Interesting piece in Arab News on the background support needed in hosting the Haj in Mecca. The service providers—those who arrange for food and housing, transportation, interpretors and the like—have been given permission to raise the prices they charge, the first time in 30 years. Thirty years is a long time to go between price adjustments.
As more than a million pilgrims arrive in Saudi Arabia, they represent the largest annual gathering of people anywhere in the world. Some Hindu festivals, like the Kumbh Mela, attract vastly larger crowds, but they are not annual events. They also tend toward the chaotic, very much at odds with how the Saudis would like the Haj to run.
Higher prices for Haj services do hold the possibility of pricing some pilgrims out of the market. Government efforts to enforce regulations forbidding them from squatting during the Haj complicate their lives further. But too many times in the past poor control or infrastructure has lead to the deaths of hundreds, something the Saudi government tries to avoid at great cost. The increase in service fees is not accompanied by any governmental tax, the article takes pains to spell out. The government absorbs the cost of the physical infrastructure and security on its own account and has since the late 1930s, when it did away with Haj taxes.
Service fees for foreign pilgrims likely to go up
P.K. Abdul Ghafour | Arab NewsJEDDAH: The service fees charged by Tawafa establishments on foreign pilgrims are likely to go up for the first time in 30 years, according to Haj Minister Fouad Al-Farsy.
“The authorities are currently reviewing the service charges of Tawafa establishments in light of increasing prices,” Al-Farsy told Al-Madinah Arabic daily.
He said the restructuring of Tawafa establishments would allow them to form companies that would provide housing, transportation and catering services to pilgrims. They would also be allowed to provide Umrah services, he added.
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Writing in the UAE’s The National, Saudi journalist Essam al Ghalib takes a look at the (thankfully) passing of a generation of Western expat workers who brought an overbearing sense of cultural superiority with them to the Arab Gulf. While perfectly willing to earn high salaries, these expats managed to hold their hosts and bosses in disdain, sneering at their ‘primitive ways’.
Gulf Arabs, particularly Saudi, brought their own sense of superiority to the table. It was and is hard for expats to make friends with many locals because they are considered inferior in so many ways. I mean, for example, how easy is it to form a respectful relationship with a Gulf Arab who considers your blonde wife a sharmoota simply by the fact that she’s blonde or chooses not to veil?
This, however, doesn’t excuse the colonialist sentiments many expats brought with them.
A goal for Saudi, and a culture clash for the spectators
Essam al GhalibWhen Saudi Arabia scored against Iran last month, the Saudis with whom I was watching the match started chanting “Saudi, Saudi, Saudi” as soccer fans do.
Halfway through the chanting, I realised that maybe this wasn’t a good idea as we were in a sports bar in Abu Dhabi and many people have mixed feelings about Saudi after 9/11. That’s when I became aware of the hard stares from the Westerners around us.
But then I told myself we were in a sports bar; cheering is to be expected. But even when the shouting subsided, the long, cold stares continued. Now having spent time in Las Vegas at the time of 9/11, I knew what they meant: they were the stares of contempt. The look of one man expressed nothing but hatred and disgust. He wouldn’t be looking at us like that, I asked myself, because we were Arabs, surely? After all, we are in an Arab country.
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As if finding a job wasn’t hard enough for Saudi women, what with society’s doubts about the propriety of women’s working, once they do get jobs, they have no legal protection against sexual harassment, reports Arab News. Saudi society has a way of turning the victim of harassment into the perpetrator, saying that ‘she asked for it’ by merely seeking to earn an income. The piece cites several instances of harassment, quotes a member of the Shoura Council who has tried to propose a law punishing harassment, and wonders what might be done.
Date me or lose your job!
— Sexual harassment by supervisor forces woman to resign
Hassna’a Mokhtar I Arab NewsJEDDAH: Lubna Alam, 35, was once a successful banker. She longs for the excitement and independence it brought her. Yet, she recalls the reasons that forced her to quit her job. She became fed up with her supervisor’s sexual harassment.
“My supervisor used to call my mobile late at night for trivial reasons. When I ignored his calls, he’d be rude to me the next day at the office. Whenever we held a meeting, he’d vulgarly comment on my looks or my clothes. It was psychologically and emotionally disturbing, and I didn’t know what to do,” said Lubna, nervously popping her fingers.
Lubna bent a lot of rules to keep working but was tiring of the situation. The straw that broke the camel’s back was when her supervisor gave her two choices: To go out on a date with him or resign.
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Somewhat related is this Saudi Gazette article, Family of four under threat from authorities. It tells the story of a woman who, in seeking to support her family, has run afoul of business licensing regulations. It’s not sexual harassment, just bureaucratic harassment.
Arabic daily Asharq Alawsat reports that Sheikh al Obeikan, advisor to the Saudi Ministry of Justice, has issued his support of a fatwa originating in Turkey that gives permission to women to defend themselves against abusive husbands. I’m not sure that brawls within the home actually solve anything, but self defense seems a basic human right. Perhaps fatawa against men’s striking women would be better, though that would certainly go against the grain of traditions, both social and religious.
Fatwa Gives Women the Right to Hit Husbands
Riyadh, Asharq Al-Awsat – A fatwa originating from Turkey has given women the right to strike their husbands in cases of self-defense.
Sheikh Mohsen al Obeikan, an adviser to the Saudi Ministry of Justice and a member of the Saudi Shura Council agreed with some Islamic scholars in Turkey and Egypt in this regard. “This [issue] is acknowledged by Islamic jurists and it has roots in Islamic Shariah, the Quran and the Hadith [Prophetic traditions],” said the Sheikh. He referred to the following excerpts of the Quran: ‘The recompense for an injury is an injury equal thereto (in degree),’ [Surat Ashoura: 40] and ‘…whoever then acts aggressively against you, inflict injury on him according to the injury he has inflicted on you…’ [Surat al Baqara: 194]
Al Obeikan, who spoke to Asharq Al-Awsat by phone, said women should only hit their husbands if they are defending themselves.
Fethullah Gulen, a prominent religious figure in Turkey, ruled that it is within women’s rights to defend themselves by countering violence with violence, and that women should learn martial arts such as Karate, Judo and Taekwondo to defend themselves against violent husbands.
The fatwa has been met with controversy among the conservatives in Turkey as it may “stir up rebellion” within families.
Writing in Asharq Alawsat, Mshari Al-Zaydi comments on the upcoming Saudi terrorism trials. These trials, he says, are a seminal event in the history of Saudi Arabia. Through a sense of over caution, though, the government is missing an important opportunity in not having the trials open to the public and to journalists. Transparency, he says, is critical in demonstrating that Saudi Arabia is serious about combating terrorism and should put out for public airing the noxious beliefs of those on trial.
I suspect the government is afraid that public trials would give too much space for the defendants to propagate their beliefs, beliefs that are still too close to the ‘official’ line promoted by clerics on the government payroll. As the defendants include some clerics, this could be a very touchy issue. In the end, though, I think Mshari is correct. It is better to have this all out in public. The government may take some damage from embarrassment, but it will also gain in credibility.
The Al-Qaeda Trails Begin
Mshari Al-ZaydiThe pre-trail proceedings of some 70 individuals charged with terrorist activities in Saudi Arabia started last week after a long wait that began after the first operation by Al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia on 12 May 2003 in Riyadh.
The Saudi Ministry of Interior had announced more than once – the last time was by Prince Naif – that the accused would be presented to the Saudi courts soon. Some people attributed the delay of the trial to the preparation of a suitable judicial environment. There was talk about the establishment of a special court for state security cases, to which judges specializing in the security cases from a jurisprudence viewpoint would be appointed, i.e. these judges would be well versed in the jurisprudence of war, aggression, and deviation, which are the jurisprudence expressions related to political terrorism in the modern sense.
Now news reports tell us that there are some 12 judges who will undertake hearing these cases, and will try some 70 accused; this is according to the Saudi newspaper, Al-Watan. Two floors in the building of the General Court in Riyadh have been allocated under strict security measures for the trial. The newspaper also says that there are permanent guards protecting the chairman of the summary jurisdiction circuit, and the rest of the judges.
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The Saudi Shoura Council is looking into making new laws to protect underage girls from being forced into marriages with elderly husbands. The laws, Saudi Gazette reports, will also look to protect foreign women, married to Saudis, from being abused financially, civilly, and legally by their husbands. The move is long overdue, but welcome nonetheless. It will be interesting to see who opposes such laws.
Move to ban underage marriages
Muhammad OdhaibDAMMAM – The Shoura Council is studying a new law to prevent marriages between aged Saudi men and young girls.
The law is expected to produce guidelines to protect young girls from marriages with Saudi men of a significantly higher age, a phenomenon that has spread in parts of the Kingdom and abroad, resulting in numerous problems for wives and Saudi children abroad.
The new law also deals with marriages to non-Saudi women in which the Saudi husbands admit fathering the children, with new legal procedures expected to be in place soon to enable their children to be brought to the Kingdom.
The law secondly addresses cases where fathers refuse to recognize their children, in which case proof of the marriage will be required from the wife through relevant authorities. If she fails to provide the documents, the matter will be referred to the courts to conduct DNA tests.
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The annual pilgrimage to Mecca, the Haj, will take place in early December this year. With nearly two million pilgrims are expected, the Saudi government tries to limit the number of Saudis who attend this important ritual so that others, for whom this is a one-in-a-lifetime event, can take part. While foreigners require Haj visas, Saudi nationals require their own permits. Without a permit, this Arab News reports, Saudis and resident expats will be turned away.
Imams urged to preach against unauthorized pilgrimage
MAKKAH: As part of a campaign to minimize crowding in the holy sites during Haj, prayer leaders have been urged to preach the importance for domestic pilgrims to obtain permits before embarking on the annual pilgrimage.
“Imams and preachers in mosques across the Kingdom will exhort people to obey the rules and regulations laid down by the government for the smooth conduct of Haj, particularly the stipulation that all domestic pilgrims, both Saudis and expatriates, should get permits before they set out for Makkah,” said Hatem Qadi, undersecretary at the Haj Ministry.
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With the turmoil of the West’s financial markets—though those in the East are not entirely stable, either—many a banker and financial expert are looking for work in the Middle East, from Riyadh to Dubai. I guess that when your company collapses beneath your feet, any port looks good in the financial storm.
Yet American financiers are finding it difficult to locate jobs. This report from The Washington Post quotes: ‘”So, you’ve managed to screw up your banks, and now you’ve come to screw up ours?” a Saudi investment executive said of the attitude toward job-seeking Americans.’ Further, many see Americans as too aggressive in their business style, too demanding in what they expect in salary, perks, and benefits. Then, too, there’s the real (and perceived) ignorance of Americans about the Middle East.
Still, according to the piece, good bankers can get the jobs if they’re realistic in their expectations and, of course, were not individually responsible for bringing down big banks!
Wall St.’s Denizens Look East
Finance Professionals Mull Relocating to Persian Gulf,
But Unhappiness Over U.S. Policies May Pose Hurdles
Ellen KnickmeyerDUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Fahad al-Deweesh, a vice president at a Persian Gulf investment firm, is getting e-mails from old finance classmates at the University of Southern California he hasn’t heard from in years, asking what the job market here looks like for Americans.
Robert Sloan, a New York-based recruiter whose clients’ starting-salary bids can run in the $1 million range, has logged a 50 percent jump since spring in the number of U.S. financial executives interested in sending résumés to Dubai and other Middle East financial hubs.
Europeans in investment banking and other financial fields have been flocking to the oil-flush Persian Gulf for months, propelled by the hope that emerging economies of the East will ride out any global recession better than New York or London will. In a phrase often used by British brokers and bankers, “It’s Shanghai, Mumbai, Dubai or goodbye.”
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I’m not sure that this is the right time to be remaking the film ‘The Message’, Moustapha Akkad’s 1977 Hollywood film about the life of the Prophet. Back then, the mere existence of the film was seen as sacrilegious by the radical ‘Hanafi Muslim’ organization—part of the American Black Muslim movement. The film’s opening in a Washington, DC cinema triggered the group to stage a take-over of the Washington Islamic Center, the office of B’nai Brith, a Jewish social service organization, and the District of Columbia’s District Building (the equivalent of city hall). The attack led to two deaths and unfortunately served to propel a young councilman, Marion Barry, who was wounded in the attack, into a lengthy career of corrupt city politics. Most immediately, the attack also led to the cancellation of the film’s showings.
Today, there is a much wider fringe of extremists within Islam, ready to take insult when none is intended. I’m sure there will be protests about the film even though it is being produced in the Emirates and according to scholarly advice about what is proper and what is not in telling this story.
Movie planned on life of Prophet Mohammad
DUBAI (Reuters) – A movie drama about the life of the Prophet Mohammad is to go into production soon, and will be only the second English-language film of its kind ever made, its producers said Monday.
“The Messenger of Peace” will be a remake of Moustapha Akkad’s “The Message,” a 1977 Hollywood classic starring Anthony Quinn which is often applauded by Muslims as an example of how commercial Western cinema can respect Islam.
“We have only the utmost respect for Akkad’s work but technology in cinema has advanced since the 1970s and this latest project will employ modern film techniques in its renewal of the first film’s core messages,” producer Oscar Zoghbi, who worked on the original, said in a statement.
ad_iconAkkad, the Syrian-born executive producer of Hollywood’s “Halloween” horror films, was killed in a suicide bomb attack by al Qaeda on a luxury hotel in Jordan’s capital Amman in 2005.
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The fire that swept through a girls’ school in Mecca in March, 2002, which killed 14 girls, was a seminal event for Saudi Arabia. It brought into public question the role of Saudi religious police as well as the effects of an archly conservative social and religious attitude toward life. Saudi Gazette, translating an article from its Arabic sister-paper Okaz, suggests that some of the problems identified back in 2002 still exist and represent a threat to the lives of other young Saudi women in the Eastern Province. There’s no reporting on other regions in this piece, though I suspect that it is not exclusive to the Eastern Province.
The problem is that building and safety inspectors—universally male—have not been permitted to inspect the myriad rental properties now being used as girls’ schools. (The government has not been able to keep up with demand for new, purpose-built schools.) As a result, buildings which do not meet safety standards continue to do serve as schools, but the extent of their problems remains an unknown.
I think that inspectors could do their jobs when the schools are closed—weekends and school holidays. Alternatively, the government could develop women’s abilities to work as inspectors. Best, of course, would be for the Saudis to relax a bit about the ‘mingling of the sexes’ and realize that having men and women in the same place does not equate with an orgy of licentiousness.
Fire breaks out in girls’ school in EP
Muhammad OdaibDAMMAM – At least 250 students were safely evacuated from a private girls’ school in Hinakyah after fire broke out on Saturday morning, authorities said.
Four teams of firefighters in minutes tackled the blaze which started in an electricity transformer, Col. Mansour Al-Dossari, spokesman of the Civil Defense in the Eastern Province, said. A short electric circuit was believed to have caused the fire.
Saturday’s fire marked the sixth incident in girls’ schools in the Eastern Province since the beginning of the new academic year two weeks ago.
Earlier, Lt. Hamad Al-Juaid, chief of the Civil Defense Department in the province, said the girls’ schools in the province have shown gross neglect for the basic safety measures, putting the lives of young students on the edge. This is a legal negligence on the part of the Girls’ Education Department in the province, he said. Some schools have been rented from private parties for more than 13 years lacking basic safety measure, he said.
The Civil Defense authorities have not been allowed to examine safety checklist in the girls’ schools to bring them into compliance with safety laws, he said. – Okaz
Saudi Gazette reports that the Saudi government will be putting 1,200 more people on trial for terrorist activity. This is in addition to the 991 identified earlier this month. The article quotes a government official as stating the 70% of the original 991 were Saudi nationals, with a majority of the remainder being Yemenis.
Kingdom to try 1,200 more terror suspects
Abdullah Al-ErafijRIYADH – Saudi authorities have planned to try nearly 1,200 new detained terror suspects on charges that they participated in terrorist attacks carried out in the Kingdom over the last five years, sources said Saturday.
Interior Minister Prince Naif Bin Abdul Aziz said that the ministry is preparing the charges with the help of the Investigation and Prosecution Bureau. The new 1200 suspected militants, rounded up in anti-terror raids across the country in recent years, will be added to the 991 suspects already referred to court for terrorism charges.
The legal proceedings mark a big step in the country’s fight against terrorism as more terror suspects stand trial in the judicial circuits within the General Court in Riyadh.
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The Saudi Arabian stockmarket, the Tadawal All Shares Index (TASI), has dropped to its lowest level in four years. This, the result of the global crisis of confidence in the credit markets, is disturbing the markets throughout the Gulf States, but the Saudi market is taking the hardest hits at present. This is likely due to the lack of sophistication on the part of Saudi investors, many of whom view the market as a risk-free (wrong), guaranteed money earner (also very wrong).
Arab News:
Saudi Gazette: