Add fuel to literal fires, Malaysia’s former Prime Minister goes off on a rant that makes one happy that ‘former’ is part of his title. As the article from the Jakarta Globe clearly demonstrates, Mr. Mahathir seems to be having some trouble keeping things in chronological sequence. He also has some trouble with reality and with anti-Semitism.
The article provides numbers on churches and other places of worship that have been torched in this current round of inter-religious friction.
If US Could Create ‘Avatar’, It Could Fake 9/11 Attacks: Mahathir
Malaysia’s former premier Mahathir Mohamad said on Wednesday there was “strong evidence” the US faked the September 11 terror attacks as an excuse to go to war against Muslims.
“There is strong evidence that the attacks were staged. If they can make Avatar, they can make anything,’ Mahathir told the Conference for the Support of Al-Quds (Jerusalem), as quoted by local media.
The former premier also blamed Jews for hindering progress in US foreign policy. Voicing his disappointment that Barack Obama had not yet ended the war in Afghanistan or closed the US terror detention center at Guantanamo, he explained that “there are forces in the United States which prevent the president from doing some things. One of the forces is the Jewish lobby.”
Jews “had always been a problem in European countries. They had to be confined to ghettoes and periodically massacred. But still they remained, they thrived and they held whole governments to ransom,” Mahathir said.
“Even after their massacre by the Nazis of Germany, they survived to continue to be a source of even greater problems for the world.”
Mahathir, who led Malaysia from 1981 to 2003, has long been known for anti-semitic and anti-US statements.
Meanwhile, police in Kuala Lumpur said on Thursday that vandals tried to torch a Muslim prayer room, one of the few attacks on an Islamic place of worship after nearly a dozen churches were firebombed amid a dispute over the use of the word “Allah” by Christians.
Religious tensions have risen after a court ruled on Dec. 31 that non-Muslims can use “Allah” as a translation for God in the Malay language. Many among the country’s ethnic Malay Muslim majority believe the word should be exclusive to Muslims, and that its use by others could confuse some Muslims and even entice them to convert.
Since Jan. 8, there have been assaults on 11 churches, a Sikh temple and a mosque.
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The Saudi government seems to be moving closer to a ban on marriages of women under the age of 18. Saudi Gazette/Okaz report that now the Board of Ulema, representing religious leadership, is stating that pointing to the Prophet’s marriage to Aisha should not be interpreted as authorizing child marriages, as many do. What is eye-opening is Sheikh Mane”s reasoning: interpretation of the law should be circumstantial, not rigid. Getting over that philosophical hump would open the door to a far more liberal Islam than that promoted by many Saudi zealots.
Board of Ulema member rebukes minor marriage
Naim TameemJEDDAH – Sheikh Abdullah Al-Mane’, a member of the Board of Senior Ulema and an Advisor to the Royal Court, has said that Prophet Muhammad’s (pbuh) marriage to Ayesha when she was nine years old cannot be used as justification for child marriage today due to the “different circumstances” of the time.
According to Sheikh Al-Mane’, when Abu Bakr (May Allah be pleased with him) was contemplating marrying off his daughter he was unable to find anyone better than the Prophet (pbuh).
“It is impossible to use the marriage of Ayesha, the Mother of Believers (May Allah be pleased with her) as a measure for child marriage because of the incompatibility of the conditions and circumstances,” Sheikh Al-Mane’ said.
Child marriage is an issue that has come to the fore in recent months following reports in the local media of aged men marrying young girls, the most recent being the marriage of a 12-year-old to a man in his eighties in Buraidah.
A court in Qassim is scheduled to look into the case on Monday, while the Human Rights Commission has also set up a Shariah specialist team to investigate and meet with the marriage official who conducted the marriage rites.
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While it might be the Bridges of Madison County that attract attention in the US, it’s the sewers (and lack thereof) in Jeddah that cause comment. Here, Arab News is pointing to an exceptionally unseemly practice by some who empty their sewage holding tanks or septic systems at the doorways of those they dislike.
South Jeddah witnesses sewage war
Abdullah Al-Muwallad | Arab NewsJEDDAH: Neighbors in the south of Jeddah are turning to an unconventional kind of biological weapon to settle their differences — sewage.
Residents have been using waste to block the front doors of those they have a dispute with, often to devastating effect.
Countries often use oil and other precious minerals to fight their political wars, while other nations would block an important sea route to exert their influence. However, this so-called sewage war is a new phenomenon.
In the southern Jeddah district of Ghulail, many people are complaining about sewage blocking their roads. However, this was not due to sewage truck drivers forgetting about the area.
Some residents in the neighborhood said they are releasing their sewage on the street to punish their neighbors for something they have done, which includes refusing to contribute financially for hiring a sewage truck to empty the underground waste tank, or simply because they are fighting amongst themselves in the same building. “The sewage war is an old type of war and unheard of for people who are living in the north of Jeddah. It is an effective weapon,” says Abdu, a Saudi man in his 60s and one of the eldest residents in the neighborhood.
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Saudi Gazette/Okaz reports on another sewage problem affecting a girls’ school. The article notes that the neighbors responsible for not emptying their sewage tanks properly are having their water cut off by the municipality until they pay fine and get their systems in order.
Girls’ school surrounded by sewage water
Rami Al-SulimaniJEDDAH – For 10 days in a row, sewage water has surrounded a girls’ high school in Al-Safa District in Jeddah, causing much distress for the staff and students.
“The 34th Girls’ High School on President’s Street was not really presidential today,” one female student said.
The residents had earlier complained about frequent leakage of sewage water around the school, but the district municipality had allegedly turned a deaf ear.
Girls were seen on Wednesday jumping over the streams of sewage water as they left their school at noon.
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Infrastructure in Jeddah needs a lot of attention. As the November floods demonstrated, putting things off until they becomes crises isn’t effective management.
The Saudi Ministry of Justice believes that publicly naming miscreants and shaming them is too severe a punishment as it would affect their families, Saudi Gazette/Okaz report.
By taking the real sting out of punishment, however, miscreants get off rather lightly, I think. Actions, good and bad, have consequences. Saudi society is quick to acknowledge positive achievements by individuals: they’re feted, awarded, and publicized. The laureate’s family gets to bask in the glow. But if a Saudi does something wrong, then strong efforts are made to protect the families. There’s a strong asymmetry there and I don’t think it’s a good one. Perhaps if the full weight of shame were to be laid upon the miscreants, they would have second thoughts about offending.
Naming and shaming not allowed, says Justice official
Fahd Al-DhuyabiRIYADH – A Ministry of Justice official said that Saudi law does not allow the Control and Investigation Board (CIB) to publicly name those found guilty of stealing public funds.
This comment comes in the wake of calls to name and shame people who are found guilty of crimes in connection with the recent Jeddah floods.
The official said that the Kingdom does not have this law because of the negative effect it will have on the families of those found guilty. Punishing offenders according to the law is sufficient, he said.
He said the Saudi legal system gave the CIB the authority of naming people only in cases of forgery.
He said the CIB would not place itself in a position where it is open to legal action.
Consultant to the Royal Court, Abdul Muhsin Al-Obaikan, has reportedly said that there is no Shariah ruling banning the “naming and shaming” of persons found responsible for the flood disaster.
According to Al-Obaikan, it would be the “legitimate decision of the ruler or judge,” to make such a ruling “in the public interest.”
“Scholars have said that a punishment can be decided by the ruler. Every case has its own circumstances,” Al-Obaikan added. – Okaz/SG
Just what can be said about this piece from Saudi Gazette/Okaz? Somebody clearly wasn’t paying attention in health class, or the class failed to cover something rather important.
7-day wife loses appendix, hubby
Manal Abdul HadiDAMMAM – A man in Qatif divorced his wife of only a week last Saturday when he discovered that she had had her appendix removed without his knowledge, believing the procedure to be the result of a hereditary condition.
On his first visit to his bride at her house to sign the marriage formalities last week, the not-husband-to-be noticed that she was a bit “under the weather”, and when he inquired of the reason he was told that she had had her appendix out and was still suffering from the consequences of the operation.
Believing the procedure to be the result of some sort of “condition” that would be passed on to any future children, the man resolved to divorce the appendix-less lady, and prolonged efforts by both families to set the record straight were fruitless, and, in the words of the seven-day husband, “too late”. – Okaz/SG
Arab News, in a rather incomplete report, notes that three additional members of the Saudi ‘most wanted’ list are no longer of concern to the government. Their remains have been identified among the ruins of some sort of explosion that took place somewhere in the region last September. Among them was former Guantanamo detainee Fahd Saleh Suleiman Al-Jutaily.
RIYADH: A former Guantanamo prisoner and two other terrorists from Saudi Arabia’s most-wanted list were killed in an explosion in September, Interior Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Mansour Al-Turki said Monday.
The three have been identified as former detainee Fahd Saleh Suleiman Al-Jutaily as well as Mohammed Abdul Rahman Suleiman Al-Rashed and Sultan Radi Somaileel Al-Otaibi. All three were in their late 20s.
“They were killed together with several others on Sept. 14. There was a group of them meeting and an explosion occurred,” the spokesman said. “We got DNA samples for all those who were killed in that explosion for identification.” Al-Turki did not explain the circumstances surrounding the blast, but an earlier report from the Arabic daily Al-Hayat claimed Jutaily had been killed in northern Yemen in an attack by Yemeni government troops.
Jutaily joined Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan in 2001 before being captured and eventually sent to Guantanamo Bay by US forces, according to US military records. He was released in 2006 and put through a Saudi rehabilitation program, but he traveled to Yemen and re-established links with Al-Qaeda.
He is one of about a dozen former detainees out of more than 120, who dropped out of the program and returned to militancy.
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Saudi Gazette runs this brief piece on plans to build a monorail system in Riyadh, as well as to fix the bus network. There is a bus system in Riyadh, but it’s not an attractive one. Buses are infrequent, crowded, and not particularly clean. They also present problems when it comes to women’s moving about. Currently, it’s primarily expat workers who use them because they do have the advantage of being cheap.
The article notes that north-south and east-west lines are being proposed. No maps are given, so the extent of the system is unclear. There’s no doubt that Riyadh, a city of over 4 million people, needs a functioning public transit system, if only to get some of the cars off the road. This isn’t the final word on fixing the issue, but it seems to be a start.
Riyadh to get mass transit system
RIYADH – Prince Salman Bin Abdul Aziz, Emir of Riyadh region, said Monday that plans are under way to build a monorail mass transit system.
Routes, detailed designs and engineering for a 26-mile light monorail on two lines are ready and awaiting budget allocation, Prince Salman said in a report on infrastructure development. “The planning commission has completed design and engineering specifications and implementation plans for the train and a comprehensive plan for bus transportation in preparation for launching the projects upon adoption of the necessary budget,” said the report released by the SPA.
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While the debate about child marriage in Saudi Arabia continues, so do the child marriages. Arab News reports on a recent case of a 12-year-old girl’s being married to an 80-year-old man. The Human Rights Commission has taken up the issue…
Child marriages still continue
Laura Bashraheel | Arab NewsJEDDAH: Despite the Human Rights Commission (HRC) trying for some time to put an end to child marriages in the Kingdom, an 80-year-old man in Buraidah recently married a 12-year-old girl after giving her father a dowry of SR85,000.
The girl’s mother, who is divorced from the father, has filed a complaint with the HRC and the authorities to end the marriage.
The Kingdom saw a spurt of marriages between elderly men and girls as young as 10 in 2009. Media coverage and the concerns of the HRC have been essential in stopping several such marriages. However, with the absence of any law on the issue, child marriages continue to take place.
In this particular case, the marriage official was blamed for approving the matrimony, a newspaper reported. The official, however, said he has no clear instructions about marrying girls under the age of 18, adding that he had called the girl, asked for her opinion and taken the consent of both the bride and groom.
The father said he married off his daughter based on her physical growth, not according to how old she is, and that he does not care what her mother thinks. He added that his daughter had reached puberty, that such marriages occur in society and that there is no harm.
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An interesting piece in Saudi Gazette discusses the growing problem of illegal drugs in Saudi society. It’s not just opiates, stimulants, and other materials that form the basis of the ‘war on drugs’. In addition, it’s the variety of substances that promise desirable changes in physique, color, condition, and life-style. Drugs are regulated in Saudi Arabia, but there are major loopholes. Not all pharmacies demand prescriptions, though they should. There are varieties of traditional ‘medicines’ and drugs that are brought in by expats or smuggled across borders. Not all of these are dangerous in themselves, of course, but they can be abused and frequently are. They also complicate other medical treatment by either potentiating or debilitating the effects of other medications. Some, too, are simply quackery. Here, the Internet serves a decidedly negative purpose.
Much of this business thrives on the combination of scientific ignorance and a strong psychological desire for ‘improvement’, however that term is defined by the individual. Whether it’s sex aids, skin lighteners (See this Arab News article), or relief from chronic pain, people will take some control over their own health, for better or worse. Protecting them from the worst is a proper role of government.
Use of illegal drugs on the rise
Diana Marwan Al-JassemJEDDAH – New communication methods, and online and TV commercials have contributed to the spread of illegal drugs, sexual stimulants and harmful medical products in the Saudi market.
Buying banned drugs through the Internet, television programs, pharmacies, and via sales representatives has become a growing phenomenon in the Kingdom.
Jeddah Health Affairs Management is trying its best to control this phenomenon, and in recent months, a large number of pharmacies dealing with illegal drugs and sexual stimulants have been ordered shut.
Saudi Gazette spoke with officials and doctors to find out the reasons behind the increasing number of people seeking to buy drugs online, via sales representatives or over the counter in pharmacies.
“The trend is mostly visible in women who want to lose weight, prevent hair loss, treat their skin, and generally look younger without consulting specialist physicians,” said Dr. Wafa’a Faqih, Associate Professor at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, and consultant for women’s diseases in King Abdulaziz University Hospital.
Another group of women, she said, are those who are suffering from pain in their knees, legs, and back and other joints. It also includes those who have painful monthly periods. “These women are basically lethargic and do not consult a doctor. They discuss their problems with friends, and receive advice from the Internet and via television programs and buy drugs over the counter,” she said.
According to Dr. Faqih, most women buy analgesics from pharmacies without realizing that they can be very harmful.
“To avoid this dangerous behavior, there is an urgent need to change society’s point of view about health care. It is also vital that periodic health checkups are made compulsory in all regions of the Kingdom including remote rural areas,” she said.
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Asharq Alawsat takes a look at the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC), the Saudi government office responsible for ‘filtering’ (read: blocking) objectionable websites from Saudi Internet users. The article states that between 700 and 1,000 requests come in daily for sites to be blocked. It does not state who is making the requests, but notes that anyone can do so through a CITC website. People can also ask that sites be unblocked, though no numbers are provided on that count.
There is no doubt that the Internet can be a dangerous tool. (A piece by Diana Mukkaled in the paper spells out an example.) It can, of course, also be an extremely useful tool. That’s the thing about tools: misused, they can be dangerous, whether they’re a hammer or a vehicle. The Saudis do try to block websites that promote extremism and violence. But that’s not all that’s blocked…
As the article notes, there are complaints from Saudis that too much is being blocked. One could argue that pornographic sites and sites that promote gambling and alcohol might be blocked for their very nature, which runs against Islam. But is hiding reality a useful way to deal with reality? Might it not be better to teach people how to deal with things—attractive as they may be—rather than to pretend they don’t exist? It seems that human nature has a perverse circuit: tell it that something is forbidden and it will seek it out.
The real problem is one of transparency. No one outside CITC knows what standards are used to block sites. Experience in using the Internet in Saudi Arabia teaches somewhat over time. One quickly learns that websites from Israel and Iran are generally blocked, as are most identifiable jihadist websites. I don’t particularly think that’s a wonderful idea, but I understand the thinking behind it. More debatable are the blocks on universities with departments dealing with the modern Middle East and Islam, as well as those who delve into things like archeology, a sensitive political issue to some, but simple fact to others.
Beyond the ability for the public to request a site be blocked or unblocked, there’s no real public role in the operations of CITC. There should be, I believe. Lists of blocked sites, accompanied by specific reasons for the blockage, would provide transparency and evidence that the government is actually performing a useful, even necessary function here. Without transparency, there is always doubt and often cynicism about just what’s going on. It’s a matter of trusting the government when it says it is protecting and serving, taking it as a matter of faith rather than as a matter of proven fact. That is autocratic, not an act the treats citizens as grownups.
300,000 Requests to Block Websites Annually
Iman al KhaddafDammam, Asharq Al-Awsat- There are between 700 and 1000 requests from internet users to block websites in Saudi Arabia per day, a source at the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) told Asharq Al-Awsat. An average of 850 requests per day means that there are 300,000 requests annually. The same source confirmed that over 93 percent of blocked websites are pornographic.
Sultan al Malik, Public Relations and International Affairs Manager at the CITC stated that there are approximately 200 requests per day to unblock websites, meaning that for every four requests to block a certain website there is only one request to unblock websites.
“The CITC happily looks into every request it receives from the public (whether it is to block or unblock a site) in no longer than 48 hours before making the appropriate decision that is in line with applied regulations,” explained al Malik.
Al Malik further stated that “the majority of blocked websites in the kingdom are pornographic. They make up over 93 percent of the overall blocked sites, whereas five percent [of blocked websites are those that help] evade the filtering system. The remainder of blocked websites are classified as being inconsistent with the applied regulations in Saudi Arabia, some of which promote the use of drugs, gambling etc.”
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Arab News translates a piece from Al-Watan, by Turki Al-Dakheel, that recognizes the problems Islam is having these days. He says that no amount of advertising or PR is going to change that. Instead, changes must come from within Islam and from Muslims. It is necessary to regain control of mosques and schools that promote extreme versions of Islam.
It’s also necessary to speak loudly, clearly, and often against those extreme versions. Islam is a pragmatic religion; there are countless examples of how rituals and obligations can be postponed if necessary, how substitutes can be acceptable, how even such vivid issues as eating pork can be justified under certain circumstances. That pragmatism, however, has been lost to those who insist on searching for, and then demanding the observance of the finest threads to be found in sometimes questionable sources.
Correct distorted picture of Islam
Turki Al-Dakheel | Al-WatanDoes the world know the real meanings of Islam, or does it only know the irresponsible behavior of some reckless Muslims? I think the second question is the most relevant. People living in remote villages in Europe, America, Brazil or Argentina will not look at Islam academically but rather through the extreme conduct of some Muslims: murder, threats, blowing up trains and hijacking aircraft. They will not know about Islam from great Muslim scholars, but rather from people like Osama Bin Laden, Mullah Muhammad Omar, Ayman Al-Zawahri and others whose hands have been soaked in the blood of the innocent.
In his interview with Al-Watan newspaper on Wednesday, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said he would make efforts with Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah to promote the Muslim world in order to improve the image of Islam in the West and correct misconceptions about it.
He said he was thinking seriously establishing a front to spread the correct understanding of Islam.
I think the first thing we should begin with is to purify the major sources from which the communities come to know about Islam being mosques or schools.
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I’ve made no secret of my dislike for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. I find that they are a bit too quick to cry, ‘Victim!’ Their choice of friends leaves something to be desired as well, a fact that sadly blackens the names of other supporters who focus more on the possitives than negatives.
I have to be fair, though, and applaud CAIR for its statement condemning the burning of Christian churches in Malaysia and its effort to raise funds to rebuild/repair those churches. It doesn’t matter that the effort might be seen as self-serving; it’s the right thing to be doing.
CAIR creates “Spirit of Islam” fund
to help rebuild Malaysian churchesThis is a press release from the Council on American-Islamic Relations, announcing a fundraising drive to solicit contributions to help rebuild churches in Malaysia. The churches in question were firebombed by extremists protesting the Christian community’s perfectly valid use of the name “Allah” in their services. You can donate to the fund online or mail a check (see below for details).
(WASHINGTON, D.C., 1/12/2010) – CAIR is calling on American Muslims and other people of conscience to help fund repairs to Malaysian churches damaged by vandals. The attacks on the churches came following a court ruling that overturned a ban on the use of the word “Allah” by Christians in that nation.
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The link for this piece goes to City of Brass, a blog on Belief Net written by Aziz Poonawalla.