[ New York Sun] Eli Lake - A new study from the Center for Religious Freedom at the Hudson Institute finds that Saudi textbooks are filled with the austere supremacism of the Wahhabi sect of Islam, despite promises from the kingdom in 2006 to alter them. Jews, Christians, and non-Wahhabi Sunni Muslims are described in many of the textbooks as enemies of the true faith and infidels. The report coincides with a conference the Saudi monarch is sponsoring in Madrid, at which he appeared to want reconciliation between the clerics of the Muslim world and their counterparts among Christians and Jews. Nearly two years ago, the State Department waived a series of sanctions suggested under the International Religious Freedom Act after America and Saudi Arabia came to an arrangement whereby Riyadh promised to excise the intolerance of their textbooks by the start of the fall 2008 school year. The director of the Center for Religious Freedom, Nina Shea, said the State Department should consider sanctions against Saudi Arabia.
2008-07-22 01:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive