Agree, very: Encyrpted secret saudi arabian muslim women dating blacks
| Encyrpted secret saudi arabian muslim women dating blacks | |
| Encyrpted secret saudi arabian muslim women dating blacks | |
| Encyrpted secret saudi arabian muslim women dating blacks | |
| Encyrpted secret saudi arabian muslim women dating blacks | |
| Encyrpted secret saudi arabian muslim women dating blacks |
Encyrpted secret saudi arabian muslim women dating blacks - you tell
Human rights in Saudi Arabia
Human rights in Saudi Arabia are a topic of concern. The Saudi government, which enforces sharia law under the absolute rule of the House of Saud, have been accused of and denounced by various international organizations and governments for violating multiple human rights within the country.[1] The totalitarian regime ruling the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is consistently ranked among the "worst of the worst" in Freedom House's annual survey of political and civil rights.[2] Qorvis MSLGroup, a U.S. subsidiary of Publicis Groupe, has been working with Saudi Arabia amidst its executions of political protesters and opponents for more than a decade to whitewash its record of human rights abuses.[3][4]
Background[edit]
Saudi Arabia is one of approximately 30 countries in the world with judicial corporal punishment. In Saudi Arabia's case this includes amputations of hands and feet for robbery, and flogging for lesser crimes such as "sexual deviance" and drunkenness. In April 2020, the Saudi Supreme Court abolished the flogging punishment from its system and replaced it with jail time and fines.[5] In the 2000s, it was reported that women were sentenced to lashes for adultery; the women were actually victims of rape, but because they could not prove who the perpetrators were, they were deemed guilty of committing adultery.[6] The number of lashes is not clearly prescribed by law and is varied according to the discretion of judges, and ranges from dozens of lashes to several hundred, usually applied over a period of weeks or months. In 2004, the United Nations Committee Against Torture criticized Saudi Arabia over the amputations and floggings it carries out under Sharia. The Saudi delegation responded defending "legal traditions" held since the inception of Islam 1,400 years ago and rejected interference in its legal system. Saudi Arabia later abolished the punishment of flogging, and replaced it by jail time or fines or both.[5][7]
The courts continue to impose sentences of flogging as a principal or additional punishment for many offences. At least five defendants were sentenced to flogging of 1,000 to 2,500 lashes. Flogging was carried out in prisons.[8] In April 2020, flogging is no longer carried out as a punishment in the Saudi court system.[7]
In 2009, Mazen Abdul-Jawad was sentenced to 1,000 lashes and five years in prison for bragging on a Saudi TV show about his sexual exploits.[9][10]
In 2014, Saudi blogger Raif Badawi's sentence was increased to 1,000 lashes and ten years' imprisonment after he was accused of apostasy in 2012. The lashes were due to take place over 20 weeks. The first round (50) were administered on January 9, 2015, but the second round has been postponed due to medical problems. The case was internationally condemned and put a considerable amount of pressure on the Saudi legal system.
In October 2015, UK pensioner and cancer victim Karl Andree, then 74, faced 360 lashes for home brewing alcohol. His family feared the punishment could kill him. However, he was released and returned home in November that year.[11]
In 2016, a Saudi man was sentenced to 2,000 lashes, ten years in prison and a fine of 20,000 riyals (US$5,300) for making tweets critical of Islam, and denying the existence of God.[12][13]
In September 2018, the official Twitter account of the Saudi Arabia prosecutors issued a warning to punish those who share anything satirical on social media that "affects public order, religious values and public morals". The punishment included a five-year prison term and a fine of 3 million riyals (US$800,000). The government of Saudi Arabia arrested a few intellectuals, businessmen and activists last year for the same reason.[14]
Torture[edit]
While Saudi Arabia's Criminal Procedure Code prohibits "torture" and "undignified treatment" (art. 2) in practice torture and using torture to extract forced confessions of guilt remains common.[15][16][17][18][19]
According to Amnesty International, security forces continued to torture and ill- treat detainees to extract confessions to be used as evidence against them at trial. According to the organization, 32 defendants accused of spying for Iran were subjected to torture and forced to confess. Detainees were held incommunicado and denied access to their families.[20]
In 2018, a UN panel that visited Saudi Arabia on the kingdom's invitation to conduct an inspection, revealed that the country has been systematically using anti-terror laws to justify torture.[21] The report found that Saudis, who have been exercising their right to freedom of expression peacefully and calmly in the kingdom, have been systematically persecuted by the authorities.[22]
Walid Fitaihi is a physician who studied and worked in the US in the 1980s.[23] He was born in 1964 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. He went back to Saudi Arabia in 2006. Dr. Fitaihi was arrested at the Ritz Carlton hotel in November 2017 and moved to al-Hair prison south of the capital.[23][24] The Ritz-Carlton hotel was used to hold many of the prominent prisoners of the Saudi government in 2017, according to Saudi activists.[24]Aljazeera reported, Dr.Fitaihi told a friend he was "blindfolded, stripped of his underwear and bound to a chair".[25][26] The daily report also said that, the Saudi government tortured him with electrical shocks, "what appears to have been a single session of torture that lasted about an hour".[25][26] Reports also said, he was whipped so severely, he could not sleep on his back for days.[25][26]
In August 2019, a news article released in The Independent reported that more than 100 female migrants of Bangladeshi descent and some 45 male migrants fled from Saudi Arabia following psychological and sexual harassment from employers.[27]
Prince Faisal bin Abdullah Al Saud, the former head of the Saudi Red Crescent Society and son of late King Abdullah, was arrested on March 27, 2020 and has since been kept under incommunicado detention. In November 2017, Prince Faisal was first arrested and put under arbitrary detention in the famous Ritz-Carlton purge. He was later released in December 2017 on the condition of handing over his assets. Currently, the authorities keeping him under detention refuse to share his whereabouts or status of health and well-being, as per Human Rights Watch.[28]
On 19 November 2020, based on the report exclusively shared by human rights charity, Grant Liberty, the Independent reported human rights violations endured by women’s rights activists and political prisoners in Saudi Arabian jails. Reportedly, the jailed women’s rights activists and political prisoners have been sexually assaulted, tortured and died as a result of their injuries in Saudi Arabian detention cells. According to the research, 20 prisoners were arrested for political crimes, 5 of whom have already been put to death, while the remaining 13 have been facing death penalty. The report was released days before Saudi Arabia hosted G20 summit with female empowerment a fundamental part of its agenda.[29]
Capital punishment; right to representation[edit]
Saudi Arabia regularly engages in capital punishment, including public executions by beheading.[30] The death penalty can be imposed for a wide range of offenses,[31] including murder, rape, armed robbery, repeated drug use, apostasy,[32] adultery,[33] witchcraft and sorcery[34] and can be carried out by beheading with a sword,[32]stoning or firing squad,[33] followed by crucifixion.[34] In 2005 there were 191 executions, in 2006 there were 38, in 2007 there were 153, and in 2008 there were 102.[35]
A spokesman for the National Society for Human Rights, an organisation which is funded by the Saudi Government, said that the number of executions is rising because crime rates are rising, that prisoners are treated humanely, and that the beheadings deter crime, saying, "Allah, our creator, knows best what's good for His people...Should we just think of and preserve the rights of the murderer and not think of the rights of others?"[36]
Saudi Arabian police and immigration authorities routinely abuse people who are stopped or detained, especially workers from developing countries. Earlier in November 2013, the authorities received criticism for the way they have planned and handled the crackdown on illegal workers. Saudi authorities – in some cases with the help of citizens – rounded up many illegal workers and physically abused them.[37][38]
On April 23, 2019, Saudi Arabia carried out mass executions of 37 imprisoned civilians who had been convicted mostly on the basis of confessions obtained under torture or written by the accused's torturers.[39] Most of the executed belonged to the country's Shia minority.[40]
In April 2020, the Saudi Supreme Court announced under a royal decree by King Salman that minors who commit crimes will no longer face the death sentence, but will be sentenced up to 10 years imprisonment in a juvenile detention facility.[41]
Human trafficking[edit]
Saudi Arabia is a notable destination country for men and women trafficked for the purposes of slave labour and commercial sexual exploitation. Men and women from Central Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, and many other countries voluntarily travel to Saudi Arabia as domestic servants or other low-skilled labourers, but some subsequently face conditions indicative of involuntary servitude.[42]
Women, primarily from Asian and African countries are trafficked into Saudi Arabia for commercial sexual exploitation; others were kidnapped and forced into prostitution after running away from abusive employers.[42]
Sexual slavery[edit]
Some Saudi men have also used contracted "temporary marriages" in countries such as Mauritania, Yemen, and Indonesia as a means by which to sexually exploit migrant workers. Females are led to believe they are being wed in earnest, but upon arrival in Saudi Arabia subsequently become their husbands' sexual slaves, are forced into domestic labor and, in some cases, prostitution.[43] Prostitution is illegal in Saudi Arabia.
Women's rights[edit]
Guardianship system, segregation, and restrictions[edit]
Saudi women face discrimination in many aspects of their lives, such as the justice system, and under the male guardianship system are effectively treated as legal minors.[44] Although they make up 70% of those enrolled in universities, for social reasons, women make up 5% of the workforce in Saudi Arabia,[45] the lowest proportion in the world. The treatment of women has been referred to as "sex segregation",[46][47]"gender apartheid",[48][49] and of some women being "prisoners" of their male relatives.[50] Implementation of a government resolution supporting expanded employment opportunities for women met resistance from within the labor ministry,[51] from the religious police,[52] and from the male citizenry.[53]
In many parts of Saudi Arabia, it is believed that a woman's place is in the home caring for her husband and family, yet there are some women who do not adhere to this view and practice, and some run the house instead of the husband himself. Moreover, there is also some type of segregation at homes, such as different entrances for men and women.[54]
Women's rights are at the heart of calls for reform in Saudi Arabia – calls that are challenging the kingdom's political status quo.[54] Local and international women's groups are also pushing governments to respond, taking advantage of the fact that some rulers are eager to project a more progressive image to the West. Since 2009, women and their male supporters have been organizing an anti male-guardianship campaign.[55][56] Female leaders of this movement have been imprisoned without charge. Women in general who challenge the guardianship system may be sent to shelters for troubled women, where according to human rights activists they face torture and sexual abuse.[50][57] Men are free to abuse women in Saudi Arabia, with reports of women being locked in their rooms for months or threatened with starvation or shooting for offenses such as getting the wrong kind of haircut or being in a relationship with a man the family has not approved.[50] Women cannot file police reports without the permission of a male guardian, and may end up being imprisoned by the government for complaining.[50] Women are prohibited from certain professions (such as optometry) and may be prohibited from mixing with men at work, but according to the government as of 2017 compose 30% of workers in the private sector[58] (which is 40% of GDP).
The presence of powerful businesswomen—still a rare sight—in some of these groups helps get them heard.[59] Prior to 2008, women were not allowed to enter hotels and furnished apartments without a chaperone or mahram. With a 2008 Royal Decree, however, the only requirement for a woman to be allowed to enter hotels is a national ID card, and (as with male guests) the hotel must inform the nearest police station of their room reservation and length of stay.[60] In April 2010, a new, optional ID card for women was issued which allows them to travel in countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council. The cards include GPS tracking, fingerprints and features that make them difficult to forge. Women do not need male permission to apply for the card, but do need it to travel abroad.[61] Proponents argue that new female identity cards enable a woman to carry out her activities with ease, and prevent forgeries committed in the name of women.
Women first joined the Consultative Assembly of Saudi Arabia in 2013, occupying thirty seats.[62] Furthermore, that year three women were named as deputy chairpersons of three committees. Dr. Thurayya Obeid was named Deputy Chairwoman of the Human Rights and Petitions Committee, Dr. Zainab Abu Talib, Deputy Chairwoman of the Information and Cultural Committee, and Dr. Lubna Al-Ansari, Deputy Chairwoman of the Health Affairs and Environment Committee.[62]
In 2013 the Directorate General of Passports allowed Saudi women married to foreigners to sponsor their children, so that the children can have residency permits (iqamas) with their mothers named as the sponsors, and have the right to work in the private sector in Saudi Arabia while on the sponsorship of their mothers, and the mother can also bring her children who are living abroad back to Saudi Arabia if they have no criminal records. Foreign men married to Saudi women were also granted the right to work in the private sector in Saudi Arabia while on the sponsorship of their wives on condition that the title on their iqamas should be written as "husband of a Saudi wife" and that they should have valid passports enabling them to return to their homes at any time.[63] Saudi women married to foreigners, however, still face difficulty in passing their nationality to their children.
Also in 2013, Saudi Arabia registered its first female trainee lawyer, Arwa al-Hujaili.[64] In Saudi courts, the testimony of women is weighted half that of a man's.[65]
According to the CIA world factbook, 82.2% of females are literate, in comparison to 90.8% literacy rates in males.[66]
In the year 2018, the Saudi government changed several policies, allowing women to drive with the permission of their guardian, attend sporting events in gender-segregated area, participate in sports (including exercising on public streets), and eliminated the need for male permission to receive education, get healthcare, or open a business.[58] It began offering physical education for girls and said it would start licensing female-only gyms.[58] The government opened the military to women in March, who can serve if they meet certain physical and educational requirements, continue to live with their male guardian in the province of service, and get male permission.[58] It also granted divorced women the ability to retain custody of children without petitioning.[58] Male permission is still required to apply for a passport, travel, marry, divorce, or leave jail.[58] Men and women are also still segregated on public transport, beaches, and pools.[58] In practice, some doctors still require male permission before providing services,[50] and male permission may be needed to rent an apartment or file a legal claim.[58] In 2019, the Saudi government has been taken new measures to release male gardianship. Thus, women will be soon allowed to travel abroad without the need of getting the permission of their male guardians.[67]
In July 2018, two prominent female human rights activists, Samar Badawi and Nassima al-Sada, were arrested for challenging Saudi Arabia's male guardianship laws.[68] According to Amnesty International, several arrested women's rights activists detained without charge in Dhahban Prison are enduring torture by electrocution, flogging, hanging from the ceiling, sexual assault.[69]
In October 2018, under the predominant male guardianship system, a Saudi woman lost a legal battle to marry the man she wanted to because he played a musical instrument, many conservative Muslims in the kingdom consider music to be “haram” (forbidden). The male relative of the woman did not allow her to marry the man of her choice citing religious incompatibility as the man played oud.[70]
Saudi Arabia is not a party to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which among many other issues prohibits forced marriages. However, it is part of the Human Rights council.
The World Economic Forum in its Global Gender Gap Report 2018 ranked Saudi Arabia 141 out of 149 countries on gender equality.[71][72]
In 2019, the government also stated that women can start working in the military. In the past they could only work in police.[73]
During April and May 2020, Princess Basmah bint Saud bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, who has been imprisoned for the past fourteen months, expected to be granted mercy and released, but wasn't. Princess Basmah's cousin, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman issued her arrest and detention in 2019 for possessing a fake passport, when she was trying to allegedly flee Saudi Arabia. She was arrested along with her 28-year-old daughter from their apartment in Jeddah on March 1, 2019. Princess Basmah remains imprisoned even after the charges held against her were dropped and she reported of having a “health status VERY critical”. She disclosed about her health condition in a series of tweets addressed to her uncle and cousin, crown prince and king Salman.[74]
On November 5, 2020, UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) appealed Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud to release women rights activist Loujain al-Hathloul. CEDAW also expressed concerns over her health conditions, as the Saudi authority was not following the UN Rules for the Treatment of Women Prisoners, which allows prisoners to regularly contact their family members.[75]
On November 30, 2020, seven European human rights ambassadors criticized Saudi Arabia over the continued detention of at least five women's rights activists, including Loujain al-Hathloul, whose case was referred to a special court for terrorism offenses in that month. On November 25, 2020, Loujain appeared in a Saudi court, as her trial was scheduled to start after 900 days in pre-trial detention. However, the court instead referred the case to the Specialized Criminal Court for terrorism and national security cases.[76]
Driving[edit]
Saudi Arabia was the only country in the world where women were forbidden to drive motor vehicles until June 2018.[77] The motoring ban was not in statute law, but was an "informal" religious fatwa imposed by conservative Muslim clerics[78] in order to maintain the country's tradition of gender segregation, although this religious view has changed in recent years.[79]
In 1990, when 47 Saudi women drove cars through the streets of Riyadh in protest against the ban, protestors were punished. "All the drivers, and their husbands, were barred from foreign travel for a year. Those women who had government jobs were fired, once their employers found out. And from hundreds of mosque pulpits, they were denounced by name as immoral women out to destroy Saudi society."[80]
When the driving ban was enforced, women complained that "we can't move around without a male."[78] Many could not afford chauffeurs, and the few buses that do operate in cities and towns across the Kingdom do not follow a set schedule.[77] On October 26, 2013, a group of women started a movement to defy the ban by driving themselves. However, on October 23, in a "rare and explicit restating of the ban", Interior Ministry Spokesman General Mansur al-Turki warned, "It is known that women in Saudi are banned from driving and laws will be applied against violators and those who demonstrate support."[81] In December 2014, two women were arrested and sentenced to almost a month of prison for defying the female driving ban.[82]
Women are allowed to fly aircraft, though they must be chauffeured to the airport.[83] A Saudi woman made news in 2007 when she became the first woman to get her pilot's licence. The woman, Hanadi al-Hindi works for Saudi Prince Al Waleed.[84]
Hisham Fageeh, a Saudi living in the US, has created a video which makes a reference to the Government's rules which prevented women from driving. The video was released the same day many women in Saudi Arabia staged a nationwide protest against the Government.[85]
In 2015, a Saudi woman working in neighbouring UAE was arrested as she tried to enter Saudi Arabia. She had her passport taken from her and was forced to wait at the Saudi-UAE border without any food or water. She claimed that her UAE drivers licence was valid in all GCC countries, but the Saudi border authorities refused to acknowledge its legitimacy.[86][87]
In 2017, a royal decree was issued to allowing women to drive.[88] The first driving license was issued to a Saudi woman in June 2018 and the ban on driving was lifted on June 24, 2018.[89][90] Between the announcement and the lifting of the ban, the leaders of the Women to Drive campaign who violated the ban were arrested and tortured.[91]
Male permission is still required to travel outside the home, so many women in conservative families are still not allowed to drive.[50]
May 15, 2020, marks the two-year anniversary of the detained women rights activists. They were advocating for the right to drive for women in Saudi. Amnesty International has urged the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to release the women rights defenders in detention for the past two years.[92]
On 26 October 2020, women rights activist Loujain started a hunger strike for not being allowed to speak with her family members during her time in detention. Her sister Lina told The Telegraph that she did not ask for her freedom, but only a regular voice call with her parents to let them know that she hasn't disappeared.[93]
On 5 November 2020, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) called on Saudi Arabia to release all the women human rights defenders in detention, including Loujain al-Hathloul, whose health was deteriorating because of her hunger strike that started on 26 October 2020.[94]
Racism[edit]
Racism in Saudi Arabia extends to allegations of imprisonment, physical abuse, rape,[95] overwork and wage theft, especially of foreign workers who are given little protections under the law.
Antisemitism[edit]
Saudi Arabian media often attacks Jews in books, news articles, at their Mosques, and with what some describe as antisemitic satire. Saudi Arabian government officials and state religious leaders often promote the idea that Jews are conspiring to take over the entire world; as proof of their claims, they publish and frequently cite The Protocols of the Elders of Zion as factual.[96][97] During the Gulf War (1990–1991), when approximately a half million U.S. military personnel assembled in Saudi Arabia, and many were then stationed there, there were many Jewish U.S. service personnel in Saudi Arabia. It is reported that the Saudi government insisted that Jewish religious services not be held on their soil but that Jewish soldiers be flown to nearby US warships.[98]
Rights of foreigners[edit]
Migrant workers' rights[edit]
According to the 2016 Amnesty International annual report, Saudi authorities detained and deported hundreds of thousands of irregular migrants, while tens of thousands were fired without having been paid for months and were left stranded without food, water or exit visas.[99]
On April 20, it was reported that the migrant workers in Saudi Arabia faced severe conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic. Where the country was under a lockdown to prevent the spread of the virus, these migrant workers were left helpless with no jobs. Due to the shortage of money, a number of these workers, particularly from Bangladesh, were living without food and lack of support from the Saudi authorities.[100]
On 30 August 2020, The Telegraph investigation reported hundreds of African migrants were locked up in degraded conditions in Saudi Arabian Covid detention centres.[101] Video sent to the newspaper showed dozens of emaciated men crippled by the Arabian heat, lying shirtless in tightly packed rows in small rooms with barred windows.[102]
On 2 October, 2020, an Amnesty International investigation revealed that at-least three migrant people died in the detention centers of Saudi Arabia, which has been holding thousands of Ethiopian migrants, according to eyewitness testimonies. Amnesty urged Saudi authorities to immediately release all arbitrarily detained migrants, and improve the conditions of detention centers.[103]
On 8 October, 2020, the European Parliament raised concerns, after it was revealed in an investigation that Saudi Arabia is holding tens of thousands of African migrants in hellish conditions in detention centers. Members of the European Parliament passed a resolution denouncing a series of human rights abuse by the regime of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman. They also urged the EU states to minimize their representation at the G20 Riyadh Summit that year, so that the rights violations by Saudi don’t get legitimized.[104]
Stateless people[edit]
There are 70,000 stateless people in Saudi Arabia, also known as Bedoon.[105] Some stateless are Yemenis who moved to Saudi Arabia, before the borders were in place.[106]
This is also prevalent in neighbouring UAE, Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain.[107]
Labors Rights[edit]
Every summer, the Saudi Ministry of Labor and Social Development enforce a 3-months midday outdoor work ban. The main aim of this ban is to protect labors from being directly exposed to the sun and high-temperature. Labor' either Saudi Nationals or foreigners, are welcomed to file any violations through the ministry's portal.[108]
Sectarianism and freedom of religion[edit]
Saudi Arabian law does not recognize religious freedom, and the public practice of non-Muslim religions is actively prohibited.[109]
No law specifically requires citizens to be Muslims, but article 12.4 of the Naturalization Law requires that applicants attest to their religious affiliation, and article 14.1 requires that applicants get a certificate endorsed by their local cleric.[110] The Government has declared the Quran and the Sunna (tradition) of the Prophet Muhammad to be the country's constitution. Neither the Government nor society in general accepts the concepts of separation of religion and state, and such separation does not exist. The legal system is based on Shari'a (Islamic law), with Shari'a courts basing their judgments largely on a code derived from the Quran and the Sunna. According to Human Rights Watch, Saudi Arabia "systematically discriminates against its Muslim religious minorities, in particular Shia and Ismailis",[111] but the Government permits Shi'a Muslims to use their own legal tradition to adjudicate noncriminal cases within their community.[110]
In 2014, Saudi Arabia enacted new "anti-terrorism" legislation. Human Rights Watch criticized the broad language of the legislation and related government decrees, which have been used to prosecute and punish peaceful political activists and dissidents.[112] HEW stated, "these recent laws and regulations turn almost any critical expression or independent association into crimes of terrorism."[112] A number of prominent human rights activists were detained under the new law, including Waleed Abulkhair and Mikhlif Alshammari.[112] Interior Ministry regulations also defined "calling for atheist thought in any form, or calling into question the fundamentals of the Islamic religion on which this country is based" as terrorism.[112]
International law[edit]
Saudi Arabia abstained from the United Nations vote adopting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, saying it contradicted sharia law.[113] It is not a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which includes freedom of religion. The country holds a reservation to the Convention on the Rights of the Child against any provisions that are in conflict with sharia law;[114] Article 14 gives freedom of "thought, conscience and religion" to children.
Saudi Arabia and some of the Gulf states have been carrying out airstrikes on the Yemen, violating international laws and arresting anyone that criticises them.[115][116][117]
Allegations of Apartheid[edit]
Saudi Arabia and the apartheid[119] analogy is a comparison of Saudi Arabia's treatment of minorities and non-Muslim foreigners with South Africa's treatment of non-whites during its apartheid era, or the description of Saudi treatment of women under Sharia Law with the concept of Gender apartheid.[citation needed]
Jews[edit]
There has been virtually no Jewish activity in Saudi Arabia since the beginning of the 21st century. Census data does not identify any Jews as residing within Saudi Arabian territory.[120]
Christians[edit]
As an Islamic state, Saudi Arabia gives preferential treatment for Muslims. During Ramadan, eating, drinking, or smoking in public during daylight hours is not allowed.[121] Foreign schools are often required to teach a yearly introductory segment on Islam. Saudi religious police have detained Shi'ite pilgrims participating in the Hajj, allegedly calling them "infidels in Mecca".[122] The restrictions on the Shi'a branch of Islam in the Kingdom along with the banning of displaying Jewish, Hindu and Christian symbols have been referred to as apartheid.[123]
The Saudi government has gone further than stopping Christians from worshipping in publicly designated buildings to even raid private prayer meetings among Christian believers in their own homes. On December 15, 2011, Saudi security forces arrested 35 Ethiopian Christians in Jeddah who were praying in a home, beating them and threatening them with death. When the Ethiopian workers' employers asked security forces for what reason they were arrested, they said "for practising Christianity". Later, under mounting international pressure, this charge was changed to "mixing with the opposite sex". [124][125]
In December 2012, Saudi religious police detained more than 41 individuals after storming a house in the Saudi Arabian province of al-Jouf. They were accused of "plotting to celebrate Christmas," according to a December 26 statement released by the police branch.[126] Proselytizing by non-Muslims, including the distribution of non-Muslim religious materials such as Bibles, is illegal in Saudi Arabia.
Shia Muslims[edit]
The Saudi government has often been viewed as an active oppressor of Shia Muslims because of the funding of the Wahabbi ideology which denounces the Shia faith.[127]
In 1988 fatwas passed by the country's leading cleric, Abdul-Aziz ibn Baz denounced the Shias as apostates. Another by Abdul-Rahman al-Jibrin, a member of the Higher Council of Ulama is on record as saying
Some people say that the rejectionists (Rafidha, i.e. Shia) are Muslims because they believe in God and his prophet, pray and fast. But I say they are heretics. They are the most vicious enemy of Muslims, who should be wary of their plots. They should be boycotted and expelled so that Muslims be spared their evil.[128]
According to Vali Nasr, al-Jibrin's sanctioning of the killing of Shia was reiterated in Wahhabi religious literature as late as 2002.
According to a 2009 Human Rights Watch report, Shia citizens in Saudi Arabia "face systematic discrimination in religion, education, justice, and employment".[129]
Saudi Arabia has no Shia cabinet ministers, mayors or police chiefs, according to another source, Vali Nasr, unlike other countries with sizable Shia populations (such as Iraq and Lebanon). Shia are kept out of "critical jobs" in the armed forces and the security services, and not one of the three hundred Shia girls' schools in the Eastern Province has a Shia principal.
Pakistani columnist Mohammad Taqi has written that "the Saudi regime is also acutely aware that, in the final analysis, the Shiite grievances ... stem from socioeconomic deprivation, as a result of religious repression and political marginalization bordering on apartheid."[130]
Testifying before the US Congressional Human Rights Caucus, Ali al-Ahmed, Director of the Institute for Gulf Affairs, stated
Saudi Arabia is a glaring example of religious apartheid. The religious institutions from government clerics to judges, to religious curriculums, and all religious instructions in media are restricted to the Wahhabi understanding of Islam, adhered to by less than 40% of the population. The Saudi government communized Islam, through its monopoly of both religious thoughts and practice. Wahhabi Islam is imposed and enforced on all Saudis regardless of their religious orientations. The Wahhabi sect does not tolerate other religious or ideological beliefs, Muslim or not. Religious symbols by Muslims, Christians, Jewish and other believers are all banned. The Saudi embassy in Washington is a living example of religious apartheid. In its 50 years, there has not been a single non-Sunni Muslim diplomat in the embassy. The branch of Imam Mohamed Bin Saud University in Fairfax, Virginia instructs its students that Shia Islam is a Jewish conspiracy.[131]
In November 2014 at al-Dalwah village in the eastern province of al-Ahsa, three unknown masked gunmen opened fire at a Husseiniya, or Shi'ite religious center, killing eight and injuring dozens.[132]
While the government and the official media and religious establishment strongly condemned the attack, a handful of articles in the Saudi press argued that the attack "had not come out of nowhere", that there was anti-Shi'ite incitement in the kingdom on the part of "the religious establishment, preachers, and even university lecturers – and that it was on the rise".[133]
The Saudi government has refused to allow Shia teachers and students exemption from school to partake in activities for the Day of Ashura, one of the most important religious days for Shia Muslims which commemorates the martyrdom of Muhammad's grandson, Husayn bin Ali.[134] In 2009, during Ashura commencements, Shia religious and community leaders were arrested.
Shiites are banned from building mosques and other religious centers, and are forced to perform Friday prayers in homes (Al-Hassan). In the Eastern city of Al-Khobar, whose population is predominately Shia, there are no Shia mosques.[135] Saudi Arabia's religious police mandate prayers and all those in public buildings during prayer time are required to stop what they are doing to pray. Because there are minor differences between the way that Shiites and Sunnis pray and between prayer times, Shiites are forced to either pray the Sunni way or take a break from work.
In 2009 a group of Shiites on their way to perform hajj pilgrimage (one of the five pillars of Islam that all able-bodied Muslims are required to perform once in their lives) in Mecca were arrested by Saudi religious police.[135] Between February 20 and 24, 2009, Shia pilgrims from the heavily Shia Eastern Province who had come to Medina for the anniversary of the prophet Muhammad's death clashed with Sunni religious police at the Baqi' cemetery over doctrinal differences concerning the rituals surrounding commemoration of the dead. Security forces shot a 15-year-old pilgrim in the chest, and an unknown civilian stabbed a Shia religious sheikh in the back with a knife, shouting "Kill the rejectionist [Shia]." The authorities denied that anyone had been wounded, and played down the ensuing arrests of Shia pilgrims.[135]
Religious police have arrested Shia Women in the Eastern Province for matters as trivial as organizing classes for Quranic studies and selling clothing for religious ceremonies as if they were involved in political activities which are not allowed in KSA.[135]
In the eastern city of Dammam where three quarters of the 400,000 residents are Shia, there are no Shia mosques or prayer halls, no Shia call to prayer broadcast on TV, and no cemeteries for Shia.
Late 2011, a Shiite pilgrim was charged for being "involved with blasphemy" and sentenced to 500 lashes and 2 years in jail.[136] Also late 2011, a prominent Shiite Canadian cleric, Usama al-Attar.[137] He was released on the same day, declaring the arrest entirely unprovoked.[138]
Much of education in Saudi Arabia is based on Sunni Wahhabi religious material. From a very young age, students are taught that Shiites are not Muslims and that Shiism is a conspiracy hatched by the Jews, and so Shiites are worthy of death.[139] Government Wahhabi scholars, such as Abdulqader Shaibat al-Hamd, have proclaimed on state radio that Sunni Muslims must not "eat their [Shia] food, marry from them, or bury their dead in Muslims' graveyards".[139]
The government has restricted the names that Shias can use for their children in an attempt to discourage them from showing their identity. Saudi textbooks are hostile to Shiism, often characterizing the faith as a form of heresy worse than Christianity and Judaism.
Because anti-Shia attitudes are engrained from an early age, they are passed down from generation to generation. This prejudice is found not only in textbooks, but also within the teachers in the classroom, and even in the university setting.[139] (Wahhabi) teachers frequently tell classrooms full of young Shia schoolchildren that they are heretics.[127][140] Teachers who proclaim that Shiites are atheists and deserve death have faced no repercussions for their actions, barely even receiving punishment.[139] At a seminar about the internet, held in King Abdulaziz City of Science and Technology, professor Dr. Bader Hmood Albader explained that the internet was beneficial to society, but that there were many Shia websites claiming to be Muslim websites, which needed to be stopped.[139]
Much discrimination occurs in the Saudi workforce as well. Shiites are prohibited from becoming teachers of religious subjects, which constitute about half of the courses in secondary education.[139] Shiites cannot become principals of schools.[139] Some Shiites have become university professors but often face harassment from students and faculty alike.[139] Shiites are disqualified as witnesses in court, as Saudi Sunni sources cite the Shi'a practise of 'Taqiyya'- wherein it is permissible to lie while they are in fear or at risk of significant persecution. Shia cannot serve as judges in ordinary court, and are banned from gaining admission to military academies,[135] and from high-ranking government or security posts, including becoming pilots in Saudi Airlines.[141]
-
-