Saudi Women to Religious Police: Out of Our Face!!

Suddenly, Saudi women are fighting back.

Check out an incredible story about how two women brazenly pepper-sprayed two Saudi religious policemen (from the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice), in the Saudi-owned daily newspaper Asharq al-Awsat (hat tip to The Arabist). The incident occurred on Sept. 20 in the Eastern Province city of al-Khobar.

In a nutshell:

The two commission members approached the girls in order to "politely" advise and guide them regarding their inappropriate clothing. Consequently, the two girls started verbally abusing the commission members, which then led to one of the girls pepper-spraying them in the face as the other girl filmed the incident on her mobile phone, while continuing to hurl insults at them.

HQ in Riyadh of the Saudi religious police

A week earlier, Saudi human rights journalist Ebtihal Mubarak wrote in Arab News about how a group of Saudi women are petitioning King Abdullah for the right to drive cars. It's evidently the first such move organized by Saudi women since the famous protest in 1990, when 47 women were arrested for driving cars around Riyadh in an astonishing act of civil disobedience. King Abdullah once signalled his readiness to consider women driving, but his brother the influential Interior Minister Prince Naif opposes the debate on the issue.

For more, check out my recent posts on the religious police and Saudi women.

--By Scott MacLeod/Cairo