Every Man in This Village Is a Liar_ An Education in War - Megan K. Stack [69]
Fatima and her children have been languishing in prison for the past three and a half months. Her crime: She wanted to live with Mansour, her husband and father of her two children.
A Saudi court had forcefully separated them. Fatima is free to leave jail if she is ready to return to her family, and not her now ex-husband.
It was her brothers who initiated a lawsuit demanding the couple’s marriage be nullified on the grounds that they were incompatible on tribal grounds.
Fatima refuses to leave the prison or go to a shelter home for fear of retaliation from her brothers, who are her legal guardians since their father’s death.
Or:
According to the allegations, the daughter, now 22, has been a victim of her father’s deviant sexual behavior since she was three. She claims her father raped her when she was 13 …
There is no specific sentence for sexual assault, so it is up to the judge’s discretion and opinion … There are no laws in place that automatically revoke a father’s custody of children—even if the father turns out to be an incestuous rapist.
The word woman is not popular in Saudi Arabia. The going term is lady. I heard a lot about ladies from Saudi officials. They talked themselves into knots, trying to depict a moderate, misunderstood kingdom, bemoaning stereotypes in the Western press: Women banned from driving? Well, they don’t want to drive anyway. They all have drivers, and why would a lady want to mess with parking? The religious police who stalk the streets and shopping centers, beating “Islamic values” into the populace? Oh, Saudi officials scoff, they aren’t strict or powerful. You hear stories to the contrary? Sensationalistic exaggerations, perpetuated by outsiders who don’t understand Saudi Arabia.
On a morning when glaring sun blotted everything to white and hot spring winds raced off the desert, I stood outside a Riyadh bank, waiting for a friend. The sidewalk was simmering and I sweated in my black cloak, but I couldn’t enter the men’s section of the bank to fetch him. Traffic screamed past on a nearby highway, and I wobbled when wind spread my polyester robe like the wings of a kite.
The door clattered open and I looked up hopefully. No, just a security guard—stomping my way and yelling in Arabic. He didn’t want me standing there, I gathered. I took off my sunglasses, stared blankly, and finally turned my face away.
He retreated, only to reemerge with another security guard. This second guard looked like a pit bull—short, stocky, and all flashing teeth as he barked: “Go! Go! You can’t stand here! The men can see! The men can see!”
“Where do you want me to go? I have to wait for my friend. He’s inside.” But he held his ground, arms akimbo, snarling and flashing those teeth.
“Not here. NOT HERE! The men can see you!”
I lost my temper.
“I’m just standing here!” I growled. “Leave me alone!” This was a slip. In a land ruled by male ego, yelling at a man only deepens a crisis.
The pit bull advanced, lips curled, pushing the air with little shooing motions. Involuntarily, I stepped back and found myself in prickly shrubbery. In the bushes, I was out of view of the window; the virtue of all those innocent male bankers was unbesmirched. Satisfied, the pit bull climbed back onto the sidewalk and stood guard over me. I glared at him. He showed his teeth. Finally, my friend reemerged.
A liberal, U.S.-educated professor at King Saud University, he was sure to share my outrage, I thought. Maybe he’d even call up the bank—his friend was the manager—and get the pit bull into trouble. I spilled my story, words hot as the pavement.
He hardly blinked.
“Yes,” he said. “Oh.” He put the car in