comment by Jerry Gordon

Earlier today, I talked with Nina Shea of Center for Religious Freedom at the Hudson Institute who was wrapping up a second Saudi text report. The 90 page report, “2008 Update: Saudi Arabia ’s Curriculum of Intolerance,” with a foreward by former CIA director R. James Woolsey was just released this afternoon. The Washington-based Institute for Gulf Affairs assisted in completion of the report released, today. This second Saudi text study encompassed a review of supposed reform texts drawn from the website of the Saudi Education Ministry. It reveals virtually no change in the core Wahhabi doctrine of hate and incitement to violence against other religions that was unveiled when the first Saudi text study was concluded in 2006. This means that the September 2008 deadline promoted by our State Department has been breached. As regards the current contretemps over the Islamic studies texts at the Islamic Saudi Academy in Virginia examined by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), where Shea is a Commissioner, this most recent Saudi text study throws in serious doubt the hasty efforts by the ISA Islamic studies faculty at redacting Saudi texts to conform to alleged US standards. Further as Ms. Shea comments it also questions the veracity and intent of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and the World Muslim League’s current ‘ecumenical meetings’ with other faiths being held in Madrid, Spain this week.

Here are some examples by the Hudson Institute Center for Religious Freedom report:

They assert that unbelievers, such as Christians, Jews, and Muslims who do not share Wahhabi beliefs and practices, are hated “enemies.” Global jihad as an “effort to wage war against the unbelievers” is also promoted in the Ministry’s textbooks: “In its general usage, “jihad’ is divided into the following categories: “Wrestling with the infidels by calling them to the faith and battling against them.” No argument is made here that such references to jihad mean only spiritual and defensive struggles.

Lessons remain that Jews and Christians are apes and swine, Jews conspire to “gain sole control over the world,” the Christian Crusades never ended, the American universities of Cairo and Beirut are part of the continuing Crusades, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion are historical fact, and on Judgment Day “the rocks or the trees” will call out to Muslims to kill the Jews.

They teach that it is permissible for a Muslim to kill an “apostate,” an “adulterer,” and those practicing “major polytheism.” Shiites are among those identified as “polytheists.” One lesson states that “it is not permissible to violate the blood, property, or honor of the unbeliever who makes a compact with the Muslims,” but is pointedly silent on whether security guarantees are extended to non-Muslims without such a compact. Other lessons demonize members of the Baha’i and Ahmadiyya groups.

The reports notes the looming deadline of September 2008 negotiated with our State Department and questions the lack of genuine interfaith tolerance recently espoused by King Abdullah that we have posted.

This analysis is issued as a deadline nears for the removal of intolerant teachings from all Saudi textbooks. This commitment stems from the Saudi government’s “confirmation” of policies that resulted from extensive bilateral negotiations with the U.S. ; these policies were publicly announced and lauded as “significant developments” by the State Department in July 2006. Whether Saudi Arabia ’s “comprehensive revision of textbooks” will be achieved by the start of the September 2008 school year remains to be seen. As the report documents, thorough textbook reform has not yet occurred.

Saudi King Abdullah is taking a leading role in interfaith dialogue initiatives, including convening a conference in Madrid later this week. The report notes that the Saudi Education Ministry’s continued teaching of hatred and violence against other religious believers raises concerns about whether the Saudi government has a genuine desire to find common ground with other religions.

What this second Saudi text review by the Hudson Institute reveals is that the Wahabbi xenophobic doctrine still prevails in Saudi Arabia and that representations that core Quaranic elements would be ‘reformed’, and ‘modified’ are pure taqiyya-religiously sanctioned dissimilitude to fool the kafirs, the unbelievers, us. Shame on our State Department for believing in good faith that a new day has dawned in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It hasn’t. What is the expression, the more things change, the more they remain the same.

State Department-Negotiated Deadline for Reform Nears
News Release, Hudson Institute, July 15, 2008

Today the Center for Religious Freedom of the Hudson Institute released a 90-page report, 2008 Update: Saudi Arabia — Curriculum of Intolerance, with a foreword by R. James Woolsey. It was prepared in consultation with the Washington-based Institute for Gulf Affairs.

This report compares the 2007-2008 textbooks that are currently posted on the website of the Saudi Ministry of Education with those analyzed in our 2006 study, and shows that the same violent and intolerant teachings against other religious believers noted in 2006 remain in the current texts.

They assert that unbelievers, such as Christians, Jews, and Muslims who do not share Wahhabi beliefs and practices, are hated “enemies.” Global jihad as an “effort to wage war against the unbelievers” is also promoted in the Ministry’s textbooks: “In its general usage, “˜jihad’ is divided into the following categories: “Wrestling with the infidels by calling them to the faith and battling against them.” No argument is made here that such references to jihad mean only spiritual and defensive struggles.

Lessons remain that Jews and Christians are apes and swine, Jews conspire to “gain sole control over the world,” the Christian Crusades never ended, the American universities of Cairo and Beirut are part of the continuing Crusades, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion are historical fact, and on Judgment Day “the rocks or the trees” will call out to Muslims to kill the Jews.

They teach that it is permissible for a Muslim to kill an “apostate,” an “adulterer,” and those practicing “major polytheism.” Shiites are among those identified as “polytheists.” One lesson states that “it is not permissible to violate the blood, property, or honor of the unbeliever who makes a compact with the Muslims,” but is pointedly silent on whether security guarantees are extended to non-Muslims without such a compact. Other lessons demonize members of the Baha’i and Ahmadiyya groups.

A lesson from a tenth grade text now posted on the Saudi Ministry’s website sanctions the killing of homosexuals and discusses methods for doing so.

In the lessons examined in this report, the Saudi government discounts or ignores passages in the Qur’an to support tolerance.

All of these textbooks have been reissued at least once and all but two of them reissued twice, yet overall the changes to the passages in question have been minimal, and the degree of substantive change has been negligible. Taken together, the report concludes, revisions in the currently-posted texts amount to moving around the furniture, not cleaning the house.

This analysis is issued as a deadline nears for the removal of intolerant teachings from all Saudi textbooks. This commitment stems from the Saudi government’s “confirmation” of policies that resulted from extensive bilateral negotiations with the U.S. ; these policies were publicly announced and lauded as “significant developments” by the State Department in July 2006. Whether Saudi Arabia ’s “comprehensive revision of textbooks” will be achieved by the start of the September 2008 school year remains to be seen. As the report documents, thorough textbook reform has not yet occurred.

Saudi King Abdullah is taking a leading role in interfaith dialogue initiatives, including convening a conference in Madrid later this week. The report notes that the Saudi Education Ministry’s continued teaching of hatred and violence against other religious believers raises concerns about whether the Saudi government has a genuine desire to find common ground with other religions.

For the report, along with English and original Arabic excerpts go to www.hudson.org/religion