Daniel Pipes writes in Front Page:
Homaidan Ali Al-Turki, 36, and his wife, Sarah Khonaizan, 35, appear to be a model immigrant couple. Having arrived in the United States in 2000, they live with their four children in an upscale Denver suburb. Al-Turki is a graduate student in linguistics at the University of Colorado, specializing in Arabic intonation and focus prosody. He donates money to the Linguistic Society of America and is CEO of Al-Basheer Publications and Translations, a bookstore specializing in titles about Islam.Last week, however, the FBI accused the couple of enslaving an Indonesian woman in her early 20s. For four years, reads the indictment, they created “a climate of fear and intimidation through rape and other means.” The slave woman cooked, cleaned, took care of children, and more for little or no pay, fearing that if she did not obey, “she would suffer serious harm.”
The two Saudis face charges of forced labor, aggravated sexual abuse, document servitude, and harboring an alien. If found guilty, they could spend their remaining lives in prison. The government also wants to seize the couple’s Al-Basheer bank account to pay their former slave $92,700 in back wages.
It’s a shocking instance, especially for a graduate student and religious bookstore owner – but not a particularly rare one. Here are other examples of enslavement, all involving Saudi royals or diplomats living in the United States.
In 1982, a Miami judge issued a warrant to search Prince Turki Bin Abdul Aziz’s 24th-floor penthouse to determine if he was holding Nadia Lutefi Mustafa, an Egyptian woman, against her will. Turki and his French bodyguards prevented a search from taking place, then won retroactive diplomatic immunity to forestall any legal unpleasantness.
In 1988, the Saudi defense attaché in Washington, Col. Abdulrahman S. Al-Banyan, employed a Thai domestic, Mariam Roungprach, until she escaped his house by crawling out a window. She later told how she had been imprisoned there, did not get enough food, and was not paid. Interestingly, her work contract specified that she could not leave the house or make telephone calls without her employer’s permission.
In 1991, Prince Saad Bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud and his wife, Princess Noora, lived on two floors of the Ritz-Carlton Houston. Two of their servants, Josephine Alicog of the Philippines and Sriyani Marian Fernando of Sri Lanka, filed a suit against the prince, alleging they were for five months held against their will, “by means of unlawful threats, intimidation and physical force,” they were only partially paid, denied medical treatment, and suffered mental and physical abuse.
In March 2005, a wife of Saudi Prince Mohamed Bin Turki Alsaud, Hana Al Jader, 39, was arrested at her home outside of Boston on charges of forced labor, domestic servitude, falsifying records, visa fraud, and harboring aliens. Al Jader stands accused of compelling two Indonesian women to work for her by making them believe “that if they did not perform such labor, they would suffer serious harm.” If convicted, Al Jader faces up to 140 years in jail and $2.5 million in fines.
There are many other similar instances, for example, the Orlando escapades of Saudi princesses Maha al-Sudairi and Buniah al-Saud. Joel Mowbray tells of twelve female domestics “trapped and abused” in the households of Saudi dignitaries or diplomats.Why is this problem so acute when it comes to affluent Saudis? Four reasons come to mind. Although slavery was abolished in the kingdom in 1962, the practice still flourishes there. Ranking Saudi religious authorities endorse slavery; for example, Sheikh Saleh Al-Fawzan insisted recently that “Slavery is a part of Islam” and whoever wants it abolished he called “an infidel.”...
Read it all. Lots of useful links in the original.
Muhammad had slaves. Muhammad was uswa hasana, the perfect man. Slavery can never be abolished in Islam. It may, temporarily, be shelved for the greater good of Islam -- i.e., if the Infidels are powerful enough, and we must placate them, as happened in 1962 when, legally but not in fact, slavery was finally abolished in Saudi Arabia.
Slavery is known to exist and to thrive within sevgeral Arab countries (the Sudan, Mali, and Mauritania as well as in Saudi Arabia). It may exist in several more. Save for the Jews who were enslaved to various Arab tribes in the Yemen (see the articles of R. S. Sergeant on the Yemen in the 1950s, where if a member of Arab Tribe A killed a Jew "belonging" to Arab Tribe B, then an Arab in Tribe B could kill a Jew "belonging" to Arab Tribe A -- Muslim justice!).
Arab slavers went on raids up and down the coasts of western Europe for a millennium, getting as far north as Ireland and, in one famous case, Iceland. They looted, burned villages, and captured men, women, and children. Historians believe about one million Europeans in Western Europe were seized in this manner. In the east, among the Slavs, raiders came by land or by sea, and seized several million Slavs (and Circassian and Georgian women, famed for their beauty).
In black Africa, the Arab slave trade began much earlier, and ended (where it ended at all) much later, than the Atlantic Slave Trade. It was stamped out only by the British -- see J. B. Kelly, Britain and the Persian Gulf, 1795-1880, for the details on how the slave trade centered on Muscat and Oman was ended, not by the Arabs, who never saw anything wrong with slavery, not then and not now, but by the British officials, using the threat of naval power.
The greatest loss of black African life came from the Arab slavers because they were most interested in kidnapping, and then castrating on site, young African boys. Given the nature of the operation and the primitive conditions, only about 10% of those taken survived both the operation, and the march to the sea, or by land, to the slave markets of Jeddah, Cairo, Baghdad, Damascus, Constantinople, and even Smyrna. For more on this see the study of J. E. Willis or the important article on the Arab slave trade and castration, "The Hideous Trade," by Jan Hogedoorn. It should be read carefully by all NGOs, and certainly in the White House. Indeed, it might usefully be circulated to black African ambassadors, and a fact sheet on the Arab slave trade in Africa might be useful in countering the sinister campaigns of Da'wa among black prisoners in America.
Read Andrew G. Bostom Black Slaves, Arab Masters.
Giles Milton White Gold.
Hugh - Thanks for the other references.
Al-Fawzan's comments should be linked to the NAACP and ACLU. I would love to see their response and commentaries.
There are many of claims and investigative reporting that implies many American women and children that go missing disappear to Saudi Arabia or Saudi royals, both domestically and abroad. Several western women have been released (rare) or escaped and reveal the "goings on". Being in large groups of women in Saudi all kidnapped from the west. Many of times they have been able to name names, and western diplomats that are brought in by the Saudi royals to use the herim.
In many of the reports and claims the State Department has knowledge and turns a blind eye. It is our domestic law enforcement that brings the above cases to the public eye. It would be interesting to see how many of the above cases were attempted to be swept under the carpet by the State Department.
When Malcolm X did the hajj to Mecca he was shocked to see blacks being sold as slaves in the market.
To his shame he kept quiet on this when he returned to America.
When Malcolm X did the hajj to Mecca he was shocked to see blacks being sold as slaves in the market.
Really? Do you have a reference for that? I would love to havethat in my toolkit for deconstructing Islamic propagandists whenever they invoke the name of Malcolm X.
Here is another truth about Malcolm that sits uneasily with the Submitters:
On Malcolm X's 80 birthday, Peter Tatchell reveals the hidden gay past of the American black nationalist leader
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1486997,00.html
The biggest problem facing the West is the Islamization of Europe. I am not convinced that Islamic peoples are capable of assimilating into a Western value system. I am quite sure that
Europe will never have the courage to so much as truly enforce laws against Muslim political violence. One can see it in Sweden, in Britain, France, Germany, and Belgium.
It is particularly tragic because the West has all the military power needed to stop this scourge.
The mistake we are making will make Munich look minor.
Midamfab
I would be very interested in seeing the women held as de facto slaves use the tort system to sue for compensation and punative damages (separate from any criminal prosecution). I expect any jury will separate the masters from their cash in a very large way.
I haven't seen a source for Malcolm X's remarks on what went on in Mecca, but I have read, in several places (can't remember where) that he was more and more horrified by the racism of the Arabs in Algeria, and he left Algeria with quite a different view -- of them and of Islam.
Perhaps the Shabazz family -- i.e., his daughters -- may know more. Or his biographers.
I have mentioned on this site before that my family helped a Filippina maid/slave escape from a Saudi husband and wife student family in the university town where we lived at the time. Her story made WGN in Chicago and Illinois
newspapers. A lawsuit was initiated on her behalf, but the students left the country before the lawsuit could proceed. The Saudi embassy was furious and they put a lot of pressure on the Philippines Consul Office to shut down the publicity. Her "employer" held her passport, she was not allowed to leave the house and suffered mental and physical abuse, although not sexual abuse as did an Indonesian girl who left our town pregnant with her employer's baby, another wealthy student who was from Oman. Two interesting sidelines to this story. The girl we helped, while living in Saudi Arabia and slaving there for a very wealthy family (she was "given"to the daughter as a wedding present) remembers the boxer, Muhammed Ali, visiting their home. Did he notice the abusive way the non-Saudi women and men servants were treated? The abuse was out in the open...it would have been hard to miss. I imagine he was just too much in love with Islam to see its dark side. And, in the case of the young woman that we helped, all of the Muslim community in our town knew of her and her treatment, and staunchly defended the Saudi family.(although the young woman was also Muslim) I put the blame squarely with the State Dept. They know when they issue these domestic workers visas, along with visas for the wealthy Arabs, of the abuse and denial of freedoms that these women have to endure while they live in the USA.
Zico and Hugh,
X
marks the spot for the link to the source at www.yahoodi.com
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A lot of the prostitution in London is controlled by Albanians who force girls kidnapped in Eastern Europe and trafficed via Bosnia and Kosovo to be sex slaves.
Hugh:
If the Shebazz family know anything, they sure aren't saying. Last I read about any of them (within the last year), they were still "keeping the [Islamic] faith".
And I'm sure they will not be amused by the Guardian article re: Malcolm's sexuality.
waterdragon52,
Last thing I heard was that Malcolm X's grandson was doing time in New York State for robbery/attempted robbery.
I believe that this grandson was the one who deliberately set his grandmother's house on fire, killing her. (I think it was Betty Shabazz herself, but am not certain).
Kafira,
You were wondering about the Shabazz family,
On 1 June 1997, Shabazz's grandson, Malcolm, who was living with her at the time, set fire to her Westchester County, NY apartment. Shabazz suffered burns over 80% of her body and remained in intensive care for three weeks, until she died on 23 June 1997. Her grandson was later sentenced to eighteen months in juvenile detention for manslaughter.
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Returning to slavery:
As early as 650 AD Arab slave traders began
taking African slaves to Arabia and beyond.
(p43, "The World's Worst Atrocities" by Nigel Cawthorne, published by Hamlyn)
The battle of Omdurman, September 2nd 1898 was the culmination of fighting between the British and the forces of the Muhammad Ahmad al-Mahdi who rose up as they objected to the anti-slavery measures that London was attempting to impose.
("The History Today Companion to British History", edited by Juliet Gardiner & Neil Wenborn, published by Collins and Brown)
According to some research I did for an African History class, black slaves were used as travelers checks to pay for supplies, food, etc. during the hajj.
Slavery in Araby is a good book by Murray Gordon which documents some of these atrocities as well.