Princess: Stepping Out of the Shadows, стр. 27
‘Minefields?’ Tahani said with alarm. ‘What minefields?’
Once more our Tahani had amused us in the midst of a very serious discussion.
All knew that we would re-enter this same conversation later, but for now we were happy women, waiting for good things to come into our lives.
‘We all have great expectations,’ Sara said in her sweet voice.
‘At least we can safely discuss our expectations,’ I reminded them all. Not so many years past, even when I was a child, such a conversation would have landed an adult woman in prison, with hands shackled around a concrete pillar. This had happened to women in my country. But I did not describe those tragic events now, as there was optimism in all our hearts and I did not wish to deflate the emotions of my sisters and daughters with sad stories.
After saying goodnight to those whom I love with my whole heart, I retired in a very happy frame of mind.
After settling in bed but before sleeping, my mind began spinning backwards through time. Images of my ancestors and ancient Arabia came once more into clear focus, like snapshots in a photo album. The pages flipped rapidly, yet all were illuminated. I saw infant girls being buried in the sand, adult women being stoned, girls and women beaten by their husbands and fathers. Then positive images began to overtake the negative, with smiling Saudi women working in important posts, travelling throughout the world, marrying men they love.
Then the pages stopped flipping in my mind and settled on a single image of two men bound together by blood and by history. I saw my grandfather Abdul Aziz embracing his grandson Muhammad. In that image, I gained an understanding. With that picture imprinted in my mind, I knew that the circle of life, from the time of ancient Arabia to the modern day, was nearly complete.
Would I, Princess Sultana al-Sa’ud, live to say that Saudi women had gone from being the most abused women on earth to the happiest?
This is my wish and my prayer.
For a better tomorrow.
Chapter Four
The Heart of Evil
AN ODE TO Bashir Assad, current president of Syria:
An unjust ruler asked a holy man, ‘What is more excellent than prayer?’
The holy man replied, ‘For you to remain asleep until midday, that for this one interval you may not afflict mankind.’
– The Gulistan of Saadi (The Rose Garden),
Saadi Shirazi, 1258
The countries of Iraq, Syria and Iran are so powerful, and so near.
Of all the neighbours of Saudi Arabia, these three nations rank as the most threatening, intimidating their own citizens while menacing the general stability of the area. Most agree that political rivalry, combined with military competition, emanates from the leaders of these three nations rather than from the people, who are, for the most part, simply ordinary citizens pursuing peace and prosperity.
Most of those who have ruled these lands are more alike than they are different. The majority of them have begun their reign with buoyant promises of greater freedoms before quickly emerging as the natural enemies of their own people. This pattern of promises made and never kept has become familiar, with Saddam Hussein in Iraq, the Assads in Syria (father Hafez and now son Bashir), and Ayatollah Khomeini – followed by other equally ruthless ayatollahs – in Iran.
I am reflecting on each of these countries in turn and sense the desperate vulnerability of those who have been born in Iraq, Syria and Iran.
In Iraq, for example, the lack of ethnic unity has brought recurring strife, and that country’s history, from ancient days to the present, has been a chronicle of anarchy. How many inhabitants of Iraq can hope to live a normal, productive life under the dangerous dagger of continuous war? None. No one has reliable figures relating to the number of Iraqis who were murdered after Saddam Hussein assumed power in that country in July 1979, ruling for approximately twenty-four years until 9 April 2003. This period of tyranny was followed by deaths brought about by the American invasion in April 2003 and throughout the occupation. The figures quoted from various organizations are staggering and range from a total of 500,000 to 750,000 Iraqis who died as a result of Saddam’s Ba’athist regime, combined with the American invasion and occupation, which ended on 18 December 2011.
In Syria, the despot Bashir Assad, and those who opposed his dictatorship, have fought each other to a common ruin. Rare is the Syrian who has dodged the precipice of personal tragedy during one of the most violent and costly civil wars in modern history. The approximate death toll resulting from that country’s ongoing revolution is now estimated to be between 350,000 and 500,000, with new fatalities added each day that the revolution continues. So many cities, towns and villages have been obliterated by the almost continuous and horrendous bombardment. It is hard to imagine the terror felt by the inhabitants – men, women and children – who have little or no hope of escape.
In Iran, the ayatollahs are like bullies, with deadly plans lurking beneath the surface – never so happy as when stirring controversy and seeking out someone with whom to quarrel. There have been ceaseless attacks upon their own citizens for the most mundane of crimes since the beginning of the current regime in 1979, when the Shah was deposed and the ayatollahs assumed control. Although extremely top-secret information so carefully guarded by the Iranian government makes it a formidable task to uncover exact figures of ‘death by Ayatollah’, the acts of violence have been unprecedented in Iranian history, according to historians and organizations who closely follow the massive number of human-rights violations there.
As far as other nations in the neighbourhood are concerned, since the coup