Last week, the New York Times asked me if I would be interested in writing for the newspaper about the Obama visit. Of course I was. Today, NYT publishes my article as part of seven views from the Middle East about what Obama should say in his much anticipated speech in Cairo tomorrow. Check it out. Here’s a picture of the voting paper that I mention in the last paragraph:

King Abdullah will open the new cycle of Shoura Council with a major speech that he will give on Tuesday. The speech is expected to highlight the goals, programs, and aspirations of the government for the current year. The King will also speak to the Shoura members about his vision for the country’s domestic and foreign policies.

But let’s pause for a moment and go back to April of last year, when the King addressed the Shoura, and many were anticipating significant announcements. Unfortunately, that speech carried nothing major. Is this a good reason not to expect much this time around? Maybe, but the recent changes in the government could be a sign that we are in for something different this year.

This is all speculation, of course. Many rumors are flying around town but no one is certain about anything. I’m keeping my fingers crossed. Not holding my breath, though.

UPDATE: No big announcements in the King’s speech. Focus was on Arab unity and the international economical crisis. Read more…

Ministry Move On Mixed Marriages Makes Many Unhappy
Hassnaʼa Mokhtar
Arab News | Jeddah
9 February 2009

When 38-year-old American Mary Jones married a Saudi in the United States 15 years ago, she did not expect that it would take two years for the Saudi government to allow her to live with her husband in Saudi Arabia.

Why two years? That’s how long it took to obtain the marriage permit from the Saudi Ministry of Interior.

From a Saudi woman’s point of view, Jones said, allowing Saudi men to marry foreigners increases the problem of spinsterhood.

“Marriage is a personal choice,” said Jones. “It’s not fair to decide for people whom they can and can’t marry. In Islam, husbands are to be chosen for excellence in religion and moral character, not for nationality.”

Last week the Ministry of Interior rejected a request by the Shoura Council for easing rules governing Saudis who marry non-Saudis. However, the ministry excluded from the rules the elderly, the disabled and people who are socially rejected.

“To allow only the elderly, outcast and disabled people to marry non-Saudis is an affront to society. It shows that we’re a non-cooperative and unbalanced community,” said 36-year-old lawyer and legal consultant Wail Joharji.

A non-Saudi has to apply for a marriage permit to marry a Saudi woman.

Relevant official documents, medical records, passport, identification letter and the marriage request must be submitted to the Interior Ministry to issue the marriage permit. Only after this permit is issued can the marriage legally take place.

Article 6 of the Saudi intermarriage bylaw states: “Any Saudi man or woman who desires to marry a non-Saudi woman or man must have acceptable character, nationality and religion, excluding people belonging to beliefs not approved by Shariah.”

But even with the strict regulations, almost 25 permits are granted daily for Saudis to marry non-Saudis, the Okaz newspaper reported on Friday quoting a source at the ministry.

Tara Gregory, an American married to a Saudi with one son living in Riyadh, wrote in her blog Future Husbands and Wives of Saudis (www.taraummomar.blogspot.com) that the entire marriage-permission process is so rife with encumbrances that it can be viewed as collective punishment.

“A few reasons that compel Saudis to marry non-Saudis are religion, love, compatibility and sometimes destiny … I propose that the Saudi government conduct a study on whether the effects of regulating such marriages are actually decreasing spinsterhood and not contributing to higher divorce rates,” wrote Gregory.

Talal Bakri, head of the Social, Family and Youth Affairs Committee at the Shoura Council, was quoted recently in a local newspaper as saying that the council requested the ease of regulations due to the unfortunate situation many Saudis who marry non-Saudis without permission are in.

“Saudis whose marriage permits were rejected are forced to travel outside the country to conduct the marriages. These marriages don’t last long and end in divorce. The victims are the children who eventually become homeless. It all gives a bad reputation for our country,” Bakri said.

Taha Al-Safi, a 25-year-old systems analyst at Saudi Aramco in Dhahran, is currently engaged to a non-Saudi.

“I wish I was an outcast or disabled so that I could obtain the marriage permission without problems,” said Al-Safi humorously.

“At the end of the day, marriage is a personal choice. And with the increased divorce rate among Saudis, I believe we must be given the option,” Al-Safi added.

The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: “If a man of whom you’re pleased with his religion and manners comes proposing, then approve the marriage.”

A member of Shoura Council said that he would like to see a woman minister in the government. Khalil al-Khalil also said he would like to see women work “side by side” with men in the Shoura Council.

Al-Khalil was speaking during a discussion panel on diversity in the Saudi society which took place this Saturday at King Saud University, where he was supposed to be joined by his fellow Shoura member Abdullah Dahlan. The latter, however, was a no-show. The discussion panel was typical of events at KSU. It started 30 minutes late and the attendance was low. The speaker’s talk was too general and he admitted later that he shied away from tackling specifics to avoid controversy.

Al-Khalil said we should not be afraid of diversity because it is “not a Western invention,” and because even the most powerful governments cannot erase it. That’s why we should protect diversity by legislation, he added.

I agree with him when he says that the government needs to step up and take its responsibilities on this crucial matter, and I think that they have failed to do so in the past. He claims that the government has a clear policy when it comes to religious diversity that is based on justice but I really don’t know what clear policy he is talking about.

Al-Khalil, who heads the security committee at Shoura, ended his remarks by saying that if we want to promote diversity then we need to build more universities, not jails. Well, it is a very interesting thing to say considering that the government just announced last year they will spend SR1.7bn ($450mn) to build five new high-tech jails around the country. Not that he and his colleagues could have done anything about it but…

What: Diversity in the Saudi Society
Who: Khalil al-Khalil and Abdullah Dahlan
When: Saturday, January 10, 2009. 10:30 AM
Where: Building No.7, Auditorium 7A
RSVP: Attending

In a conservative, conformist society like ours, diversity is not a popular term. Its opponents have always tried to make diversity look like a threat to national unity. That’s total bull, of course. Because our diversity only makes us stronger.

Hopefully this and other interesting ideas will be tackled in this discussion panel hosted by the Literary Club at KSU next Saturday. The speakers are Khalil al-Khalil and Abdullah Dahlan, both members of the dead Shoura Council. It is an open event and everyone is encouraged to come. The discussion panel will also be broadcast live to Khadija Bin Khuwailed auditorium in Olayisha campus for girls.

Mazen Baleelah, member of the Shoura Council, has been working to pass a new law criminalizing sexual harassment in the workplace. Some people supported him in his effort saying it is long overdue; some other people thought he is exaggerating and that sexual harassment is not yet a pressing issue that we need to deal with by legislation. However, the most surprising reaction so far has come from some female academics who spoke to al-Madinah daily last week. They objected to the proposal because they think such law would encourage mixing of the sexes in workplaces. Baleelah was quick to respond that although none of the six articles in the new law encourages mixing of sexes, such mixing is a reality of our everyday life in this age that we need to address properly if we want move forward.

What do I think about all of this? Well, the Shoura Council is dead to me so I’m not expecting anything good to come out of that place. Also, it seems ironic that some women are standing against a law that should protect women, but hey, what do I know? Finally, are we moving forward? Yes we are! We are moving forward, but really really slowly, like an old quadriplegic turtle.

The Shoura Council is an advisory body comprised of 150 members appointed by the King and serves as a quasi-parliament. Those members are academics, technocrats and businessmen. They are, in other words, the intelligentsia of the Saudi society, the crème de la crème, the elite, the… well, you get the idea.

However, I find myself rather gobsmacked by some of the conclusions they make and the recommendations they reach on some issues. Here’s a recent example: after being equally split over a need to simplify the regulations of Saudi marriages to foreigners, the newly appointed vice president Bandar al-Hajjar rejected the proposal. What a disappointing start for Mr. al-Hajjar who was just a few days ago the president of the National Society for Human Rights.

I do not understand the harsh restrictions enforced on citizens who want to marry foreigners. Why should the government bother with who one chooses to marry? I really do not understand the government’s obsession with interfering in the minutiae of people’s personal lives.

The argument offered by the proposal opponents is embarrassingly weak and wrongheaded they should be ashamed of themselves. “Such recommendations would greatly increase the number of Saudis marrying foreigners while we are fully aware of the complications that such marriages create,” they said. They also said changes would only exacerbate the problem of spinsterhood in the Kingdom. Are they trying to convince us that by taking these unfair measures they are actually protecting Saudi women?

As for the “complications” bit, the best response comes from Sabria Jawhar who says, “Well, those complications are created by the Saudi government in the first place. Perhaps minimizing the complications that exist in the law would help those marriages.”

Now how can a large group of supposedly intelligent people all agree on taking such an unintelligent position is just beyond me. Sadly, it is not the first time and this is not an isolated, single case. Remember the weekend thing?

Around one year ago, my good friend Khaled said that we should not get all worked up over the nonperformance of the Shoura Council because it is nothing more than a dead body that we should respectfully leave to rest in peace. I guess he was right all along.

After over a month, the murder of Lebanese singer Suzanne Tamim is finally being brought to justice.

In the scandal that has the whole Arab world captivated, Egyptian multibillion pound business tycoon and member of the Shoura Council (upper house of Parliament), Hisham Talaat Mustafa was arrested and charged yesterday for the murder of Tamim. He allegedly paid hitman El Sokkary $2 million for the deed.

For those of you who don’t know about the case, Lebanese singing sensation Suzanne Tamim was murdered in her Dubai flat on 28 July mysteriously. There were a few leads on her killer, but for weeks many were worried that there wouldn’t be enough evidence to convict.

From the start, the case was connected to Mustafa, her former lover who happens to have very close friends in the Egyptian government and private business sectors.

Soon after the murder, Egyptian press starting going wild over the Mustafa allegations, which led to major investment regression in his businesses. After that, coverage of the case (to the best of my knowledge) was banned in Egypt… until this morning, when he graced the covers of both Al ahram and Al hayat.

Shares of his company — Egypt’s largest real estate company by market value — declined by 15.97 percent yesterday to LE 5.21, weighing on Egypt’s stock exchange.

I’m eager to see how the trial will play out. Billionaire with the right friends. Dodgy Egyptian justice system. High profile international murder case… not to mention the case’s effects on the Egyptian economy. Should be interesting. This is like the OJ Simpson case of the Arab world.

Originally uploaded by m_twfeeq

This happened a few days ago but its still quite a heated topic.

If you’re parliament -specifically the Upper House (say the US Senate) was on fire and the emergency and fire services were taking their beautiful time -wouldn’t you be a little worried even skeptical to suspect it be just only an accidental fire?!? Sounds like a cover up. I think every Egyptian smells this but we’ll see what the authorities make of it.

Its not as if the building was in the middle of the desert, its downtown Cairo! They could easily have pumped water from the Nile. But then again you do have the Cairo traffic -I have to make sure I read many Surah’s and prayers to make sure we get from A to B in one piece  because the driving is that crazy! Even then, when I was watching this covered on the news -it appeared as if the authorities were literally watching this burn to the grown. There are precious docos inside -about the entire country hello! and yet this was not enough to save it.

Another blogger -Multicultural Muslimah, also mentions things that was not covered.

Here’s more:

http://www.dailystaregypt.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=15877

Fireman dies following Shoura Council fire, investigation continues

By Mostafa El Sawy

CAIRO: A fireman died on Wednesday from injuries sustained during the night-long efforts to control the fire that broke out Tuesday afternoon at the Shoura Council, Minister of Interior Habib Al-Adly told reporters outside the gutted building yesterday.

The minister also ruled out arson.

On Tuesday night, as the fire was still raging, Cairo’s Governor Abdel-Azim Wazir initially told reporters that there were no serious injuries just minor suffocation cases.

The governor also ruled out arson, saying “Please let us focus on the problem without misleading people with those worthless rumors.”

“We will wait for the Prosecution Office’s investigations to reveal more details about the reasons behind the fire,” the governor said.

At the time, the governor said, “The fire is being dealt with seriously and enormous efforts are being exerted to put out the fire. But the problem is the building’s wooden floors,” which fuelled the blaze.

The governor expressed his shock that such an important building could face a problem like this.

Although reports indicate that the fire was under control by dawn, smoke was still seen over the historical 9th-century building at 7:30 am Wednesday.

“Four emergency service staff members and nine people who were in the building, were reported injured, suffering from smoke inhalation,” an official at the Ministry of Interior’s media department told Daily News Egypt on Wednesday.

An eyewitness said that the fire started at around 4:30 pm and that it would have been easier to control if firefighters had responded more promptly. Onlookers said emergency service staff arrived 45 minutes later.

Firefighting departments were called in from surrounding governorates to help quell the flames. Trucks from Cairo, Helwan and Maadi fire departments were spotted on the scene along with fire trucks from the Cairo Petroleum Refinery Company and the Egyptian Armed Forces.

The flames touched the rooftop of the Tax Authority building, but firefighters were able to put that fire out in less than 15 minutes.

The ceilings of each of the Shoura Council’s three-storey building collapsed. The fire, which began on the third floor, spread downwards, engulfing the other two floors over the course of several hours.

Two army firefighting helicopters were sent to drop water over the burning flames, but they missed their target on the first attempt as most of the water was poured on the reporters and security officials standing by.

Both the fire trucks and the helicopters were faced with a shortage of water.

The helicopters went from the Shoura Council to the nearby Nile River to refill the small buckets, which did nothing to diminish the flames. Those attempts lasted around 20 to 30 minutes.

“The fire trucks were not well equipped nor were the firefighters well-trained; to be fair it should be said that huge efforts were exerted but in an inexperienced unorganized way,” Nabil Ahmed Abdullah, production security supervisor at a petroleum company who witnessed the incident, told Daily News Egypt on site a little after midnight.

Although state TV advised people to take alternative roads, instead of the vital Al Qasr Al Aini Street, home to the Council, the road was not blocked. The resulting traffic jam hindered firefighting efforts.

Several eye witnesses including one of the paramedics’ team said that two Shoura Council employees were trapped inside the building earlier when the fire started and were later seen clinging to the building’s outer pipes for more than 30 minutes before security forces helped them down.

A former general in the Civil Defense, which overseas the fire department, criticized the government’s response.

“Something wrong happened,” Gen. Adel el-Abodi said. “How come a whole building caught fire in an hour? Where are the fire alarms and where are the sprinklers?”

It was the second fire in the parliament’s upper house in 10 years, he said. “But in 1998, we managed to control the fire in the room it erupted in,” he said. –Additional reporting by AP.

http://www.dailystaregypt.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=15876

Al Baleel’s “Fire” edition banned claims editor

By Sarah Carr 

CAIRO: The second edition of independent Egyptian daily Al-Badil’s Wednesday issue was not printed due to its tone in covering the Shoura Council fire, the paper’s editor claims.

State-run Al-Ahram Printing allegedly received orders not to print the second edition of the paper.

A huge fire which began on Tuesday evening gutted the Shoura Council.
 
The second edition of Al-Badil is viewable on the newspaper’s website. 

Coverage of the fire is led with headlines reading “Fierce fire destroys People’s Assembly and Shoura Council committee buildings in less than two hours; flames consume Ferry, contaminated blood, cancerous pesticides and Upper Egypt train files” — a reference to several high profile and controversial incidents which occurred in Egypt in the last few years.

Other headlines state that 40 fire engines were unable to control the fire for five hours and that the paper’s journalists were prevented from covering the event.

An article alleges that the Shoura Council building was not equipped to withstand fire despite its having been renovated, and despite the fact that it houses important public documents.

Engineers are alleged to have told Al-Badil journalists that Shoura Council security staff prevented them from entering the building before the fire broke out, and that they could have prevented the fire had they been allowed entrance.

Zakaria Hassan, former head of the Nasser Military Academy, is quoted as saying, “The fire has revealed serious shortcomings in firefighting capacity because of the poverty in the country and bad planning … A special force should have been in place to fight a fire on this scale.”

Occupational safety consultant General Nader Noaman also criticizes the response to the fire in the Al-Badil article.

“There was a delay in the response to the fire which made it difficult to deal with.

“While there were trucks carrying water; at least six permanent sources of water were required in order to bring the fire under control.

“Furthermore, throwing water at the fire from planes led to the collapse of the buildings’ roofs,” Noaman is quoted as saying.

According to an article written by Al-Badil journalist Wael Mahgoub (which appears on the Mabadali.blogspot website) the newspaper’s first edition — sent to the printing house at 5 pm — was reduced to 18,000 copies.

The second edition — which has a circulation of 25,000 — was not printed at all, allegedly after the Al-Ahram Printing House had received orders from security bodies not to print the newspaper, Mahgoub wrote on his blog.

Al-Badil’s chief editor Mohamed El-Sayyed Said told Daily News Egypt that the newspaper’s photographer was attacked by security forces.

“We were the first journalists on the scene, and took hundreds of photographs showing how the fire developed.

“Security forces destroyed our photographer’s camera and confiscated its digital memory card — this happened very early on, before other journalists arrived,” Said explained.

Said says that he suspects Al-Badil’s outspoken criticism of the government could explain the orders given to Al-Ahram not to print the second edition.

“Colleagues say that political motives lie behind the decision to ban the second edition — but I can’t say this with any certainty until I have further proof.

“While Al-Masry Al-Youm was allowed coverage of the incident, we were not, and I can only think that this is because we are much more critical than Al-Masry Al-Youm.

“We are in any case extremely concerned that Al-Ahram did not perform its duties in accordance with its contract with us,” Said told Daily News Egypt.

Women’s driving and the mahram (male guardianship) have been two of the most pressing and controversial issues in the country during the past few years. However, serious debate regarding these issues has been almost absent from the local media in the past few weeks.

I slightly noticed the absence, but I thought it could be that people simply got sick of endlessly discussing these issues without seeing any visible progress. But I was wrong. According to Dr. Abdul-Rahman Al-Enad, member of Shoura Council, the Ministry of (dis)Information have secretly ordered the newspapers to ban any article on these two issues. He didn’t explain why MOI have taken such measures, but the message is clear: they don’t want anyone to talk about this.

Dr. Al-Enad, who is also a founding member of NSHR, revealed this secret and other juicy bits during a lecture on human rights and freedom of expression that he gave to a group of journalism students and teachers at KSU last Saturday.

Truth be told, I was a bit hesitant to attend the lecture because my recent experiences with Shoura Council members were not particularly encouraging. I’m glad to report this wasn’t the case this time. Dr. Al-Enad was frank, blunt and refreshingly as cool as a Shoura member can be.

He started his talk with a brief introduction on the principles of human rights and the international laws, then quickly moved to focus on the importance of free speech as a fundamental and indispensable right for the citizens any developing nation.

Dr. Al-Enad said that although the Press and Publications Law states that “freedom of press is protected in line with laws and Sharia,” such statement has no basis in The Basic Law, which serves as a constitution, where Article 39 states: “Mass media and all other vehicles of expression shall employ civil and polite language, contribute towards the education of the nation and strengthen unity. It is prohibited to commit acts leading to disorder and division, affecting the security of the state and its public relations, or undermining human dignity and rights. Details shall be specified in the Law.”

The devil is in the details. The Basic Law refers you to the Press and Publications Law, which in turn doesn’t offers much details. All what the latter has to offer is the vague sentence “in line with laws and Sharia.” What laws and what interpretation of Sharia, no one exactly knows.

As I previously said here, The Basic Law should be amended to enumerate the rights and duties of citizens, and one of these rights is freedom of expression. Dr. Al-Enad agrees, but says the problem is that the Shoura Council has no right to amend The Basic Law. Actually, the Council doesn’t even have the right to modify its own rules. Only the King has the power to do that.

However, the Council has the authority to review and approve lower laws. One of these laws is the E-Crimes Act, which has been passed in March 2007. I am concerned because the act contained some articles that are very stretchy and non-specific, and they can be easily used to target freedom of expression online.

I went to ask Dr. Al-Enad about this law after he finished his lecture. He told me he does not remember the details of the law, and asked if he can contact me later to talk about this. I gave him my card, and I’m still waiting to hear from him. Can I trust the Shoura Council to act positively to protect human rights and free speech, at least on this particular case? For now, I’m reserving my judgment until the esteemed member and I get a chance to talk. Because, you know, it’s always good to talk.

Human Rights Watch has urged courts in Jeddah to dismiss a case against Rai’f Badawi, founder of Saudi Liberals forums. On May 5, the prosecutor charged Badawi with “setting up an electronic site that insults Islam,” and referred the case to court, asking for a five-year prison sentence and a 3 million riyal fine.

Badawi no longer owns or controls the website. After unknown hackers, who probably think they were doing some sort of electronic jihad, attacked the website several times and threatened him and his family, he sold the website and fled the country two weeks ago. A new owner announced a while ago that he took over the website, which has been offline for more than a week now.

It is understood that Badawi will be tried according to the E-Crimes Act that has been issued in March 2007. The act, which can be found here (Arabic PDF), contains some laws that seem to target free speech such as Article 6 which incriminates “producing content which violates general order, religious values, public morals or sanctity of private life, or preparing it, or sending it, or storing it via the network or a computer.”

The questions is: who defines and specifies what are those religious values and what are those public morals? I don’t know if this act has been approved by the Shoura Council or not, because I think it is unacceptable for the Council to approve such act that contains these vague laws and articles which contradicts international conventions and accords on which Saudi Arabia is a signatory.

On a related note, Amnesty International are appealing for Muhammad Ali Abu Raziza, a psychology professor at the University of Um al-Qura, who has been sentenced to 150 lashes and eight months’ imprisonment for meeting a woman in a coffee shop. There has been a lot of controversy surrounding this case and the reports on it in the local press has been full of contradictions. Therefor, I can’t make up my mind on who is at fault here.

However, I think the Commission should seriously reconsider how to define and deal with this whole “khulwa” thing. When a man and a woman meet in a public place like a cafe, a restaurant, or in the street where they are surrounded by people and others can see them, does it constitute a khulwa? I doubt that they will ever think this through but I guess it’s worth asking anyway.

First you have some people who believe that the government cannot be criticized simply because الشيوخ أبخص, and the government know the interests of the citizens better than themselves. Then you have some officials in the government who believe they cannot be criticized because, well, they are the government, falsely thinking this gives them some kind of immunity. And now you have a Shoura member who believe he and his fellow members cannot be criticized because he claims that almost no one out there know anything about the nature of work they do under that big dome.

However, Abdullah Al Twairgi is not jut asking for immunity, but he also seeks establishing a law to punish those who dare to talk bad about the Shoura Council. Obviously the right honourable member was so offended by an episode of Tash Ma Tash that was aired in Ramadhan and lightly touched on the performance of the council, and now he wants to ban reporters from attending the council discussions until they come up with something that can silence the critics. Way to go doctor!

At least I’m glad I have not elected you.

When I was interviewed by Naif Abu-Saida on Orbit few months ago, I asked: “Do we, in Saudi Arabia, really have a civil society? There is no system or law regulating the functioning of civil society organizations.” Naif disagreed with me and insisted that there are such organizations and it was simply ignorant on my part to deny their existence.

The interview was mainly about blogging, but civil society got a mention during a call by fellow blogger Hadeel al-Hodhaif who touched on the issue. Since then, I’ve been meaning to write about this but never got around to do it and I finally decided to give it shot, so here it goes.

What Naif meant when he was talking about civil society organizations is mainly charities and philanthropic bodies. It is true that charities are usually included when citing examples for civil society institutions, but most literature on the subject is focused on the political element of these organizations, which aims to “facilitates better awareness and a more informed citizenry, who make better voting choices, participate in politics, and hold government more accountable as a result.”

Needless to say, such political element is clearly absent in this part of the world. Of course this has much to do with the fact that we don’t live in a democratic system because the civil society concept is closely linked to democracy and representation. As far as I know, Shoura Council have been discussing a new law for regulating civil society organizations that is expected to be voted on soon.

Until we find out what our esteemed Shoura members have been up to, my question for now is: considering our circumstances, can we here in Saudi Arabia actually call the many charities and philanthropic bodies functioning in the country civil society organizations?

It wasn’t unexpected at all, at least not to me: several members of the Shoura Council decided to use the religion card against a proposal to change the Kingdom’s official Thursday-Friday weekend to Friday and Saturday. It is truly a pity how some people in this country would shove religion in everything even when it has nothing to do with it. The weak arguments raised by these right honorable members of our esteemed council are “baseless,” just like one of them described the economic reasons cited for the change.

Frustrated, although absolutely not surprised, I find myself repeating what Tariq al-Maeena has said earlier this week: “Are they trying to frustrate efforts toward a more progressive and productive society? It seems to have worked in the past on other issues such as the liberalization of laws relating to women.” It seems to me that this is exactly the case: when you can’t find a reason to halt the change, hey, you can use religion. But you know what I’m eagerly waiting for now? A fatwa by the religious establishment here declaring that changing the weekend is going to make this nation go to hell in a handbasket.