The Destruction of Mecca by Wahabi / Salafi Saudi Kings with Hate of History of Islam.

OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR By ZIAUDDIN SARDAR

SEPTEMBER 30, 2014

WHEN Malcolm X visited Mecca in 1964, he was enchanted. He found the city “as ancient as time  itself,” and wrote that the partly constructed extension to the Sacred Mosque “will surpass the  architectural beauty of India’s Taj Mahal.”

Fifty years on, no one could possibly describe Mecca as ancient, or associate beauty with Islam’s holiest city.

Pilgrims performing the hajj this week will search in vain for Mecca’s history. The dominant architectural site in the city is not the Sacred Mosque, where the Kaaba, the symbolic focus of Muslims everywhere, is.

 It is the obnoxious Makkah Royal Clock Tower hotel, which, at 1,972 feet, is among the world’s tallest buildings. 

Islamic Historic Sites Destroyed in Mecca 

Old Map Mecca and with Marking for historic Sites 

It is part of a mammoth development of skyscrapers that includes luxury shopping malls and hotels catering to the superrich. The skyline is no longer dominated by the rugged outline of encircling peaks. Ancient mountains have been flattened. 

The city is now surrounded by the brutalism of rectangular steel and concrete structures — an amalgam of Disneyland and Las Vegas. The “guardians” of the Holy City, the rulers of
Saudi Arabia and the clerics, have a deep hatred of history. They want everything to look brand-new. 

Meanwhile, the sites are expanding to accommodate the rising number of pilgrims, up to almost three million today from 200,000 in the 1960s.

The initial phase of Mecca’s destruction began in the mid-1970s, and I was there to witness it. Innumerable ancient buildings, including the Bilal mosque, dating from the time of the Prophet Muhammad, were bulldozed.

 The old Ottoman houses, with their elegant mashrabiyas — latticework
windows — and elaborately carved doors, were replaced with hideous modern ones. Within a few years, Mecca was transformed into a “modern” city with large multilane roads, spaghetti junctions, gaudy hotels and shopping malls.

The few remaining buildings and sites of religious and cultural significance were erased more recently. 

The Makkah Royal Clock Tower, completed in 2012, was built on the graves of an estimated 400 sites of cultural and historical significance, including the city’s few remaining millennium-old buildings.

Bulldozers arrived in the middle of the night, displacing families that had lived there for centuries.
The complex stands on top of Ajyad Fortress, built around 1780, to protect
Mecca from bandits and invaders. 

The house of Khadijah, the first wife of the Prophet Muhammad, has been turned into a block of toilets. The Makkah Hilton is built over the house of Abu Bakr, the closest companion of the
prophet and the first caliph. Apart from the Kaaba itself, only the inner core of the Sacred Mosque retains a fragment of history. 

It consists of intricately carved marble columns, adorned with calligraphy of the names of the prophet’s companions. Built by a succession of Ottoman sultans, the columns date from the early 16th century. And yet plans are afoot to demolish them, along with the whole of the interior of the Sacred Mosque, and to replace it with an ultramodern doughnut-shaped building.

The only other building of religious significance in the city is the house where the Prophet Muhammad lived.

During most of the Saudi era it was used first as a cattle market, then turned into a library, which is not open to the people. But even this is too much for the radical Saudi clerics

who have repeatedly called for its demolition. The clerics fear that, once inside, pilgrims would pray
to the prophet, rather than to God — an unpardonable sin. It is only a matter of time before it is razed and turned, probably, into a parking lot.

The cultural devastation of Mecca has radically transformed the city. Unlike Baghdad, Damascus and
Cairo, Mecca was never a great intellectual and cultural center of Islam. 

But it was always a pluralistic city where debate among different Muslim sects and schools of thought was not unusual. Now it has been reduced to a monolithic religious entity where only one, ahistoric, literal interpretation of Islam is permitted, and where all other sects, outside of the Salafist brand of Saudi Islam, are regarded as false. 

Indeed, zealots frequently threaten pilgrims of different sects. Last year, a group of Shiite pilgrims from Michigan were attacked with knives by extremists, and in August, a coalition of American Muslim groups wrote to the State Department asking for protection during this year’s hajj.

The erasure of Meccan history has had a tremendous impact on the hajj itself. The word “hajj” means effort. It is through the effort of traveling to Mecca, walking from one ritual site to another, finding and engaging with people from different cultures and sects, and soaking in the history of Islam that the pilgrims acquired knowledge as well as spiritual fulfillment.

Today, hajj is a packaged tour, where you move, tied to your group, from hotel to hotel, and seldom
encounter people of different cultures and ethnicities. Drained of history and religious and cultural plurality, hajj is no longer a transforming, once-in-a-lifetime spiritual experience. 

It has been reduced to a mundane exercise in rituals and shopping. Mecca is a microcosm of
the Muslim world. What happens to and in the city has a profound effect on Muslims everywhere. 

The spiritual heart of Islam is an ultramodern, monolithic enclave, where difference is not tolerated, history has no meaning, and consumerism is paramount.

It is hardly surprising then that literalism, and the murderous interpretations of Islam associated with it, have become so dominant in Muslim lands.

Ziauddin Sardar is the editor of the quarterly Critical Muslim and the author of “Mecca: The Sacred City.”

source: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/01/opinion/the-destruction-of-mecca.html?_r=0

Wahabi States of UAE and Saudia Appalling Human Rights and treatment of Pakistanis as Slaves.

By Amir Mughal 

How shameless these Citizens of Oil Rich Arab Sates [UAE, KUWAIT, QATAR, SAUDI ARABIA, OMAN, BAHRAIN] while their own countires 'enjoy' a dark record of Human Rights Abuses yet they HAVE the courage of writing letters to George W. Bush whose US Establishment supports regimes which should have been annexed and investigated by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, International Labour Organizations. Their rulers are indulged in every kind of luxury while Lebanon was burning not a single shopping centre and cinema was closed even for a single day in protest, they are the worst Rulers and their LOCAL CITIZENS are worse than their rulers, all day long cruising in HUMVEE and Four Wheelers with tinted class while expatriates particularly from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh faces worst working conditions and environment in the World. You can say that they are the worst amongst Racist Nations in the World.

Particularly when you go to their court their authorities will always favour their LOCAL no matter if the LOCAL [WATANI] is worst kind of offenders.

Ms Mira Al Hussein should know these facts about their state i.e UAE

KIDS AS CAMEL JOCKEYS:

QATAR: [Funny thing is that Qatar has US Military bases and enjoy excellent relations with the USA which is supposed to be a democratic entity]

There was no societal pattern of abuse of children, apart from the trafficked, juvenile camel jockeys (see Section 5, Trafficking).

The Women and Children Protection Committee of the Supreme Council for Family Affairs maintained a children's hotline called the Friendly Line for use by children. The system allowed both citizen and noncitizen children to call with questions and concerns ranging from school, health, and psychological problems to concerns about sexual harassment.

Trafficking in Persons

The law prohibits trafficking for persons; however, men and women were trafficked into situations of coerced labor, and male children were trafficked into the country to serve as jockeys in the camel races. In December, the Cabinet approved measures to ban the use of children as camel jockeys.

More than 100 children aged 4 to 15, mostly of Sudanese origin, were used as jockeys in camel races. Guardians and handlers, who often claimed to be parents, brought the children into the country and supervised their training. The boys lived in harsh conditions. They did not receive proper education, medical care, and supervision. A visit to a camel jockey compound found young, sickly, overworked and malnourished Sudanese boys. Contact between the boys and their guardian was infrequent, if at all. The boys subsisted on a substandard diet. They were made to work very long hours and trained on a daily basis to become riders.

The country also was a destination for women and girls who traveled to the country to work as domestic servants. Some reported being forced into domestic servitude and sexual exploitation.

In January, the Cabinet established the Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Implementation Committee, which was charged with implementing specific anti-trafficking reforms. It sponsored training for judges and their deputies on prosecution of trafficking-related offenses. It monitored immigration patterns for evidence of trafficking. The Government provided assistance to domestics who have suffered from abuse and provided shelter for them in deportation centers. It ran a 24-hour hotline to advise women and children in abusive situations.

ABU-DHABI, DUBAI, SHRAJAH.

The UAE has more than two million camels and camel races are among the most popular sports events in the country. The camel races take place every winter, from October to April on various tracks throughout the UAE. His Highness Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan, along with other rulers of the emirates, attends most of the races.

Camel owners are continuously encouraged by Sheikh Zayed, which includes financial incentives, prizes that include luxury cars, four-wheel-drives, mansions, yachts, cash and gold sword. One of the major events, the Zayed Grand Prize camel races, is being held at Al Wathba race track, a large 10km track, about 45km from Abu Dhabi city. Major races are also held at the Nad Al Sheba Camel Race Course in Dubai.

The jockeys are usually young boys, two to seven year olds chosen for their light weight. The beginning of the races marks a festive season for the UAE's people who are usually accompanied by traditional music and singing to the Arabian drum beats. The green, red, black and white national flag of the Emirates flutters atop high poles that line the road leading out from town.

Human rights organizations (Not permissible in the UAE) continued to express concerns that in the UAE, the lives of young boys are being put at risk for the entertainment of spectators at camel races. Information provided by them stated that very young boys would continue to be used in camel racing despite the fact that this was illegal.

The new rules published by Emirates Camel Racing Federation (ECRF) in June 2003, stipulated that any camel jockey must be aged 15 years or more and weigh at least 35kg. Although, the rules are being ignored and the allegations remain that the Emirate government has acknowledged that many racers are too young and weigh too little but avoid stopping the traffic of slaves because they themselves are camel and slave owners.

Children, usually abducted or sold voluntarily from, where else, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh to camel racing syndicate in the UAE. The weight of the jockey is crucial to the success of the venture, so young boys; even two year olds are imported! South Asian boys in particular are recruited because they tend to be the cheapest, weigh less and tend to scream louder at a higher pitch than most adults, causing camels to run faster.

The tiny riders are bound to a camel's back, often using Velcro fastenings. But sometimes the kids slip off and either get trapped underneath the camel or are trampled. It is not uncommon for children to fall off or get dragged along, sometimes to their deaths, according to a report from the London-based human rights group Antislavery International. A Pakistani boy who worked five years as a camel jockey, starting at age 4, remembers the race as noisy and dangerous, where more than 50 camels with screaming children strapped onto their backs would run. He personally saw about 20 children die, and more than a dozen injured every week. He recalls: "There was this one kid whose strap broke at the beginning of the race. His head was crushed between the legs of the running camel. Once the race has started it cannot stop. Many of these under-aged riders have been left to die from the appalling injuries suffered on the desert race courses without any medical treatment. The camels are valuable assets worth millions of dollars, instead the children are viewed as cheap and expendable. With camel racing heavily patronized by the UAE's oil-rich rulers, who have least respect in the legislature, thousands of small children from Indian sub continent face a bleak and dangerous future.

Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery:

The United Arab Emirates [map] is a federation of sheikhdoms located in SE Arabia, on the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman. The federation consists of seven sheikhdoms: Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Dubai, Fujairah, Ras al-Khaimah, Sharjah, and Umm al-Qaiwain. The city of Abu Dhabi in Abu Dhabi is the capital. The UAE has an open economy with a high per capita income and a sizable annual trade surplus. Its wealth is based on oil and gas output (about 30% of GDP), and the fortunes of the economy fluctuate with the prices of those commodities. Since the discovery of oil in the UAE more than 30 years ago, the UAE has undergone a profound transformation from an impoverished region of small desert principalities to a modern state with a high standard of living.

The United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.) is a destination country for women trafficked primarily from South, Southeast, and East Asia, the former Soviet Union, Iran and other Middle Eastern countries, and East Africa, for the purpose of sexual exploitation. A far smaller number of men, women, and teenage children were trafficked to the U.A.E. to work as forced laborers. Some South Asian and East African boys were trafficked into the country and forced to work as camel jockeys. Some were sold by their parents to traffickers, and others were brought into the U.A.E. by their parents. A large number of foreign women were lured into the U.A.E. under false pretenses and subsequently forced into sexual servitude, primarily by criminals of their own countries. Personal observations by U.S. Government officials and video and photographic evidence indicated the continued use of trafficked children as camel jockeys. There were instances of child camel jockey victims who were reportedly starved to make them light, abused physically and sexually, denied education and health care, and subjected to harsh living and working conditions. Some boys as young as 6 months old were reportedly kidnapped or sold to traffickers and raised to become camel jockeys. Some were injured seriously during races and training sessions, and one child died after being trampled by the camel he was riding. Some victims trafficked for labor exploitation endured harsh living and working conditions and were subjected to debt bondage, passport withholding, and physical and sexual abuse.

The U.A.E. Government does not collect statistics on persons trafficked into the country, making it difficult to assess its efforts to combat the problem. Widely varying reports, mostly from NGOs, international organizations, and source countries, estimated the number of trafficking victims in the U.A.E. to be from a few thousand to tens of thousands. Regarding foreign child camel jockeys, the U.A.E. Government estimated there were from 1,200 to 2,700 such children in the U.A.E., while a respected Pakistani human rights NGO active in the U.A.E. estimated 5,000 to 6,000. The U.A.E. Government has taken several steps that may lead to potentially positive outcomes, such as requiring children from source countries to have their own passports, and collaborating with UNICEF and source-country governments to develop a plan for documenting and safely repatriating all underage camel jockeys.

The Government of the U.A.E. does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making significant efforts to do so. Despite sustained engagement from the U.S. Government, NGOs, and international organizations over the last two years, the U.A.E. Government has failed to take significant action to address its trafficking problems and to protect victims. The U.A.E. Government needs to enact and enforce a comprehensive trafficking law that criminalizes all forms of trafficking and provides for protection of trafficking victims. The government should also institute systematic screening measures to identify trafficking victims among the thousands of foreign women arrested and deported each year for involvement in prostitution. The government should take immediate steps to rescue and care for the many foreign children trafficked to the U.A.E. as camel jockeys, repatriating them through responsible channels if appropriate. The government should also take much stronger steps to investigate, prosecute, and convict those responsible for trafficking these children to the U.A.E. - U.S. State Dept Trafficking in Persons Report, June, 2005 [full country report]

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH:

Children are especially vulnerable to labor and sexual exploitation and denial of basic rights, whether traveling alone or with family members. In several Gulf countries children are trafficked for use as beggars, and sometimes suffer terrible maiming to improve their moneymaking potential. In Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, and U.A.E. young boys are trafficked from South Asia and Sudan for use as camel jockeys, at great risk to their lives and health. Children who migrate with their families often find that discriminatory legislation make them ineligible or unable to afford basic health care and education.

The U.A.E., with its October through April racing season, is the main destination for children trafficked for camel racing; in July 2003 Unicef estimated the number trafficked to U.A.E. alone to be in the thousands. U.A.E. has vowed to crackdown on the use of children under fifteen years or forty-five kilograms as jockeys but enforcement appears to be limited to repatriating children whose handlers apply for visa renewals. A group of twenty-one boys age six to twelve-years deported to Pakistan in May 2003 reportedly told Pakistan's Lawyers for Human Rights and Legal Aid that they had been working as jockeys for as long as five years before their deportations, and had suffered sexual abuse, denial of food, and severe beatings.

Notes and References:


US DEPARTMENT OF STATE.

Qatar: Country Reports on Human Rights Practices - 2004 Released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor February 28, 2005

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2004/41730.htm

UAE PRISONS .

http://www.uaeprison.com/camelkids.htm

Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery

http://gvnet.com/humantrafficking/UnitedArabEmirates.htm

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH.

Support Migrants' Rights Letter to World Bank President James Wolfensohn on Eve of Annual Meetings September 18, 2003.

http://www.hrw.org/press/2003/09/migrant091803-ltr.htm

Child camel jockeys find hope By Lucy Williamson BBC News, Dubai.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4236123.stm

Camel jockeys trying to recover lost childhood By Andrew Hammond

http://www.dawn.com/2005/05/10/int14.htm

source: http://chagataikhan.blogspot.com/2009/04/open-letter-to-bush-from-arab-girlopen_22.html