By Geoffrey

Do you recall the public outcry in the West when several years ago, a young American man was sentenced to a public whipping for dealing drugs in Singapore?  I do.  The impression that incident left was to some degree, indelible.  Drug dealing and the damage it causes to society is horrendous and insidious.  Public whipping is inhumane and barbaric. 

Today, we are offered another window into the dark ages.  There seems to be a cavernous recess in the mind where we store the raw materials we use to justify our acts of inhumanity to our fellows.  There seems no end to our capacity for brutality, barbarity or madness.

Take for example, the story of these two young women:

The first is that of Fawza Falih.  She is an illiterate woman who on June 17th of 2007, was sentenced to death by beheading in Saudi Arabia because a man had accused her of making him impotent.  The charge was “witchcraft”.  Twenty prominent religious leaders from more than a dozen faiths are trying to stop her execution and a major international human rights organization has called the conviction of Fawza Falih, “A travesty of justice.  “As is common with women under such circumstances, she appears a victim of systematic and multiple violations of due process and fair trial rights including arbitrary arrest and torture. Women already suffer severe restrictions on daily life in Saudi Arabia and cannot appear before a judge without a male representative. According to information posted on the Human Rights Watch website, human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia are often ignored by United States officials. ““Religious leaders, including Muslims, Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, Native Americans and other faith traditions, have written a letter with an attached petition, signed by more than 2,700 additional clergy and individuals, to the Saudi King  pleading for Fawza Falih’s release. Asking for mercy and compassion, the letter points out that , "In the seventh chapter of the Qur'an it is God who tells us 'My mercy encompasses all,' a mercy which bestows profound peace and infinite love. Is it not the principle of divine compassion that rules the heart in Islam?"

 The petition to save Fawza Falih's life is available online.

 http://www.petitiononline.com/AIDFAWZA/petition.html

Rizana Nafeek:  The second story is that of a Sri Lankan teenage girl who has also been sentenced to death by beheading in Saudi Arabia. Her name is Rizana Nafeek, now a teenager of 19, awaiting her encounter with an executioner.  She was born to a poor Muslim family on the East Coast of Sri Lanka. She is the eldest of a family of 4 children. Her father was driven from his woodcutting job in the forest by the rebel forces in Sri Lanka's civil war. The only solution the family could find was to falsify her birth certificate and send her to work as a housemaid in Saudi Arabia.  She worked there for a family of 10 children from 4.00 AM until midnight. She also had to bottle feed a 4-month old baby though she had absolutely no training in how to do so. While feeding the baby, it choked on the milk and died.  Rizana was handed (as a 17 year old) to the police and charged with murdering the baby. She did not understand Arabic yet was interrogated in it and forced to sign a confession in it.  She was tried without legal help and she was convicted of murder and is now awaiting her execution. 

Save Rizana from Beheading

(Video) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3W0ycles2Oo

 Make no mistake.  There is no country in the world where grave injustice and unimaginable brutality do not occur on a daily basis.  The real question is, “What should we do about it?”  Absent our gut reactions, a call upon our baser instincts, the answer seems to be; we should communicate about it.  What do you think? If you feel you’d like to do something about this, you may send a courteous letter (if you want it to be read) to the King of Saudi Arabia:

The Custodian of the two Holy Mosques

Office of His Majesty the King

King Abdullah Bin 'Abdul 'Aziz Al-Saud

Royal Court, Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

Fax: (via Ministry of the Interior)

+966 1 403 1185

For those of you who have strong stomachs and want to know precisely how a beheading occurs in Saudi Arabia, read on.  For those of you who find it too upsetting, stop reading here.

DON'T READ IF YOU ARE SQUEAMISH:  The beheading .....

Fawza Falih, on some bright and sunny morning not known to her in advance, will be given a strong tranquilizer.  

Thus subdued, she will be escorted by the police into a van and taken out to a public place like a park, or a square or a parking lot.  

After midday prayers are finished, her eyes will be covered.  She will be blindfolded.  

A large sheet of plastic will be stretched out on the ground and the woman, shackled and barefoot with her hands tied behind her back will be led to the center of the plastic sheet and made to kneel facing the Holy City of Mecca.  

The executioner, after warming up with mighty sword swings in the air will jab her in the back to cause her to jerk her head upward and at that moment, with one swift stroke of his huge scimitar, he will separate her head from her body.  

The attending physician then will sew the head back onto her body and she will be transported to rest in an unmarked grave in the prison cemetery.  And justice will have been served?

Geoffrey