"-" <jazzerciser@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:4887954d.102915364@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> http://www.nationalpost.com/news/world/story.html?id=662057
>
> Saudi textbooks still teaching hate: re****t
> Jews, Christians referred to as apes and swine
>
> Charles Lewis, National Post
> Published: Thursday, July 17, 2008
> Fahad Shadeed/Reuters
>
>
> Despite promises to the U.S., Saudi students are still learning from
> textbooks
> that espouse the killing of homo***uals and vilification of non-Muslims.
> Despite a promise to remove attacks on other faiths from the public
school
> curriculum, Saudi Arabia's state-produced textbooks still refer to Jews
> and
> Christians as apes and swine, insist that Jews conspire to take over the
> world
> and on Judgment Day "the rocks or the trees" will call out to Muslims to
> kill
> the Jews, says the Wa****ngton-based Hudson Institute, a conservative
think
> tank.
>
> The textbooks, used by five million students in the kingdom every year,
as
> well as in many Saudi-funded institutions outside the country, also
attack
> homo***uals and Muslims who do not practice a fundamentalist form of
> Islam.
>
> For example:
>
> • "The punishment for homo***uality is death. The companions of the
> Prophet
> were unanimous on killing although they differed ... in the manner of
> killing.
> Some companions ... stated that a homo***ual is to be burned with fire
...
> he
> should be stoned or thrown from a high place."
>
> • "You can hardly find an example of sedition in which the Jews have not
> played a role."
>
> • Zionism has achieved its aims through a variety of "destructive
> movements"
> including the Rotary Clubs and International Lions Clubs, which are
> "Masonic
> clubs based in America and they have secret agents all over the world."
>
> One of the suggested activities for Grade 8 students is to "write a
> composition on the danger of imitating infidels, giving some examples of
> imitation among the students and then present it to his classmates."
>
> Nina Shea, author of the re****t, Saudi Arabia's Curriculum of
Intolerance,
> said the deeper problem the textbooks represent is a noxious ideology
that
> is
> being ex****ted all over the world.
>
> "This ideology is kindling to [Osama] bin Laden's match," she said.
>
> "It radicalizes those who are indoctrinated with it. The aim is to
> radicalize
> students to hate the West, hate non-Muslims, to hate Jews, and to say
that
> killing is sanctioned by God.
>
> "Saudi Arabia is making every effort to make it mainstream in the Muslim
> world
> and make it the dominant interpretation of Islam."
>
> She said the Saudi education system is the main reason Web sites
designed
> to
> recruit suicide bombers are directed so heavily at Saudi youth.
>
> The ultra-conservative Sunni kingdom practises a form of Islam called
> Wahhabism, which advocates jihad.
>
> Ms. Shea, who produced her first re****t on the textbooks in 2006, said
> Saudi
> Arabia agreed to make changes after pressure from the United States. The
> deadline is September, 2008.
>
> "[The State Department] had to look like we're doing something in the
face
> of
> this really toxic teaching," she said.
>
> "It's so indefensible and so inexplicable that this is being
disseminated.
> It's not even private clerics or an enemy who is disseminating this.
This
> is
> our ally."
>
> The international human rights lawyer said her latest study looked at
the
> textbooks used in the 2007-08 school year. But she found little
difference
> from the books studied for her first re****t and does not believe the
> Saudis
> will meet the September deadline.
>
> Rather, she believes they agreed to make the changes as a "publicity
> ploy."
>
> "They want to take some of the pressure off by promising to make the
> changes
> ,but they are fairly confident that the State Department will not go
after
> them and will not even bother to open the books or translate them, which
> they
> have not done at all."
>
> And when a new president enters the White House in January, the
agreement
> will
> likely be forgotten, she said.
>
> Ms. Shea believes Americans give Saudi Arabia an easy ride because of
> their
> country's dependence on foreign oil.
>
> "Oil independence is really im****tant for this reason. Because it's
going
> to
> be very hard for the Saudis to change."
>
> Officials at the Saudi embassy in Wa****ngton, D.C., declined to comment.
>
> National Post
>
> clewis@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>
>
>
> 2008 Canwest Interactive, a division of Canwest Publi****ng Inc.
>
The "religion of peace", an Orwellian misnomer if there EVER was
one.
|
