatima reported Mimi to the mutawa for“fornication.” The fact that this was totally untrue made nodifference. Once Mimi was arrested, Prince Salman signed her deathwarrant. Satam could do nothing to reverse this decree. Thus, thefollowing Friday, after prayers, the appropriate verses from the Qu’ranhaving been read, Mimi was stoned to death. The two Indian men she wasaccused of “fornicating” with (shopkeepers, where Mimi was shopping forKarin) each received one hundred lashes.
The graphic description of Mimi’s stoning is too awful for me to repeat.
I am waiting for Secretary of State Clinton and President Obama tospell out precisely what American policy should be vis a vis SaudiArabia given their barbaric record on human rights and their major rolein funding and exporting Islamic Jihad globally.
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