On July 15, Human Rights Watch issued a report on the condition of Foreign workers in Saudi Arabia. The revelation that "Guest Workers" are systematically abused in Saudi Arabia should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with that region's history. What a shame that it took Sarah Whitson, executive director of HRW's Middle East and North Africa Division, to finally speak the unpalatable truth. "We found men and women in conditions resembling slavery," said Whitson in the press conference announcing their findings. The report described "the pervasive abuses foreign workers endure...the abysmal and exploitative labor conditions many workers face, and the utter failure of the justice system to provide redress." The real question is this - why did the Islamic world not uncover these human rights abuses, so close to the holy city of Mecca?

Based on interviews taken in Bangladesh, India and the Philippines, HRW found abysmal and exploitative labor practices, wanton rape of women workers, and beheading of guest workers accused of crimes without proper legal process. Anyone who has visited Saudi Arabia knows the racism with which many ordinary Saudis treats the brown and black-skinned masses that come for Hajj. Like hundreds of Bangladeshis every year, my parents endured these indignities during their recent pilgrimage. When he returned from Mecca, my father told me, "To them, we will always be miskeen (beggar). Doesn't matter what we do, or where we come from. They see our skin and don't need to see more." If this is how pilgrims are treated, imagine how much worse is the plight of the "Guest Worker". Yet, we Muslims remain silent on these abuses - after all the Saudis are the keepers of Islam's holiest site, so they cannot possibly be racist!

How appropriate as well that HRW used the phrase "slavery" to describe conditions inside the desert kingdom. Saudi Arabia was in fact one of the last nation-states to abolish slavery. Along with Yemen, the Saudis only abolished slavery in 1962. Prior to that, the Islamic world's experience with slavery was extremely problematic. Muslims once led the rest of the world in science, culture and human emancipation. The positive examples are numerous and often-repeated. However, the advances brought about in the early days of the Islamic Caliphate ossified, with very little innovation or re-interpretation in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Although slavery and the taking of concubines was legal in the Islamic world, in practice it was far milder than that practiced in nineteenth century North and South America. Henri Dunant, the Swiss founder of the Red Cross, visited North Africa in 1860 and commented on the "relative mildness" of the slavery practiced there. As compared to ancient Rome and modern colonial systems, Islam gave the slave a certain legal status and the slave-owner also had obligations (as well as rights).

The Islamic world started off by giving more rights to slaves than in the European colonies, but as with many other areas, these progressive positions did not keep up with changing times. By the early nineteenth century, Britain, under pressure from domestic abolitionists, had abolished slavery in its colonies. Slave-trading was declared an "international crime" and traders were to be punished wherever they were encountered. With this newly liberal outlook, the British Empire soon came into conflict with the Ottoman Empire's practice of slavery.

The Persians initially rejected the British push for emancipation of slaves in 1846, but eventually a compromise agreement was reached. Over in the Ottoman Empire, an 1830 ferman freed all Christian slaves who had not converted. Oddly, slaves who had converted to Islam were not freed (perhaps due to the British focus on Christian slaves). Finally, in 1857, again under British pressure, a second ferman was issued banning trafficking in black slaves throughout the Empire, with special exception for the Hijaz.

There was also, by now, internal pressure to reform slavery in the Islamic world. The Bey of Tunis announced in 1846 that every black slave who asked for it would receive a "deed of enfranchisement." In his announcement, he also noted that Muslim jurists were divided about the legal basis for slavery. One noted anti-slavery advocate was Moroccan writer Ahmad Khalid al-Nasiri, who accepted the legality of slavery under Muslim law, but vigorously protested its application. He wrote in the 1800's, condemning "the unlimited enslavement of the blacks and the importation of many droves of them every year, for sale in the town and country markets of the Maghrib, where men traffic in them like beasts, or worse." (Bernard Lewis, quoting Kitab al-Istiqsa, Casablanca, 1955)

The unpalatable truth is that, the Ottoman and Persian empires were one of the last to abolish slavery, falling far behind their European counterparts in matters of human emancipation. Full abolition of slavery did not come until the twentieth century, with Saudi Arabia holding out until 1962. Given that desert kingdom's shameful record on this basic human right, it was no surprise to read Human Rights Watch's report and find that today's migrant workers are kept in conditions of "near-slavery."

The Muslim world is sliding backwards into medievalism, and it is time for reformers to speak openly and bravely. There is a cancer that is eating away at our soul - a disease marked by paranoia, double standards and virulent racism. While we are in full-throated cry against abuses in Iraq and Palestine, we stay completely silent when it is Muslims who are the abusers (of both non-Muslims and Muslims). How else to explain our outpouring of sympathy for the Bosnian genocide, but our complete silence on the ongoing genocide in Sudan? In that country's civil war between the Arab Muslim North, and the Black Christian and Animist South, 2 million people have been killed to date.

In a BBC profile (June 10, '04) of the hundreds of Black Africans who have been raped by pro-government Janjaweed Arab militia, one victim described the attackers: "They called me Abeid (slave in Arabic)." A UN resolution on the Sudan crisis was blocked by China and the two Muslim nations with Security Council seats - Pakistan and Algeria.

Saudi Arabia, Sudan - the list goes on. Shame on the Muslim world for staying silent!

I am amazed at the silence of Muslims when it come to Muslim oppresion. We have to take a stand against what is evil even if it is in our own family.

The anger many Muslims feel needs to be directed at countries like Saudia Arabia so they can be reformed and their double standards exposed clearly to the world.

How can we Muslims speak of human rights to others when it is not practised by nations claiming to represent the Muslim faith.

>I am amazed at the silence of Muslims when it come to Muslim oppresion.<

>How can we Muslims speak of human rights to others when it is not practised by nations claiming to represent the Muslim faith.<

Speak for yourself, we all knew long before the Saudis became public enemy number 1 whats goes on in the gulf arab states. Kuwait is far far worse, but the media will not focus on them because they're an American protectorate. The Saudis have actually gotten better since the economy started suffering from the fall out of Gulf War 1. Seems the Saudis are now learning the folly of their past mistakes.
Its also revealing that the author of this piece is attempting to blur the clear cut distinction between Muslims and non-Muslims by supporting the Ahmedi cult. If you believe they're Muslims, so are Farakhanis, Submittors, khairjites, Nation of Gods and earth and just about any other cult which has nothing to do with Islam.

Dear DrDriveBy,
You wrote: "the author of this piece is attempting to blur the clear cut distinction between Muslims and non-Muslims by supporting the Ahmedi cult"

Have you seen the film? I suspect not.

I defend the Ahmadi sect's right to free expression, and freedom from persecution. I don't "support" their views, I support their rights to express them.

It's called free speech. Heard of it?

Don't forget, it's not just Sudan. Our Muslim brothers (light-skinned Northern Arabs) are slaughtering, raping and enslaving the Christian south (black skinned Africans). Racism and religious hatred.

The UN resolution on Sudan was blocked by China, and the 2 Muslim nations on Security Council-- Pakistan & Algeria. Hey, where's the ummah now?

Dr Drive By wrote:
>"Kuwait is far far worse, but the media will not focus on them because they're an American protectorate."

Uh..Saudi Arabia is not an American protectorate? Suggest you check the following book:

House of Bush, House of Saud: The Secret Relationship Between the World's Two Most Powerful Dynasties
by Craig Unger
Buy on Amazon

Amazon review: As Unger claims in this incisive study, the seeds for the "Age of Terrorism" and September 11 were planted nearly 30 years ago in what, at the time, appeared to be savvy business transactions that subsequently translated into political currency and the union between the Saudi royal family and the extended political family of George H. W. Bush. On the surface, the claim may appear to be politically driven, but as Unger (a respected investigative journalist and editor) probes--with scores of documents and sources--the political tenor of the U.S. over the last 30 years, the Iran-Iraq War, the war in Afghanistan, the birth of Al Qaeda, the dubious connection between members of the Saudi Royal family and the exportation of terror, and the personal fortunes amassed by the Bush family from companies such as Harken Energy and the Carlyle Group, he exposes the "brilliantly hidden agendas and purposefully murky corporate relationships" between these astonishingly powerful families." --Silvana Tropea

Reader Comment: A reader (Sherman Oaks, CA United States)
Because it looks at a KNOWN FACT and breaks it down for the average American. For the record, I am a Republican. In the eyes of some who gave this book 1 star, I might be termed a RINO. I voted for Ronald Reagan and George Bush Sr. I did NOT, however, vote for George Dubya Bush. Why? I don't like idiots. I don't like people who pander. I didn't like Bill Clinton for the same reasons. Why is it when the facts, which are clearly laid out brilliantly in this book, are always assailed by the FAR RIGHT WACKOS in my party? They complain about the PUBLIC SCHOOLS turning out idiots, but I wonder if people in my own party can even criticize it anymore?!?!? READ THIS BOOK. IT OPENS SOME EYES. I, FOR ONE, CAN LIVE WITH JOHN KERRY AS PRESIDENT. SINCE MCCAIN WON'T RUN, MAYBE WE CAN SEE IN 2008.

Dr Drive By wrote:
>The Saudis have actually gotten better since the economy started suffering from the fall out of Gulf War 1.

Here is an example of "getting better", from 2003, 10 years after Gulf War 1, from the Human Rights Watch Report:

"Fatima, a twenty-six-year-old Muslim woman from Mindanao province in the Philippines.Ü When she traveled to Saudi Arabia in February 2003 on a two-year contract as a domestic worker, she left behind her husband and four children, aged two to nine years old.

Fatima was not allowed to leave the house.Ü Her male employer demanded her passport when he met her at the airport, and she was never provided with an iqama, the official residence permit that would have allowed her the freedom to move freely without the fear of arrest.Ü

Fatima told Human Rights Watch that her employers said it was haram (forbidden) for her to talk to the familyÌs Indian driver.

In addition to her long days of work, Fatima endured the shock and humiliation of three serious incidents of sexual harassment and one beating from her male employer. She told Human Rights Watch that twice he exposed himself to her and offered to pay her if she masturbated him.Ü ÏI refused. I told him that I want money in the right way.Ü I told him I am not a prostitute, but a married woman and a Muslim,Ó she said.Ü After these rejections, Ïhe held a knife to my neck and threatened to kill me if I told the madame [his wife].ÓÜ Fatima provided details about the last and most traumatic incident, on a day etched in her memory: June 8, 2003:

I was mopping the floor in the salon. He came in and asked for water.Ü When I gave it to him, he dropped it on the floor and told me to clean it up. ÜThen he took off his thobe and said to me, ÏTake this.ÓÜ It was his penis.Ü He told me, ÏItÌs good, I want to marry you, I love you, I want to support your children.Ó

I said no.Ü I said IÌm a Muslim and it is haram.Ü I left and ran upstairs. He came after me, saying it was not haram.Ü He closed all the doors and punched and beat me. He said: ÏDonÌt push me to do something bad.Ó

He locked the door to her bedroom before he left the house. Fatima sought shelter in her bathroom and locked the door.Ü ÏI was praying, and crying, and stayed there all night,Ó she said.

>Have you seen the film? I suspect not.<

I dont need to see it, I've studied Ahmedi literature for over a decade to know what they really are. Go study their beliefs in detail before defending them like some brain dead liberal apologist. Only an ignorant Muslims or an Ahmedi would defend these hypocrites.

>It's called free speech. Heard of it?<

Fraud is not free speech, Ever heard of freedom from defamation and false advertising ?

>Uh..Saudi Arabia is not an American protectorate? Suggest you check the following book:<

The average Saudi is not a pro-American lapdog unlike Kuwaitis. Obviously you view the citizens and the royal family as one. Saudi Arabia is now being demonized to the max to build a bipartisan consensus to invade the kingdom in the future. Having lived in Saudi Arabia for a significant period of time I know of this first hand.
Craig Unger's (from Faren-hype 911) book is nothing new or groundbreaking, yet another anti-saudi tract from the liberal side of the Neocon mafia. Its laughable that not one of these liars have the intellectual fortitude to acknowledge the invisible elephant in the room known as Israel.
AS far as human rights watch and its reports, I say to blazes with them...where were they at the height of Saudi abuses in the 1980s ? The timing speaks for itself.
Citing a rape to base your opinion on the entire country shows your own twisted logic and irrationality, a quality which is no shortage amongst extremists on both ends of the American political spectrum.

I noticed theres no report by HRW on Qatar and Kuwait....interesting indeed.

Their is no need for personal attacks DrDriveBy.

After all we are all Muslims.

Dr. DriveBy wrote:
>>Have you seen the film?

>I dont need to see it

"I don't need to see it to condemn it."

This is not a response that befits a logical, open-minded Muslim.

This is how the mullahcracy in Iran, the Wahhabists in Saudi Arabia, the Maudoodis in Pakistan and the Jamaat e Islami in Bangladesh have spread their roots.

When a reward was announced for author Taslima Nasrin's head in the 1980s, many of the Jamaat (Bangladesh) members were asked how they were doing this when copies of LAJJA (Shame), the book in question, were not available in BD easily. They replied, "We don't need to read it."

What happened to Islam's spirit of inquiry, reason, logic and bahas (debate)?

If Muslims now feel that they don't need to read anything to debate it, or they can condemn things sight unseen, we are in the dark ages of jahiliya.

DrDriveBy wrote:
>I noticed theres no report by HRW on Qatar and Kuwait....interesting indeed.

Type Kuwait or Qatar in the Search Box of HRW.Org and you get many pages of results:

1. Kuwait Results

2. Qatar Results

DrDriveBY wrote:
>yet another anti-saudi tract from the liberal side of the Neocon mafia

NeoCon= Neo-Conservative

You meant to write "Liberal Mafia".

Dakota Wrote:
>Their is no need for personal attacks DrDriveBy. After all we are all Muslims.

No, I don't think I should have to appeal to that in order to get a civil debate from DriveBy. The Prophet (pbuh) showed us the way. He treated in a civil manner Christians, Jews, and other non-Muslims during his era. In fact, it is widely documented that the least amount of abuses against Jews happened during the Muslim expansionist period (vs. horrific abuse during Christian expansion).

So we should treat all people fairly and kindly, regardless of what religion they are. Our kindness/concern/sympathy should not be limited to only Muslims.

A Muslim is also a Humanist. It is not enough to speak out for Iraq, Palestine and Bosnia, we must also speak out for Rwanda, Sudan and Myanmar.

This is deep stuff, I feel for that muslimah that experienced that dv.

>This is not a response that befits a logical, open-minded Muslim.<

Have you ever read a shred of ahmedi literature ? I have, and that leaves no doubt that they are outside the fold of Islam. Instead of playing devil's advocate go do your homework. How open-minded is it defend munafiiqs ?

>What happened to Islam's spirit of inquiry, reason, logic and bahas (debate)?<

Oh its there, and its very clear on the subject of attacks on the Prophets of Allah, Whats truly illogical is how people like you defend those you have no knowledge of. If you were interested in "the spirit of inquery" you'd do some real fact finding wouldnt you. Bringing up a serial liar like Nasrin who called al-Quran and a backward outdated book in need of updating, that may have had something to do with the outrage of brothers in Bangladesh.. Nasrin is a typical anti-Muslim charlatan in Nora Khori fashion. Its become quite the method for munafiqs to get a shot at free publicity and stardom in the west by deliberetly attacking Islam and its instituations.

>Their is no need for personal attacks DrDriveBy.

After all we are all Muslims.<

What attacks ? Defending such blatant ignorance is detrimental to all Muslims. A true form of jaheeliyah supporting those who are against and outside the fold of deen.

>NeoCon= Neo-Conservative

You meant to write "Liberal Mafia".<

No buddy, I meant it exactly as I typed it. Neoconservatives are mostly former liberals (and still socially liberal), and they have many democrats in their club of gangsters. If you think these neocons are just a bunch of right wing extremists you'd got a lot of reading to catch up on.

>A Muslim is also a Humanist.<

Wrong again, humanism derives the goals of life from human need and interest rather than from theological abstractions, ie athiesm. And Muslims are not athiests, not counting those of us who've made our nafs our lord.

You are right Naeem. Thank you for correcting me. We should treat everybody with dignity.

May Allah give us guidance.

And may we accept his guidance.

DrDriveBy wrote:
>Have you ever read a shred of ahmedi literature ?

Yes, I have. I've read lots of it actually (in Bengali).

Let me repeat myself (as I did in my original post). I don't agree with their beliefs (I'm Sunni), but I defend their right to express those beliefs, and I oppose Bangladesh Government's ban on their books. I'm for free speech, even speech that I (or you) may disagree with.

Now as I pointed out before, YOU haven't seen the film. So I believe you need to do (to borrow your quaint phrase) your homework. I'm happy to mail you a copy of the film.

DrDriveBY wrote:
>Nasrin is a typical anti-Muslim charlatan in Nora Khori fashion.

Nasrim may be an anti-Muslim charlatan (and yes, I believe she is), but she still has the right to free expression. The fatwa on her head is immoral and illegal.

DriveByShooting wrote, in various posts, writes:
>Speak for yourself, we all knew...
>I dont need to see it...
>brain dead liberal apologist...
>ignorant Muslims...
>these liars...
>As far as human rights watch and its reports, I say to blazes with them...
>your own twisted logic and irrationality...
>truly illogical...
>serial liar...

Bottomline:

1. Anyone who disagrees with DriveByShooting is:
- brain dead
- ignorant
- liar
- twisted
- irrational
- illogical

2. When asked to watch the film in question (MUSLIMS OR HERETICS?), before giving opinion, he replies:
"I dont need to see it"

3. When asked to read/study the HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH report in question, he replies:
"I say to blazes with them"