Saudi reforms: reading, writing, and tolerance

The pages of the Islamist Internet website scroll across the screen, showing street maps of this capital city, and issuing protest instructions.

This call to arms by Saudi hard-liners is to protest the merger of the women's education department with the Education Ministry, which previously managed only men's education. The merger was ordered by King Fahd, after 15 schoolgirls died in a fire in Mecca last March.

In a flurry of unsubstantiated rumors that sparked a public outcry, uncompromising religious police were said to have added to the death toll by preventing immodestly dressed girls – who left their black abayas in the burning building – from escaping.

The tussle is a sign of how the ruling family – a staunch ally of the US – is trying to moderate religious hardliners, who exert strong influence over the education and justice systems. Officials say they are trying to invest the antiquated education system – charged with perpetrating hatred of Jews and Christians – with tolerance and critical thinking.

But the Internet gives voice to other views. The website calls for activists to visit the house of the mufti in Riyadh during the afternoon prayer time, then move their protest to the house of the chief justice during sunset prayers, "to remind them to reject the merger of women's and men's education."

"I don't want to exaggerate their numbers," says Jamal Kashoggi, deputy editor of the English-language Arab News, based in Jeddah, who surfs such websites daily. "Our hard-liners ... are not visible, and have hardly any newspapers or magazines. But they still play an important role in education and the judiciary."

That influence, Saudi educators say, has meant a curriculum that uses some intolerant texts – some from the Islamic holy book, the Koran – that one US official calls "objectionable."

Other critics charge that young Saudis are taught a harsh worldview based on an extreme Salafi strain of Islam, which is the ideological cousin of Al Qaeda and Taliban thinking. That worldview holds that Muslims are waging a clash-of-civilizations-type war against crusaders and Jews – the same words used by Osama bin Laden – and must return to the pure religious life exhibited by the prophet Muhammad 13 centuries ago.

Koranic verses taught here include this one, according to a Saudi official: "O you who believe! Take not the Jews and Christians as friends/protectors, they are but friends/protectors of each other. And if any amongst you takes them [as friends], then surely he is one of them."

But Saudi officials argue that such Koranic quoteshave been plucked out of context by the Western press.

"We see Islam as a way of life, so we can give our students meaning based on religious values, to direct our children to behave in a certain way," says Khalid al-Awwad, the well-tailored, Western-trained deputy education minister. "We are a unique society – we have the Islamic holy places here. We should be an example of behavior for all Muslims."

Deputy Minister Awwad says that schools should teach broadly, without concern for politics. He says the Koranic quote is taught in its historical framework, particular to its own era. He points to one counter-balancing example, also from the Koran, which he says is also taught in Saudi schools. "Allah does not forbid you to deal justly and kindly with those who fought not against you on account of religion," the verse reads. "Allah loves those who deal with equity."

"When you see it in this context, it is clear," Awwad says of the education system here. "Tolerance is the key."

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