Abdulaziz Al Qasim

That’s why I’ve volunteered my time and resources to help with a non-profit seminar that aims at educating Saudi women on how to obtain their full inheritance. The seminar was initiated jointly by the Business Women’s Forum of the Eastern Province and AbdulAziz Al Qasim and Associates Law Firm. The speakers are Abdulaziz Al Qasim himself, two professor from King Abdulaziz University, Dr. Hanan Al Qahtani and Dr. Ahlam Al Ouadhi and an Islamic scholar all the way from Tunisia, Prof. Amaal Grami. This is a translation of the ambitious proposal and paper titles:

Objectives of the seminar

• Educate women about family laws in Islam with emphasis on inheritance law.
• Educate women about the tools and legal means at their disposal.
• Raise awareness about women’s financial, commercial and economic rights in Islam.
• Integrate women’s economic issues within national economic strategies.
• Achieve social justice and stop illegal gender discrimination.
• Highlight how family businesses in the commercial sector can successfully apply these laws without disrupting the business or undermining a female family member’s rights.

Seminar program

Each one-day seminar is divided into two sessions. The morning session will consist of four guest speakers with considerable experience and expertise on the subject. The afternoon session will consist of a panel discussion with our guest speaker and will explore themes related to the morning sessions.

• Commercial inheritance law and women in the Kingdom, and how to best apply this knowledge.

Speaker: Prof. Abdul Aziz al-Qasim, Abdul Aziz Al Qasim and Associates Law Firm.

• The legitimate right of women to inheritance versus the current practices and outcomes.

Speaker: Prof. Hanan Al Qahtani, King Abdulaziz University

Prof. Amaal Grami

• Different approaches taken by other Arab countries with regards to Sharia inheritance laws.

Speaker: Prof. Amaal Grami, Faculty of Literature, Arts and Humanities, University of Manouba

• Achieving social justice through Sharia compliance and application, and stopping illegal discrimination

Speaker : Prof. Ahlam Al Awadhi, King Abdul Aziz University

For this seminar, I’ve created my first ever website: www.Saudiwomeninheritance.com through which women can register. And we also have a twitter account: @Saudinheritance. And of course a Facebook page.

The first seminar will be in Riyadh on Saturday May 4^th, then in Jeddah on May 6^th and finally in Khobar on May 9^th. It will be completely in Arabic and only women are allowed to register.

Here, I thought I would cover a bit on how the court’s ruling was received by influential Saudis online.
Essam Al Zamil, an economist and blogger, created an online poll to get a feel of how the public took the judge’s ruling. As of writing this post, about 10,000 have taken part and 85% state that the ruling was unjust.

الاستطلاع ما زال مفتوحا.. شارك فيه حتى الآن اكثر من 3200. والنتيجة ما زالت 84% ضد الحكم الصادر على حسم.bit.ly/13LmLes#محاكمة_حسم

— عصام الزامل (@essamz) March 9, 2013

Tawfeeq Al Saif, a political analyst and civil rights activist, tweets apparently addressing the government: Consider the course of events? Did former prison sentences result in killing hope for reforms? Have Saudis become more determined to reform or more afraid of you?

تاملوا في مسار الاحداث.هل نفعت سجونكم السابقة في قتل الامل بالاصلاح؟. هل اصبح السعوديون اكثر عزما على الاصلاح ام اكثر خوفا منكم؟#محاكمة_حسم

— توفيق السيف (@t_saif) March 9, 2013

Hala Al Dosari, a writer and human rights activist, tweets that this trial sends a message to Saudis that a peaceful solution is unacceptable and punishable by law and that judges have the powers to go beyond regulations and that the judiciary is politicized.

#محاكمة_حسم ما يقوله له لنا الحكم أن الحل السلمي مرفوض و يعاقب عليه القانون و ان القضاة لهم صلاحيات تعزير تتعدى الأنظمة و أن القضاء مسيّس

— هالة الدوسري (@Hala_Aldosari) March 9, 2013

Ahmed Baaboud, a fellow blogger, tweets that he will tell his daughter Jori about Abdullah Al Hamid; that he will tell her that Al Hamid sacrificed for her without knowing her, only so that she might have a better tomorrow, just so that the sun may shine some day.

غداً سأخبر جوري عن عبدالله الحامد.. سأحكي لها أنه ضحى من أجلها و هو لا يعرفها.. فقط لكي يكون غدها أفضل.. فقط لتشرق الشمس يوماً #محاكمة_حسم

— أحمد باعبود (@a_baaboud) March 9, 2013

Ahmed Adnan, a journalist and author, tweets he is against the judge’s ruling and doesn’t respect it, and also  against ACPRA and doesn’t respect them. (Presumably because ACPRA did not speak out on Kashgari’s case and they were slow to respond in Turki Al Hamad’s case, both of whom were arrested for writing what some consider blasphemous in Islam).

انا ضد أحكام #محاكمة_حسم ولا أحترمها، وأيضا انا ضد #حسم ولا أحترمها

— ahmed adnan (@wddahaladab) March 9, 2013

Mohammed Al Ajamie, a Twitter activist, tweets that he feels the frustration that the families of the political prisoners feel at the imprisonment of Al Hamid and Al-Qahtani because of how secure they felt with their presence after the elites abandoned these families.

أشعر بالروح المحبطة التي أصيب بها أهالي المعتقلين بعد سجن الحامد والقحطاني فهم كانوا يشعرون بالأمان بوجودهم لتخلي النخب عنهم#محاكمة_حسم

— محمد العجيمي(@MoAlojaimi) March 9, 2013

Ibraheem Al Modamigh, an attorney, tweets that today’s ruling leaves no room for doubt that the judiciary is politicized and is not independent and that any neutral careful reading of the ruling will reach this disappointing and unfortunate result.

حكم اليوم لا يدع مجالا للشك فى أن القضاء مسيًس وغير مستقل والقرائة المتأنية المحايدة للحكم توصل لهذه النتيجة المحبطة والمؤسفه

— إبراهيم المديميغ (@imodattorney) March 9, 2013

Fouad Al Farhan, a human rights activist and blogger, tweets that the judge’s decision to dissolve ACPRA and confiscate their property is an invitation to the public to work in secret and shows that they hate clarity, openness and peaceful public action.

قرار القاضي بحل جمعية حسم ومصادرة ممتلكاتها هي دعوة منه للجمهور للتوجه للعمل السرّي..يكرهون الوضوح والصراحة والعمل السلمي العلني #محاكمة_حسم

— فؤاد الفرحان (@alfarhan) March 9, 2013

Abdulla Al Maliki, a political activist eloquently tweets that glory, pride and history is for Al-Hamid and Al-Qahtani and that we now lost the shade of their roofs but the roof will always remain high as long as there are souls hungry for freedom and justice ..

المجد والفخر والتاريخ للحامد والقحطاني .. كنا سنتظل بسقفهما .. ولكن سيبقى السقف مرتفعا ما دام أن هناك أرواحا متعطشة للحرية والعدالة ..

— عبدالله المالكي (@iAbuhesham) March 9, 2013

Badr Al Jaafri, a lawyer, tweets that Rights .. freedom .. dignity .. justice .. are what ACPRA is made of and that these well-established values cannot be dissolved and confiscated even if some believe otherwise.

الحقوق..الحرية..الكرامة..العدالة .. هذه ممتلكات حسم .. هي قيم راسخة في الوجدان .. غير قابلة للانتزاع والمصادرة وإن بدا غير ذلك

— بدر الجعفري (@BadrAljaafari) March 9, 2013

Dr. Salman Al Oudah, famous sheikh, tweets that imprisonments and sacrifices only ingrain ideas, draw people together, and make media substance for those near and far.

السجون والتضحيات ترسخ الأفكار وتجمع الناس حولها.. وتجعلها مادة إعلامية للقريب والبعيد. #محاكمة_حسم

— د. سلمان العودة (@salman_alodah) March 9, 2013

Fayed Al Olaiwi, a columnist and author, tweets that the secret to the rise of Malaysia is in Mahathir’s success in the abolition of the royal veto and lifting the immunity of the royal family and entourage and thus the judiciary became independent and eliminated corruption!

سر نهضة ماليزيا في نجاح مهاتير في إلغاء الفيتو الملكي ورفع الحصانة عن الأسرة وحاشيتها وبالتالي استقل القضاء وقضي على الفساد! #محاكمة_حسم

— فايد العليوي (@fayedalolaiwi) March 9, 2013

Mohammed Al Dugalaibi, a public relations specialist, tweets to whom it may concern to not let it occur to them, even for a moment, that the eagerness to arrest reformers and the feeble attempts to obscure facts will discourage the resolve of the free.

لا يخطر ببالك ولو للحظة واحدة بأن شبقك إلى إعتقال المصلحين وتزييفك الواهن للحقيقة سيثني من عزيمة الأحرار. #إلى_من_يهمه_اﻷمر #محاكمة_حسم

— محمد الدغيلبي (@dugailbi) March 9, 2013

Dr. Kassab Al Otabi, a political activist, tweets that our generation is aware and they will remember these scenes of injustice and tyranny and systematic attempts at indoctrination but we will not kneel nor will we forget and forgive.

جيلُنا واعٍ وستختزن ذاكرته مشاهد الظُلم والاستبداد ومُحاولات التطويع المُمنهجة. لكنه لن يركع ولن ينسى ولن يغفر. وأنّى له ذلك؟ #محاكمة_حسم

— د. كساب العتيبي (@Dr_Kassab) March 9, 2013

Ahmed Abu Dahman, a novelist and poet, tweets that a government that arrests its peaceful opponents will also arrest its supporters and its relatives; it will die alone. Qaddafi is an example.

#محاكمة_حسم النظام الذي يسجن معارضيه السلميين سيعتقل مناصريه . سيعتقل ذويه . سيموت وحيداً . القذافي نموذجاً .

— أحمد أبو دهمان(@abodehman) March 9, 2013

Ibraheem Al Qahtani, a blogger and comedian, wonders that now that Al Hamid and Al Qahtani have been imprisoned, will development in the country suddenly grow a six pack. (This is in reference to one of the charges against them that they obstructed development).

الحين اذا تم سجن الحامد والقحطاني مفروض ان التنمية عندنا يطلع لها “سكس باك” من كثر النشاط ولا؟

— إبراهيم القحطاني (@brhom) March 10, 2013

Sultan Al Fifi, an activist, tweets how much of the country’s resources have Al Hamid and Al Qahtani stolen, how much land have they fenced up, how many corrupt arms deals have they dealt? What have they done to deserve such a ruling?

كم شبكتما من الأراضي.. كم سرقتما من المال العام.. كم أبرمتما من صفقات التسلح الفاسدة.. ماذا فعلتما لتستحقا مثل هذا الحكم؟#محاكمة_حسم

— سلطان الفيفي (@SultanAlfifi) March 9, 2013

Abdullah Al Alami, an author, columnist and economist, tweets that we must all know the truth that if these rulings were in a poverty stricken country we would have seen Mr. John Kerry on TV denouncing that country’s human rights violations.

حقيقة يجب ان نعرفها: لو ان الأحكام صدرت في بلد فقير، لكان السيد جون كيري الآن يندد على شاشات التلفزيون بانتهاكات حقوق الإنسان في ذلك البلد

— عبدالله العلَمي (@AbdullaAlami) March 9, 2013

Saeed Al Wahabi, an author, tweets that it would be to the government’s benefit that they confront open and public civil associations in the light of day rather than resorting to dark tactics and wonders if they’ve forgotten the years of terrorism.

من صالحك يا دولة إنك تواجهي مؤسسة مجتمع مدني معروف أعضائها ونشاطها في النور بدلاً من حراك الظلام ، نسينا سنوات الإرهاب #محاكمة_حسم

— سعيد الوهابي (@S_Alwahabi) March 9, 2013

Things are looking up for women in Saudi Arabia. While they are still second-class citizens required to have a male guardian to grant them permission to travel and are banned from driving cars, women now make up 20 percent of the appointed advisory council and are allowed to fully participate in municipal elections. Women are also finally allowed to work openly in malls as sales clerks. Moreover, any day now, the Ministry of Justice plans to grant licenses to women lawyers and maybe even implement child protection laws. Thus, generally we’re on the right path. Yet that path could be derailed with the slightest sign of upheaval or war. When attempting to pacify or recruit ultra-conservatives on a particular cause, the first issue to be put on the negotiation table is women’s rights. To get Islamist sheikhs to endorse (or at least be silent over) arbitrary political detentions, a possible outbreak of war between Israel and Iran, or the use of drones by American forces in neighboring Muslim countries, all that has to be promised is the status quo on women’s issues such as maintaining the ban on women driving or agreeing that a legal age for marriage will not be assigned. In any national turmoil, women are usually the first to be sacrificed. Nowhere is that more true than in Saudi Arabia. Independent civil societies are outlawed. The only organizations outside of the government are those of Islamists who abuse their religious power, calling on men to attend a literary club meeting just to protest women being allowed to attend in the same hall. They also went in scores to the royal court to protest women being allowed on the advisory council. These incidents were at a time of relative stability; can you imagine what would happen to women’s rights if this stability were to be shaken?

Two other Saudi women, Muna Abu Sulayman and Hala Al Dosari, also wrote a piece for the publication. You can check theirs out HERE.

Reblogged from Omaima Al Najjar:

After I was inspired by Manal Al Shirf campaign I asked my brother to teach me how to drive. Back then I was living in Riyadh city. Our teaching sessions have always started on Friday or Thursday mornings that’s when the streets are less busy. After making a good progress my brother started letting me drive to my hometown, the Eastern province, which is about 450 kms away.

Read more… 1,042 more words

This is a translation of an article  written by Prof. Al Bakr published in Al Jazirah newspaper today.

It is no longer easy to read our local newspapers, now full of painful news, especially related to children, young orphans and disadvantaged minors and women. These are those most vulnerable in a society that tends to substantiate male superiority while perpetuating the weakness and subordination of women and children.

The story of the little girl Lama that was sexually abused and murdered by her father, who is now in prison awaiting trial, and other recurrent stories like it, show the power of men in this society and their capability of harming weaker parties unable to defend themselves due to lack of awareness, mechanisms and laws that protect children and women from all kinds of harassment and abuse.

Societies are based on families caring for their children. A father and mother’s immediate responsibility in every family is to care for and nurture their children, but that is not what occurs in all cases. In Saudi Arabia, there is a need to form laws that protect weaker entities within the institution of the family. The absence of such laws produce cases like Lama, who die waiting for justice, and this absence of legislation will keep producing others like Lama we may or may not know about.

In the past, it was acceptable and feasible to address similar cases within the context of the family and neighborhood due to the small population of Saudi at that time and the simplicity of the social system. This is no longer possible in this day and age. The population of Saudi has grown enormously and every family within this modern lifestyle system has practically barricaded themselves inside their cement homes, isolated from others around them. Many negative lifestyle options have now become accessible such as drug use and alcohol while the legal system has not caught up by implementing legislation, protocol and social services to prevent and protect against abuse and neglect.

Our modern times have seen a shift in how we define and view terms like childhood, abuse, neglect and other terms relating to rights in modern social institutions. Our generation was subjected to many forms of verbal and (maybe physical) abuse from teachers, parents, relatives and neighbors according to the prevailing intellectual structure of the society; as the Arabic proverb goes the meat is for the teacher and the bones for the parents. If at that time society did not criminalize many forms of abuse, today there is no room for such practices, even if it is for noble goals. No one can hit a child under the pretext of disciplining or slap a teenager under the pretext of returning him or her to their senses, let alone deliver deliberate harm or neglect or sexual abuse as poor Lama faced that left her body lying in the morgue for four months!!

It is time to wake up. Such practices must be criminalized because it is a crime in our modern time’s definition. Many of the frighteningly light court rulings on cases of domestic abuse do not correspond to the severity of the crime. Civil and Shariah laws should be updated to catch up with Saudi society’s intellectual shift in the understanding of rights and duties. All kinds of abusive behavior against children and women should be clearly identified by law makers and Sharia laws and codified.

There is an immediate need to call for a draft law that clearly defines all forms of abuse including verbal, psychological, physical, and sexual abuse and other forms of sexual harassment and abuse that women and other minorities in society face.

We have grown weary of hearing about the Lamas of our society. Their stories, reverberated by the newspapers and satellite channels, nationally and internationally, have created an awareness among society regarding the lack of a basic law for the protection against abuse. It is high time for legislation to cover this deficiency. Saudi Arabia has signed many international treaties that ensure basic human rights for all and rejects any kind of discrimination. Islamic laws also emphasize the protection of rights for all. Our shared religion and these treaties could help us to initiate laws against neglect and abuse that many have long waited for.

BBC WHYS radio program invited two veteran human rights activists, Aziza Al Yousef and Hatoon Al Fassi to shed light on the case and clarify the assumptions and ambiguities surrounding the Saudi legal (system?). I highly recommend listening to this and compare it to the official government statement. To listen to the recording CLICK HERE.

If you are short on time watch the CNN 3 minute video report, which will bring you up to speed and also has brief input from Aziza Al Yousef. To watch CLICK HERE.

First, when it comes to whether or not Fayhan Al Ghamdi had raped his daughter, the social worker assigned to the case, Randa Al Kaleeb stated so in a phone interview with an investigative program host, Ali Al Olayani. And we have Dr. Mohammed Mahdi, the medical examiner in Lama’s case,  from the Forensic Medicine Department in Riyadh, who stated to Asharq Aawsat:

The offender committed all types of physical abuse on the victim as well as her exposure to sexual assault as a result of swelling in the region of the genitals and laceration in the anal area. There is ambiguity and secrets and the narrative is incomplete. In domestic abuse cases, injuries are usually afflicted over several months and not all in one bout. Also there is disparity in the type of injuries, from burns to those afflicted with sharp tools, along with the presence of strikes that take distinctive forms. All of these specifications have been identified on Lama’s body through the bruises and effects of burns and blows and led to them being afflicted with a thick electrical cable and a cane. These tools have been seized from the offenders home at the request of the Forensic Medicine Department as evidence. It’s Lama’s right that we reveal the truth of what happened to her.

Second, when blood money is offered and accepted then all maximum penalties are off the table. Over and over again, the courts have let fathers and husbands literally get away with murder by paying blood money and at most serving five to twelve years. I’ve given examples in my previous post, but I’ll give you another example that’s as recent as January 6^th 2013. Wissam was a 13 year old to an Egyptian mother and a Saudi father. His mother came to Saudi as a 16 year old bride twenty years ago. Five years ago her husband divorced her and the torment began. It ended with the father chasing Wissam from the street to the door and stabbing him over and over again. Wissam died minutes later in his mother’s arms at the entrance of his home. The final ruling on January 6^th was that blood money be paid and a five year sentence. After the judge ruled, Wissam’s sister turned to her mother and asked “Mama when father comes out of prison, will he kill us like he killed Wissam?”

Dr. Amal Al Kafrawi psychiatric and addiction specialist told Alwatan that protection from domestic violence committees under the Ministry of Health are unavailable and non-existent, despite the existence of them in name within the ministry. She added that the impact of domestic violence is mostly suffered by the children. She stated that we find that the weak individual is assaulted in every way without having the chance to defend himself or his human rights, which must be guaranteed by his community, so children grow up in an atmosphere of constant persecution and humiliation that destroy their innocence.

The only case in Saudi history when a father/murder was made to pay is that of Ghusoon, an eight year old girl who was chained and tortured over a year by her father and stepmother while her mother ran from one official to the next asking for help. Ghussoon was starved, had kerosene poured over her, burned and even hit with a car in her father’s yard. All of this because the father doubted his paternity. Alas Ghusoon died before anyone would listen to her mother. In only that case was it considered murder and the father executed. You would think that Ghusoon’s case would create a precedent, right? Wrong. Because Saudi’s (reminiscently medieval) justice system is resistant to codification. Every judge can rule in whatever way he sees fit, as long as he can find a religious text to base his ruling on. That means you can have two cases of murder, divorce or whatever with the exact same specifications and in the courtroom of the same judge and still get two different rulings depending on who the defendants are, what they wore, their piety…etc.

I can only guess what the motive is behind NSHR statements and actions. The only thing that’s apparent is that they are downplaying the case.

According to news reports, Al Ghamdi told the judge that Lama was behaving strangely and that he questioned her virginity. He went as far as to have a medical professional check that her virginity was intact. Her mother said in an interview on Ali Al Olayani’s show that she felt that there was something wrong three months before Lama was admitted to the hospital but that her ex-husband would only allow her short telephone conversations. She begged him to give her the girl but he refused. By the time she finally got to see her, Lama was in the ICU. Her mother described her to Al Olayani; Lama had one of her fingernails removed, the side of her head was smashed and the rest of her body was covered up. She had to hear from hospital staff and social workers how Lama’s rectum was torn open and that the abuser had attempted to burn it closed. Randa Al Kaleeb, a social worker from the hospital where Lama was, told Al Olayani in a phone interview that Lama’s back was broken as well and that she had been raped “everywhere”.

It’s a horror story on all levels. Yet the horror did not end with Lama’s death last October, as the court has initially decided that the four months that the father/murderer spent in prison is enough time and that all he has to do is pay blood money. Four months and a few thousand riyals is the cost of Lama’s innocence and life. This outcome is based on a hadith that does not occur in the two top resources for hadith, Bukhari and Muslim. It also goes against the Quran’s condemnation of fathers who murder their daughters. The hadith translates into “A father is not executed for his child.” Of course the patriarchal misogynistic scholars and judges who use this hadith to justify not punishing Al Ghamdi, do not care about the long-term implications of such a ruling. According to Suhalia Zainalabdeen, a member of the National Society for Human Rights, in all of her career she knows of only one case in which a father was severely punished for torturing and killing his daughter. She says that this leniency is also extended to those who murder their wives. She gives two examples of similar cases. One in which a husband cut his wife’s throat as she was breastfeeding their child and he only got five years for it. Another is the case of a husband who tied his wife to his car and dragged her until she died. He got twelve years.

If that’s what murdering male guardians get, can you imagine the leniency when those they abuse don’t die? Male guardians are legally able to sell their daughters as child brides. There are no laws that protect children, especially girls. When a child protection system was proposed to the Shura council, they got stuck on how to define childhood without banning child marriages. Stories of mothers who cannot get custody or protect their daughters from abusive fathers abound. I personally spoke with a social worker that has twelve years experience in the system. She told me that what usually happens is that the abused woman would go to the police. The police would then call the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (CPVPV) and the woman’s male guardian who is in most cases her abuser. So there would be the woman surrounded by policemen, clerics and her abuser. The aim is to “reconcile” the woman and her guardian. The social worker told me that the police and clerics would keep trying at the reconciliation for up to four hours. If the woman refuses to leave the station with her guardian, only then would social workers be called and protection offered.

There are no reports that I know of where abusers were sentenced for abusing their daughters and/or wives. The worst they get is a short detainment for questioning and in the worst cases they are required to sign a pledge to not do it again.

Apologists and extremists perpetuate that the male guardianship system turns women to queens. That might be true but only in a macabre sense of the word.

I finished reading House’s book On Saudi about two weeks ago and I’ve had quite a few people ask me what I thought about it. I tell them generally what I thought which is that it struck me as a book where it seems that in an overenthusiastic frenzy to be bold, she didn’t have much regard for accuracy. The whole book does not strike me as a book written by a person who has been visiting Saudi for five years, at least not a very observant one. The whole style is not far from what you would get from a book on Saudi published in the 1960s purely for an American audience unlikely to question it or have access to interaction with a Saudi.

When I say this in a conversation, the only examples that come to mind is her equating the Kaaba with the Holy Stone on page 31 and her claiming that a very questionable Hadith is “popular” to bolster her argument that Saudis are submissive to the monarchy as part of their practice of religion. The hadith she claims ”quotes the prophet Muhammad urging believers to “stick to obedience even if it is to an Abyssian slave, since the believer is like a submissive camel, wherever he is led, he follows.””  And the source is some obscure webpage.

Yet it’s not only those two samples; the book is riddled with many inaccuracies that niggled at me as I read. Right now, sitting at home with the E-book, I’m better equipped to elaborate with a few more examples:

House wrongly states “Unlike the other schools of law, which employ consensus (ijma), analogy (qiyas), and other rationalist methods to decipher God’s will, the Hanbali tradition relies almost exclusively on a literal interpretation of the Kuran and Sunna for guidance.” Page 37

Needless to say, the Hanbali tradition is strongly based on ijma and qiyas. For example qiyas and ijma is why women can’t drive in Saudi because anyone with the most basic background in Islam knows that there were no cars at the time of the Prophet and women were able to ride horses, camels and donkeys. Thus there is no “literal interpretation” that would lead to the Saudi fatwas banning women from driving. These fatwas and religious arguments were all based on Saudi clergy consensus and analogy.

Another example of House’s inaccuracies is her repeatedly quoting Robert Baer as an expert on Saudi and it’s oil fields. A man who has never visited Saudi and is notorious for his conspiratorial demonization of the Saudi government. His book’s titled Sleeping with the Devil, the devil being us Saudis; not exactly what one would call optimal journalistic objectivity.

And then of course there’s House referring to Hail as a region on the Saudi-Iraqi border, which of course is simply disproven by checking any map. Hail is part of the central region and quite a ways from any border.

And then there’s a sentence I particularly enjoyed on page 208: “Three school gymnasiums host Catholic, Protestant and Mormon services, not only for Saudi ARAMCO employees but also for Christian expatriates in the surrounding area.” I know ARAMCO is relatively open compared to the rest of Saudi, but Saudi employees practicing Christianity openly on premises is beyond ludicrous.

And the list goes on and on from exaggerating the Iranian threat to inaccurate statements on education. Yet the most crucial issue that House got wrong is her understanding of Saudi mindsets and particularly Saudi youth. She almost made it out to seem that we are somehow inherently passive and too arrogant to work.

“Saudi Arabia, in short, is a society in which all too many men do not want to work at jobs for which they are qualified; in which women by and large aren’t allowed to work; and in which, as a result, most of the work is done by foreigners-Pakistanis, Indians, Filipinos, Bangladeshis, and others-who compose the majority of the labor force.” p. 147

Nowhere does she mention how difficult it is to compete in a market where foreign labor is cheap and desperate. How is a Saudi supposed to compete with someone who is willing to work twice as long and for a quarter of what a Saudi needs to live and cover basic needs. For example, in nursing, a Filipino or Indian is happy to work insane hours for anywhere in between 2,500-4,000 SAR (670-1000USD) and live in a dorm-like situation nearby. How are Saudis supposed to compete with that?

Then House goes on to assume she understands what Saudis want for their political future:

“So America conceivably could influence the kingdom, but in no way is the United States the role model for Saudi Arabia. Increasingly educated Saudis want to modernize, but they most surely do not want to Westernize, and they resent the American view that modernization means Westernization. Saudis don’t pine for democracy, but they seek a more open civil society where they are free to congregate and express views and where society’s rules are clear and enforced equitably on all. They want Ipads and access to the Internet, but the conservative among them-and most Saudis still are conservative- do not want all the other alien infidel influences emanating from America and the West. Saudis are unique and seek to remain so.” P.236

House’s summation of what Saudis want is so superficial that I literally cringed when I read it. Seriously is this what she got from visiting Saudi for five years? Ipads and infidels! I guess a lot was lost in translation. The only thing she got right is that Saudis are not looking to an American model for their future.  What most agree on, across liberal and Islamist factions, is more like a Norwegian model; a constitutional monarchy with an elected PM and parliament and a welfare system that reflects how rich the country is. Was she not aware of the thousands who signed petitions demanding a constitutional monarchy in 2011? One that got 6100 signatures in a week translates to the following:

  The People want to Reform the Government Campaign

To support the right of the Saudi people and their legitimate aspirations:

1 – a constitutional monarchy between the king and government.

2 – a written constitution approved by the people in which governing powers will be determined.

3 – transparency, accountability in fighting corruption

4 – the Government in the service of the people

5 – legislative elections.

6 – public freedoms and respect for human rights

7 – allowing civil society  institutions

8 – full citizenship and the abolition of all forms of discrimination.

9 – Adoption of the rights of women and non-discrimination against them.

10 – an independent and fair judiciary.

11 – impartial development and equitable distribution of wealth.

12 – to seriously address the problem of unemployment.

Was House not told about the nine reformers currently serving a collectively 228 year sentence? Did she not talk to people like Fouad Al Farhan and Dr. Mohammad Al Qahtani? I guess she was too fixated on Saudis wanting to hold onto their way of life and dress in the face of unavoidable globalization to ask real journalistic questions. Saudis not wanting the American family structure and hamburgers replacing Saudi family structure and kabsa does not translate to an opposition to democracy.

The only saving grace of the whole book is the chapter on Saudi princes. In chapter seven she profiles and interviews four princes, all direct grandsons of the founder of the Kingdom. I found it quite insightful to view them through an outsider’s eyes and her description of how each received her, down to details on what they served and how they dressed was entertaining. It is rare to get that close and personal with the royal family. So that chapter was both fun and informative.