When it comes to fisking bird-brained BS about the Pope and his much maligned challenge to the Islamic world to enter into some semblance of rational dialogue, well, nobody does it better than Omri.
And while we're on the subject of the Arab News and the right men for the job, don't miss this lament about a recent trick the authorities at the Aziziya Water Distribution Center in Jedda, Saudi Arabia, have adopted to protect precious water deliveries from pilfering: requiring women to sit shotgun in the delivery truck. I kid you not. To assure that the cargo isn't hijacked or sold by the driver en route to someone else at an inflated price, women who come to Aziziya to purchase water for their families are being told to hitch up their abbayas and climb into the cab. Never mind that these women aren't technically permitted to be alone with any man other than their legal guardian (i.e., father, brother, husband). Or that they risk accusations of adultery by doing so.
It would be rational to assume that, prior to this incident, no one here could have foreseen women getting into the passenger seats of cars driven by men who were not their legal guardians, leave alone into the cabins of industrial trucks, without being targeted by the religious police or, at the very least, severely chastised and rebuked by the male members of their families. But that’s what necessity does. It dictates situations otherwise seemingly unimaginable.
And where were all the men who are supposed to be the self-imposed guardians and protectors of these women? Why weren’t they the ones taking it upon themselves to provide water for their households? Isn’t it a tad ironic that so many of them insist on exercising their authority over their womenfolk when it comes to issues of education, employment et al but when it comes to the boring and monotonous chore of queuing up for water, they give them license to fend for themselves?
Ironic? Well, yeah. Many times, the right man for the job is a woman. But probably not in this case. What were they thinking?
