Jean Sasson's Blog, page 7

FOR SHAME!

This horrific story just wiped the smile right off my face.  Until the entire world reacts against governments who have no respect for women, such attacks will go on and on and on.  Her husband should have acid thrown on him to feel for himself how his wife suffered.

Former Pakistani dancing girl commits suicide 12 years after horrific acid attack which left her looking 'not human'

Fakhra Younus said 'My face is a prison' after attack which melted her nose
She had undergone 39 separate surgeries to repair damage
Leapt to her death from sixth floor Rome building earlier this month
Her ex-husband was charged with attempted murder in 2002 but has since been acquitted

By

A Pakistani former dancing girl left fighting for life by a 'horrific' acid attack has committed suicide a decade after being heavily facially disfigured.

Fakhra Younus, 33, leapt to her death from a sixth floor building in Rome 12 years after the acid attack which she said left her looking 'not human'.

At the time of her attack in May 2000, her ex-husband Bilal Khar was the man accused of entering her mother's house and pouring acid over Younus's face as she slept.

Life-changing: Fakhra Younus, pictured left before the horrific acid attack in May 2000, was left heavily facially disfigured after having acid thrown in her face

The attack, which took place in front of Younus's then five-year-old son, left her unable to breathe and fighting for life.

Her nose was almost completely melted and she has since undergone 39 separate surgical procedures to repair her disfigured face over the past decade.

Beaten, raped and kept as slaves: Extraordinary story of the mother and daughter who BOTH had babies by their captors (and only escaped after their children were murdered)
Shocked jurors shown naked photo of acid-attack woman and told she doesn't have enough skin for any more transplants
Hunt for racist thug who squirted acid at black mother as she walked with her six-month-old baby

The horrific attack also burned off her hair, fused her lips, blinded her in one eye, destroyed her left ear and melted her breasts.

After being rushed to hospital she said, 'My face is a prison to me', while her distraught young son said at the time, 'This is not my mother'.

Disfigured: Younus, left, pictured with supporter Tehmina Durrani, has undergone 39 separate surgical operations to repair the damage done to her face

The mother-of-one moved to Italy after the incident to live in Rome and continue her treatment.

But on March 17 she took her own life, after leaving a message saying she was committing suicide over the silence of law on the atrocities and the insensitivity of Pakistani rulers.

Cleared: Younus's ex-husband Bilal Khar, the son of a wealthy Pakistani governor, was cleared in 2003 of charges relating to the attack

Bilal Khar was arrested in 2002 and charged with attempted murder following the attack, only to be released on bail after five months.

Khar, an ex-parliamentarian and son of a wealthy Pakistani governor, was eventually cleared of the attack, though many believe he could have used his family connections to escape conviction.

After Younus's tragic suicide emerged earlier this month, Khar continued to deny having any part in the attack – claiming in a television interview a different man with the same name had carried out the crime.

Khar claimed his ex-wife killed herself because she didn't have enough money, not because of her horrific injuries.

More than 8,500 acid attacks, forced marriages and other forms of violence against women were reported in Pakistan in 2011, according to The Aurat Foundation, a women's rights organization.

The Pakistani government introduced new laws last year criminalising acid attacks and stating that convicted attacks would serve at least 14 years in jail.

Tehmina Durrani, the ex-wife of Bilal Khar's father, had become an advocate for Younus after the attack, and said the acid attack victim had pledged to bring her attacker to justice when she had recovered.

Mourning: Fakhra Younus's body is carried through Karachi airport in her native Pakistan after her body was returned to the country from Italy

Grief: Family members of Fakhra Younus cannot hide their anguish at Karachi airport as the acid attack victim's body was returned to Pakistan

Durrani said: 'She said, 'When I come back, I will reopen the case, and I'll fight myself," and she was a fighter.'

Durrani said Younus' case should be a reminder that the Pakistani government needs to do much more to prevent acid attacks and other forms of violence against women, and also help the victims.

'I think this whole country should be extremely embarrassed that a foreign country took responsibility for a Pakistani citizen for 13 years because we could give her nothing, not justice, not security,' said Durrani.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2121536/Former-Pakistani-dancing-girl-commits-suicide-12-years-horrific-acid-attack-left-looking-human.html#ixzz1qYhOoy6J

Former Pakistani dancing girl commits suicide 12 years after horrific acid attack which left her looking 'not human'

Fakhra Younus said 'My face is a prison' after attack which melted her nose
She had undergone 39 separate surgeries to repair damage
Leapt to her death from sixth floor Rome building earlier this month
Her ex-husband was charged with attempted murder in 2002 but has since been acquitted

 

BABY PYGMY HIPPO – Jean Sasson is in love!

 This is being blogged just to put a smile on everyone's face.  Send it around the world and the whole world will be smiling!


















Baby pygmy hippo may be most adorable animal ever
11 hrs ago

Peaceful-seeming hippos are often described as the most dangerous animals in Africa, but here's one that we'd love to bring home. This baby pygmy hippo, born on a wildlife ranch in South Africa, is only a few days old — and he's been named for Prince Harry, who has done lots of aid work in southern Africa. After Harry's parents rejected him, he was adopted by handlers at the ranch and lives "like a monarch in a special suite at the sanctuary," according to the Daily Mail. Just 11 pounds now, he'll only grow to three feet tall, about a fifth the size of a regular hippo.

AMERICAN CHICK IN SAUDI ARABIA – #1 bestseller on Barnes and Noble NOOK E-book.

 

Much to my surprise and joy, AMERICAN CHICK IN SAUDI ARABIA hit the #1 slot on the Barnes & Noble bestseller list, and, on the second day it was released.  I'm thrilled, to say the least.

It all began with an ad in the newspaper. I was living in Jacksonville Beach, Florida and was enrolled in court reporting school.  It didn't take me long to realize that I didn't have what it takes to find joy in a career in the American court system.  That's when I started checking out newspaper ads for a job, something to "tide me over" until I could make up my mind what I wanted to do, and where I wanted to go, next.  My eyes landed on an ad for a administrative position in Medical Affairs at a royal hospital in Saudi Arabia.  Suddenly I was intrigued, even excited.  I was always an avid reader and had vast curiosity about the rest of the world, so I applied for the job, and just like that, within six weeks I was on my way to an exotic kingdom in the middle of a desert, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.  I signed up for a two-year contract but ending staying for 12 years.  That's because I truly enjoyed the many adventures of living and working in Saudi Arabia.

I only had two problems living in the kingdom:  First of all, I was appalled by the status of women, all still veiled at the time, and most without any rights to make personal choices.  Secondly, I was horrified by the cruelty and neglect of animals, including abandoned dogs, stray cats, caged and neglected birds, mistreated camels, and on and on.  I don't have the sort of personality that will ignore the mistreatment of human beings or of animals.  As all my friends can testify, I was embroiled in frequent misadventures!

Yet the Saudi people were some of the nicest people I have met, and most, if not all, extended a welcoming hand.  In those early days, Saudis were happy to have foreigners coming to live in their country.  And, it didn't hurt that I was working for Dr. Nizar Feteih, the Saudi head of the hospital, the cardiologist for King Khalid, and a man closely connected with the royal family.

Only later, after the first Gulf War did they withdraw the welcome mat.  Now I hear that it is nearly impossible for foreigners to meet up with and become friends with Saudis.  What a pity!

But for me, living in Saudi Arabia turned into a life-changing adventure.

This first in my book series tells how I am plunged into the hidden lives of the veiled women in Riyadh, where women are locked in luxurious homes and fundamentalist mutawas terrorize the streets. I was lucky to meet women from all walks of life–a feisty bedouin, an educated mother, and a conservative wife of a high-ranking Saudi–all who opened a window into Saudi culture and helped to reshape my worldview.


I hope that you agree that after spending many years living and working and traveling the world, and after writing books about many brave heroines and one brave hero, the time has finally come for me to write about my personal adventures.

My CHICK series will focus on my life and adventures while in Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Kuwait, Iraq, Thailand, and the Philippines.  My series of books will not focus on me only, but will reveal personal stories about some very compelling people I have met along my life's path.

CHICK is now available as an e-book on Barnes & Noble NOOK.  Next month it will be available on AMAZON and can be downloaded on KINDLE or on your PC desktop, etc. I do so hope you get to read it.

After I finish writing my personal story, it will be released in printed book form.

Here's some additional information about my other books and about CHICK:

PRAISE FOR JEAN SASSON'S BOOKS:

"Fascinating…an intimate account of a family life that became steadily more dangerous and bizarre…in forced pursuit of Osama's jihadist dreams." –Washington Post

"The startling truth behind veiled lives…frank and vivid" Sunday Express

"Anyone with the slightest interest in human rights will find this book heart-wrenching." –Betty Mahmoody, bestselling author of NOT WITHOUT MY DAUGHTER

"A fascinating narrative…devasting" Robert Harris, Sunday Times

"Absolutely riveting and profoundly sad…" –People

"A chilling story…a vivid account of an air-conditioned nightmare…" –Entertainment Weekly

"Must-reading for anyone interested in human rights." –USA Today

"Shocking…candid…sad, sobering, and compassionate…" –San Francisco Chronicle

ABOUT JEAN SASSON:

Jean's first book THE RAPE OF KUWAIT, based on her eye witness reporting on the invasion of Kuwait by Iraqi troops, was an immediate bestseller. Shortly thereafter she became a full-time writer. Her next three books, PRINCESS, PRINCESS SULTANA'S DAUGHTERS, and PRINCESS SULTANA'S CIRCLE, became international sensations as they were the first books to bring to the western world the shocking stories about life for women in Saudi Arabia. Jean is also the author of MAYADA, DAUGHTER OF IRAQ, about the prison experiences of an Iraqi journalist praised by Saddam Hussein; LOVE IN A TORN LAND: The True Story of a Freedom Fighter's Escape from Iraqi Vengeance which tells the story of a beautiful Kurdish woman; GROWING UP BIN LADEN: Osama's Wife and Son Take Us into Their Secret World; and FOR THE LOVE OF A SON: One Afghan Woman's Quest for Her Stolen Child. Her work has been featured in People, Vanity Fair,The New York Times, The Washington Post, The New Yorker, The New York Post, The Sunday London Times, The Guardian, CNN, FOX, NBC, and many other news organizations.
I'm still traveling the world, although I have made my homebase in Atlanta, Georgia.
I'm still a passionate animal rights and women's rights supporter.

If you have time, check out my website at www.jeansasson.com

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

While having a nice dinner with my two nephews (Greg & his son Alec), my fifteen year old nephew Alec asked me if I had read the book, THE HUNGER GAMES.  I had to admit that I had not, and in fact, had not even heard of the book.  Alec said that he was interested in reading the book.  Well, my next stop (after finishing my meal) was Barnes & Nobel bookstore — anytime any teenager is interested in reading, I don't pause!

Once I saw the book display and read the jacket covers, I decided to buy a copy for myself.  Let me say that I am not a big fiction reader UNLESS the book is historical fiction.  I always feel I want to LEARN something.  But due to recommendations from my nieces and nephews, I did read the fictional TWILIGHT series, which I found surprisingly good and very entertaining.

Last evening when I came home I climbed into bed and set aside the current book I'm reading, HELL ABOVE EARTH, a non-fiction book about the nephew of Hermann Goring who was a bomber pilot for the US Air Force in WWII.  (I'll write about that later.)

Meanwhile, once I turned the first page of THE HUNGER GAMES, I was a goner!  I read the book straight through before sleeping.  It's simple but exciting.  I REALLY could not put the first book down, and now I'm sorry I'm so busy that it may be a week before I can read the rest of this trilogy.

I've heard that books for teenagers are doing great and I can see why when I read THE HUNGER GAMES.  I do so much serious non-fiction reading that I felt like I was giving my brain a little candy and honestly, I immensely enjoyed the sugar high!  Although there are many dark moments in the story, the way Suzanne Collins handles the material is admirable.

IF you feel you want to escape reality for a short burst, and enjoy a good read, I highly recommend THE HUNGER GAMES.  And, my congratulations go to Suzanne Collins, a very successful female writer, for her imagination.

Anthony Shadid

Unexpected death is always a sad shock.  When death comes to one who is the father of two young children, a man who is contributing something positive to the world, it's even more tragic.  Death recently came for a man the world knows as Anthony Shadid, a writer and New York Times  reporter.   Shadid was covering the rebellion in Syria, but his heart was not stilled by a bullet or a rocket launched by the Syrian military.

Anthony Shadid risked his life to get to the truth of the current violence and rebellion in Syria.  After personal witnessing, he was following horses down a path.  The horses triggered an asthmatic reaction.  Despite having the medicine that should have saved him, Anthony Shadid died at age 43, a man who should have covered many more stories, a man much too young to die.  The date was February 16, 2012.

Death took a man needed by his family, and needed by the world.  Honest reporters who have empathy for others are becoming more rare with each passing years.  I believe that Anthony Shadid was such a man.

And so it came to be that on February 16, 2012, family and friends and peers made the horrifying discovery that they had reason to mourn.

From what I've been told, Anthony Shadid was a good man.  And I've heard about Anthony from someone who knew him well, one of Anthony's best friends, another good man whom Peter Sasson and I befriended while living in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Hikmat Farha.

Over the past few years, Hikmat became one of Anthony's closest friends.  During telephone calls, Hikmat frequently mentioned that I must meet his friend Anthony Shadid.  Hikmat knew that I would admire and respect Shadid just as much as he did.  Unfortunately, I didn't get to Lebanon during the times that Shadid was in Lebanon.

My friend Hikmat was devastated by the loss of his friend, as were many others.  Hikmat said that he had pleaded with Anthony not to go to Syria, that he had a bad feeling about the trip.  But Anthony was a reporter who "couldn't NOT go."  He felt that certain stories would never be told if he was not on the ground reporting.  He was right.

Hikmat's close friendship with Anthony came about because both men were connected to Jedeidet Marjayoun, a historic village in the south of Lebanon.  While Hikmat's family remained in Marjayoun, Anthony's father left the area years ago and ended up, in all places, in the state of Oklahoma, where Anthony was born.

Hikmat's family was forced to flee the area during Lebanon's civil war, but always kept their properties there in the beautiful little village.  Thankfully, Hikmat's family also owned properties in Beirut and in Beit Meri, so they did have a place to stay during the years of raging war.

When Anthony Shadid returned to visit his homeland and the village of his family, he decided to rebuild his grandfather's home in Marjayoun.  This experience was the basis of a book, House of Stone, just released by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing.

I just read the book.  It's a great book, written with honesty and humor and an obvious love for the author's country and heritage.  I predict that it will be a bestseller, as it should be.  I'm just sorry that the author is no longer around to enjoy the success of his heart-felt book.  Bob Minzesheimer of USA Today wrote about the book and says that "Shadid found his way home in 'House of Stone,' "and "Before his death, reporter poured heart into book."

I agree with Mr. Minzesheimer.  Anthony Shadid did pour his heart and soul into a book about his family, his family's village, and the home that he so painstakingly rebuilt, thinking that he would live out his life in that stone house.

It's a worthy book and I recommend it highly.  I only wish that Anthony Shadid had lived so that he might have gained many more experiences in his stone house in the quaint little village of Marjayoun, and so that he could relate even more stories about the interesting cast of characters he brought to life in the book.  It's a saga that this reader would have faithfully followed.

Please read additional information on the death of Anthony Shadid below:

Colleague recalls journalist Anthony Shadid's last moments

Two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Anthony Shadid is seen in this undated handout released March 21, 2011.  Credit: Reuters/Turkish Foreign Ministry/Handout

Fri, Feb 17 2012




By Sharon Waxman

Mon Mar 5, 2012 9:04am EST

LOS ANGELES, March 4 (TheWrap.com) – In his last moments, New York Times correspondent Anthony Shadid knew that he faced danger from the horses that would lead him back to safety from Syria, over the border with Turkey.

But he had little choice but to press on.

"He will get through this as he did on the much more strenuous hike in, I thought," wrote Shadid's colleague Tyler Hicks in a front-page story in the New York Times on Sunday.

But Shadid, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, died of an allergy attack brought on by the horses on his way out of Syria in February after a weeklong reporting assignment.

Hicks' account — unusual for a photographer — described a dangerous week with the Syrian rebels, who he called well organized. He and Shadid had worked in many strife-ridden zones before, but Shadid never got to write up his copious notes from this final trip.

In a moving tribute, Hicks described the dramatic, fatal scene after an initial asthma attack on the way into the country.

"Anthony's health had been good during the week and he prepared himself for the trip down with antihistamines and a supply of inhalers," Hicks wrote. "He had a black and white kaffiyeh covering his face to filter the air, the same one he had worn around his neck throughout the assignment. He told the young men he wouldn't ride a horse and to walk ahead with them at a distance.

"'Should we walk in front of the horses?' I asked Anthony.

"'No, they need to guide us,' he said.

"The pace down was faster and easier than coming up a week earlier, and this time our bags were carried by horses instead of on our backs. But then I could hear that Anthony's breathing became strained, and within a mile he was asking to rest. He will get through this as he did on the much more strenuous hike in, I thought, and with one of my arms around his waist, and the other holding his forearm, we continued to walk.

"Soon after, Anthony stopped and leaned against a large boulder, and unlike the first time, when he had merely labored for breath, now he collapsed onto the ground. I called out his name, but he was already unconscious and his breathing had stopped completely. I performed CPR for half an hour while begging the smugglers to find a doctor. I hoped for a miracle. Turkey was now out of the question, and backtracking would only return us to a remote border village. Finally, a small covered truck drove quietly within sight of us and we carried Anthony, whose death I could still not come to terms with, into the back, where I climbed in with him."

Hicks later carried his friend's body over the border.

Equality for Women: The Voice of Middle Eastern Women, Jean Sasson

Equality for Women: The Voice of Middle Eastern Women, Jean Sasson.

All about writing a book and getting it published

I receive several letters a week from readers who are interested in writing a book and getting it published.  I'm often asked for tips and I always respond.  However, as I am writing two books this year, I am having difficulty these days writing an original note for each person.  Therefore, I decided to write a brief post giving the best advice that I know, something I can pass along to anyone who is interested in writing and needs a little guidance  I believe that there can never be enough books in our lives, so anyone who wants to write a book, I like to offer encouragement.

First of all, you must have a passion for books.  If you don't love to read, then I can't imagine how on earth you will make a good writer.  Secondly, you must be curious about the world, about people you don't know, about cultures you have not yet experienced, and about countries you have not visited.  Additionally, you must have a passion for your topic.  And, you must strive to learn a lot about the topic.  Don't attempt to write about something you are not very familiar with.  I think it would be very difficult to write about Africa if you had never been there.

For example:  From the time I was about fourteen years old, I knew that I would one day write.  I nearly always had a book in my hand.  Those books took me around the world, creating enormous curiosity about other cultures and countries.  Once while reading a book by that great author, Herman Wouk (I can't recall if the book was Marjorie Morningstar or Youngblood Hawk) I was nudged by a little voice telling me, "One day I'll write stories about others.  I know that I will."

Here's another important point:  IF you are going to write non-fiction, then you must have empathy for others.  From my first memories, I can remember noticing when others were hurt, mentally or physically, and I was always distressed for them.  And from an early age I jumped in and took strong action when I saw a situation where an animal or a person was being harmed.  I never hesitated.  That's what empathy will do for you — create action!

So, if you love books, have curiosity about others, and have empathy for others, then I believe that you have the makings of a good writer.

After gaining your education, it's very important to also gain personal knowledge of the world.  That's why I highly recommend that you travel, to take off from your safe perch and travel around the world.  Take a job in a foreign country, or volunteer for an organization who needs people who are free to travel.  You'll gain so much knowledge of other lands and other countries and meet so many great people who will inspire you to take pen in hand get to writing!

Although I knew I would one day write, I also felt that I should travel and learn about cultures so different from my own small town southern background.  That's why I leapt at the chance to live and work in Saudi Arabia, a very exotic and unique country.  I've never regretted my twelve years of living in the kingdom, which was a education all to itself!

Once you feel the passion for a certain topic or story or individual story, then you do your research.  You can't just write without knowing about the background of the person you are writing about, or the history of a country.  I always love the research part of writing, because that's your excuse for travel or reading.  For example, although I knew a lot about World War II and the ongoing issues in Palestine and Israel, when I was inspired to write a story about families who came together because of WWII and the Middle East wars over Palestine & Israel, I enjoyed a full year of researching and reading about that time, to make sure I really had a feel for it all.  Then I was ready to write Ester's Child (soon to be retitled:  Lost in Jerusalem).

After gaining knowledge and perhaps after travel, you can channel your passion in a very postive way.  "Now is the time to write this book!"  Once you feel fully prepared, make a schedule for writing your book.  I always take a calendar and mark each month how many pages I must get per month.  Then I break it down to page output per day.  Generally my goal is to write five good pages a day.

Then, I sit down and I do it.  Other than emergencies, I don't let anything interfere with my writing schedule.  I generally must work from 9 in the morning to 10 at night (with two breaks — one at lunch and one at dinner time) to get five GOOD pages that someone else would want to read.

It's important that you only think of that day's output!  Don't think, "On my!  I must write 500 pages to have this book!"  That is overwhelming.  Instead, think of each day:  "I must have five new pages before I go to bed."  Although it is more difficult to get five GOOD pages a day than you would ever imagine, it is doable…  But remember: Keep your mind off the total page count!

Every book is unique in that you really don't know how long it will take to finish it.  Every book has a life of its own.  My own schedule for the various books I wrote follow:

1)  I spent two months researching The Rape of Kuwait and eight weeks writing it — a very quick turnaround, but that book was basically a news report so it was easier to write than most.

2, 3 & 4)  The Princess Triology:  PRINCESS took six months to write.  DAUGHTERS took 8 months to write.  CIRCLE took a year to write.

5)  Ester's Child (Lost in Jerusalem) took THREE YEARS to write!  It's a very complicated book with several ongoing plots and is my only work of historical fiction. (Non-fiction is a story already set, so you follow the true life story of someone; thus, you really can't be making up plots, etc., that take up so much time.  Fiction can go many ways; thus, your time writing a book of fiction will take longer, at least that is what I predict!)

6)  Mayada, Daughter of Iraq took 6 months to write.

7)  Love in a Torn Land took 18 months to write.

8)  Growing up Bin Laden took 13 months to write.

9)  For the Love of a Son took 6 months to write.

10)  American Chick in Saudi Arabia:  I worked on the three stories in this "short" on and off for several years — in spare time — so I really don't know exactly long it took me to write CHICK.

11)  My 11th book and current project is taking a long time — I'll tell about that soon enough!

Once you finish your book, you'll need an editor.  You can hire an editor to go over your work OR if you feel you have done a good job of it, perhaps you'll only need the editor at the publishing house.  (Editors generally advertise in writing magazines — check out your local newstand.)

NOW:  TO GET PUBLISHED:  The statistics are very daunting.  There are 50,000 books published in America every year.  That huge number might make you think:  "Well, obviously everyone who writes a book gets published."  WRONG.  There are hundreds of thousands of aspiring writers who never get published.  It's very difficult to have a book published.  And, it is getting more challenging by the day because the publishing world is in crisis.  With e-books capturing most of the sales at low prices, and with so many people believing that they should have free what it takes another person years to write, authors and publishers are suffering.  (NEVER EVER DOWNLOAD a copyrighted book for free.  You are breaking the law and that makes you a criminal.  Plus, it's just plain unfair to the writer who worked so hard on their book.)  Hopefully they'll figure it out soon so that professional writers can continue to write and to make a decent living working their trade.

You must have a literary agent IF you are going the traditional route of having a publisher purchase the rights and publish your book.  The only way to get a literary agent is to submit proposals to literary agents.  There are many books out there that tell you exactly how to go about submitting proposals/manuscripts to literary agents.  So, I won't go into detail.  I will tell you that you can look online, or you can ask around if you know anyone in the business, or there are books that list literary agents and list the genres they generally represent.

Once you get a literary agent, your agent will work with you to whip your manuscript into proper shape for submission.  Then your literary agent will approach editors at publishing houses on your behalf.  (The usual commission for literary agents is 15% for sales in North America and 20% for international sales, or, sales to the foreign markets.) Believe me, it is well worth the percentage to have a professional taking care of the details and talking to publishers.  It's their business so leave it to them.

IF you are fortunate in that more than one publishing house is interested in your work, then your literary agent will have an auction for your book.  That's when the fun begans and you feel that all the hard work was worth it.

IF you don't want an agent, and would rather self-publish, there's no shame in self-publishing.   I hear that Amazon and other outlets have made it very simple to self-publish.

What I have written is very brief, but I hope it inspires those of you who want to write to GET WRITING and WRITE EVERY DAY! 

From the bottom of my heart, this author wishes you a lot of luck and huge success!

King Faisal, the king who did the most for Saudi Arabian women

 

Two future kings of Saudi Arabia, Faisal and Khalid

 

King Faisal of Saudi Arabia

Many years have passed since the founder of modern day Saudi Arabia, King Abdul Aziz, said wistfully, "If only I had three Faisals!"  That wise old king recognized early that his son Faisal was the hope of the land.  Although at Abdul Aziz's death, his "next in line to the throne" son Sa'ud stepped into the position of king, Sa'ud's limitations were many with his disasterous rule bringing the Kingdom to the verge of bankruptcy with his reckless spending and equally reckless decisions.  Finally the sons and advisors of the first king were forced to step in to convince Faisal, who was Crown Prince, that he must assume the kingship.  Faisal was not keen, as he felt that his brother was chosen by his father, whom Faisal always honored.  But, Sa'ud was forced to leave in order to "save the kingdom" and from the moment Sa'ud departed, Faisal turned his energies and wisdom to save Saudi Arabia.  He balanced the budget, cut family expenses, and turned his attention to the plight of women.  Under Faisal's rule, schools for girls were first opened in the kingdom.  (He was encouraged in this direction by his Turkish wife, Iffat.)  The move was unpopular, costing Faisal much support from the strict men of religion and other ultra-conservatives, who believed that women should remain in purdah and without the benefits of education.

Without King Faisal, education for Saudi Arabian women would not be what it is today, a country where more women are educated than men, and the setback would have cost Saudi women twenty years or more.  Tragically, Faisal was assassinated in 1975 by a nephew who was avenging his brother who was killed in a riot against the introduction of radio and television in the kingdom.

Every Saudi should remember their former King, who was cut down in his prime.

I was reading over some of Faisal's speeches last evening and felt very wistful when I read words spoken by Faisal in 1963 in Taif, talking about the urgent need for peace in the Middle East.  Here we are, nearly fifty years later, and his words ring as true as they did so long ago:

"Brothers:  The Arab countries today are in urgent need of stability and peace.  Every country, every government, every responsible citizen and every individual in every Arab country should devote himself to the service of his country and his people to raise his country to the place it deserves among the nations of the world.  This is what the Arabs need today.  Quarrels, disagreements, insults and altercations are forbidden by our religion, are unworthy of the Arabs' dignity and are in conflict with their own interest.  It serves the interest of no one when an Arab inflicts damage to himself or on others.   All it accomplishes is to hinder the Arab countries from carrying out their duties properly."

Considering the turmoil we are sadly witnessing across the Arab world, an extremely important part of our world, Faisal's words ring true.  I wish every person would study his life, his words, and take heed.

When I traveled to live and work in Saudi Arabia in 1978, I recall staring at his kingly photograph hanging in the halls of the King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre, a dream of a hospital planned by King Faisal, and a dream he did not live to see realized.  Since I worked for the head of the hospital, Dr. Nizar Feteih, who was also the ruling king's (King Khalid) cardiologist.  I was fortunate enough to meet various members of the royal family.  Had he lived, perhaps I would have been lucky enough to meet King Faisal.  It is a regret that I never had such an opportunity.

I've inserted a photo of a young Faisal and a young Khalid at the begining of this blog.  Since I met King Khalid when he was an elder statesman, never did I dream he was such a handsome young man.  But I should have known, for King Khalid was the father of some of the most beautiful princesses in the kingdom.  His breathtakingly lovely daughters had inherited their father's fine looks.  And, like their father, they were very sweet natured.

FOR THOSE INTERESTED, scroll down for additional information about King Faisal:

 

 

 

 

Faisal of Saudi Arabia





King of Saudi Arabia


Reign
November 2, 1964 – March 25, 1975 (11 years)


Predecessor
Saud


Successor
Khalid





Spouse
Sultana bin Ahmed bin Muhammad Al-Sudairi (died)Iffat Al-Thunayan


Issue


Prince Abdullah Prince Muhammad Princess Sara Princess Lolowah Prince Khalid Prince Saud Prince Sa'd Prince Abdul-Rahman Prince Bandar Princess Latifa Princess Munira Princess al-Jauhara Princess al-Anud Princess Misha'il Princess Fahda Princess Nura Prince Turki Princess Haifa


House
House of Saud


Father
Abdul-Aziz


Mother
Turfa


Born
1906 Riyadh, Al Rashid


Died
25 March 1975(1975-03-25) (aged 69) Saudi Arabia


Religion
Sunni Islam

Faisal bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud (1906 – March 25, 1975) (Arabic: فيصل بن عبدالعزيز آل سعود‎ Fayṣal ibn 'Abd al-'Azīz Āl Su'ūd) was King of Saudi Arabia from 1964 to 1975. As king, he is credited with rescuing the country's finances and implementing a policy of modernization and reform, while his main foreign policy themes were pan-Islamism, anti-Communism, and pro-Palestinian nationalism.[1][2] He successfully stabilized the kingdom's bureaucracy and his reign had significant popularity among Saudis. In 1975, he was assassinated by his nephew Faisal bin Musaid.

 

 



 Lineage

Faisal was born in Riyadh. He was the third son of Saudi Arabia's founder, Abdul-Aziz. Faisal's mother was Tarfa bint Abduallah bin Abdulateef al Sheekh,whom Abdul-Aziz had married in 1902 after capturing Riyadh. She was from the family of the Al ash-Sheikh, descendants of Muhammad bin Abdul-Wahhab. Her father, Abd Allah ibn Abd al-Latif Al ash-Sheikh, was one of Abdul-Aziz's principal religious teachers and advisers. By the time of his father's death, Faisal was the second oldest surviving son.

Early life of King Faisal

As one of Abdul-Aziz's eldest sons, Faisal was delegated numerous responsibilities to consolidate control over Arabia. In 1925, Faisal, in command of an army of Saudi loyalists, won a decisive victory in the Hijaz. In return, he was made the governor of Hijaz the following year.

After the new Saudi kingdom was formalized in 1932, Faisal became Minister of Foreign Affairs, a position he continued to hold even as King. Faisal also commanded a section of the Saudi forces that took part in the brief Saudi-Yemeni War of 1934, successfully fighting off Yemeni claims over Saudi Arabia's southern provinces.

ARAMCO's development of Saudi oil after World War II nearly sextupled revenue from $10.4 million in 1946 to $56.7 million in 1950. As King Abdul-Aziz's health declined and his leadership became lax, Faisal comprehended the necessity for better economic management. In the summer of 1951, Abdul-Aziz enlarged the government bureaucracy to include many more members of the extended royal family. Faisal's son Abdullah was appointed Minister of Health and Interior.

Crown Prince and Prime Minister

Upon the accession of Faisal's elder brother, Saud, to the throne in 1953, Faisal was appointed Crown Prince. Saud, however, embarked on a lavish and ill-considered spending program that included the construction of a massive royal residence on the outskirts of the capital, Riyadh. He also faced pressure from neighboring Egypt, where Gamal Abdel Nasser had overthrown the monarchy in 1952. Nasser was able to cultivate a group of dissident princes led by Prince Talal who defected to Egypt. Fearing that Saud's financial policies were bringing the state to the brink of collapse, and that his handling of foreign affairs was inept, senior members of the royal family and the religious leadership (the ulema) pressured Saud into appointing Faisal to the position of prime minister in 1958, giving Faisal wide executive powers.In this new position, Faisal set about cutting spending dramatically in an effort to rescue the state treasury from bankruptcy. This policy of financial prudence was to become a hallmark of his era and earned him a reputation for thriftiness among the populace.

A power struggle ensued thereafter between Saud and Faisal, and on December 18, 1960, Faisal resigned as prime minister in protest, arguing that Saud was frustrating his financial reforms. Saud took back his executive powers and, having induced Talal to return from Egypt, appointed Talal as minister of finance.In 1962, however, Faisal rallied enough support within the royal family to install himself as prime minister for a second time.[9]

It was during this period as head of the Saudi government that Faisal, though still not king, established his reputation as a reforming and modernizing figure.He introduced education for women and girls despite the consternation of many conservatives in the religious establishment. To appease the objectors, however, he allowed the female educational curriculum to be written and overseen by members of the religious leadership, a policy which lasted long after Faisal's death. It was also during this time that Faisal formally abolished slavery.

In 1963, Faisal established the country's first television station, though actual broadcasts would not begin for another two years. As with many of his other policies, the move aroused strong objections from the religious and conservative sections of the country. Faisal assured them, however, that Islamic principles of modesty would be strictly observed, and made sure that the broadcasts contained a large amount of religious programming.

Struggle with Saud

The struggle with King Saud continued in the background during this time. Taking advantage of the king's absence from the country for medical reasons in early 1963, Faisal began amassing more power for himself. He removed many of Saud's loyalists from their posts and appointed like-minded princes in key military and security positions,such as his brother Abdullah, to whom he gave command of the National Guard in 1962.Upon Saud's return, Faisal demanded that he be made regent and that Saud be reduced to a purely ceremonial role. In this, he had the crucial backing of the ulema, including an edict (or fatwa) issued by the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, a relative of Faisal's on his mother's side, calling on Saud to accede to his brother's demands. Saud refused, however, and made a last-ditch attempt to retake executive powers, leading Faisal to order the National Guard to surround Saud's palace. His loyalists outnumbered and outgunned, Saud relented, and on March 4, 1964, Faisal was appointed regent. A meeting of the elders of the royal family and the ulema was convened later that year, and a second fatwa was decreed by the grand mufti calling on Saud to abdicate the throne in favor of his brother. The royal family supported the fatwa and immediately informed Saud.

And, history was made when Faisal became the 3rd king of Saudi Arabia.

 

(This last bit of information pulled from the internet.)

 

Warrior Baby – The chapter that didn't make the book cut.

Warrior Baby all grown up!

When any writer is writing a book, often there are pages and even chapters that do not make the publisher's "cut."  This was one of those chapters.  But, it is a true event that occurred, a true story about Joanna al-Askari.  She almost didn't make it to live.  Her mother, Kafia, was terribly distressed when she learned that she was expecting a 5th child.  The family was poor, she was married to a man who was deaf and barely able to make a living.  Kafia, who loved her living children, felt she could not go on.  Living in a time and country where legal abortion was not an option, Kafia tried everything she could to abort her pregnancy.  One effort was more bizarre than the other.  She did not succeed.  Joanna was born, and indeed grew up to be a "warrior baby," the name given to her by the doctor after she survived the numerous abortions attempts.  Although I wrote this chapter in the voice of the unborn, all the events that occurred to the family are real.  Here you go… Here's WARRIOR BABY!

Warrior Baby

By Jean Sasson

My mother is trying to murder me.

No one knows about this potential crime but me.

Even if I could tell somebody, they wouldn't believe me.  Mother is such a sweet-faced beauty that no one could possibly associate violence with her image, and certainly not murder.  She's got a delicately featured face dominated by enormous expressive, coffee-hued eyes.  Even now, at my tender age, I understand that because of her dramatic beauty, mother ensnares the approving attention of everyone who sees her.

But mother does not look beautiful now.  She is bounding about the room with all the frenzied desperation of a stalked gazelle.  Her lovely features are those of a stranger, an angry stranger who twists mother's sweet countenance into intense grimaces and scowls.  Even the veins of mother's neck are swollen into ugly ropes that mar her throat's white smoothness.

Mother is lovely is so many ways, but she is most proud of her hands.  She is often complimented on her hands, repeatedly told that they are graceful instruments, exquisitely slender, with svelte fingers that are generally adorned with rings.

I curve my head further downward to look at my little hands. I stretch my tiny fingers as wide as I can.  My hands have only recently formed, but I think they are beautiful, too, just like mother's fingers, long and smoothly tapered.

I quickly forget about my delicate fingers to shrivel in fear when mother gives a push against me.  Mother's hands are ugly now, distorted into tautened claws, shorn of all ornament, crimson red and grasping.

Suddenly I fear mother's hands.  I believe she'll use those claws to rip me out of her womb.

Mother is determined to kill me.  She first grapples to lift two heavy bags of rice up on a table-top; then she pulls herself off a foot-stool to climb atop a table.  Once on the table, she stands quietly before she bends forward.  With a big groan she tucks a sack of rice between each forearm and her waist.  With bags snug in place, mother sends a heartfelt, although questionable, prayer heavenward before she launches her body into the air.  She lands heavily as her splayed feet plants firmly on the hard floor.  As she lands, a soft could of dust puffs from the Oriental carpet, causing mother to have a long coughing spell.

I cough, too, in my own delicate manner.

Overhead, the dainty chandelier that my father once proudly transported all the way from Paris now sways upon the impact.  I sway, too, but when my little form thrusts against the liquid-filled uterine sac so carefully designed to protect me from undue jarring, I'm only bounced about, remaining unharmed.

With those long fingers stretched wide, mother carefully strokes her abdomen.  She seems to understand that I have not lurched loose.

I want to tell her that I'm a stubborn little fetus and it's going to take an enormous effort for her to tear me away.

My mother is stubborn, as well, so our battle is just beginning.

She gathers up the rice bags for a second time to plod out into the hallway, where she stares for a minute at the long stairwell.  She clutches those heavy rice bags in her arms and begins to run up and down the stairs.  She executes this particular exercise ten times before examining herself once more.

She grunts in frustration when she realizes that there's a baby still on board.  Her lips pucker in displeasure.

Mother makes the trip up the stairway once again.  She poises on the top step, her face straining with a big effort, her jaws locked tight like a vicious guard dog.  She balances quietly for a brief moment before she purposely loses her footing.  She flings her body down in a whirling tumble, finally collapsing heavily on one side.  Mother is breathless from the pain of the fall, but even the hard tumble fails to accomplish her goal.  I am still attached.

I'm shaken, but with every breath she takes, I take one too.  I rebound from the fall more easily than mother, because her body is protecting me.  I want to be born, to have a chance to live on the outside world, so I'm hanging on, no matter what!

Lying prone on the floor staring at the ceiling, Mother becomes even more exasperated at me.

I want to cry out, to remind her that I am an innocent fetus in her womb and that I want to experience life in all its richness and wonder.  My feelings are hurt because mother has never even pondered the life I have inside of me, or of the promise of my future.

When she finally considers me, it's an unsettling image that flashes through her mind – she imagines my tiny fingers tenaciously hanging on to her flesh, refusing to let go of her womb.  For a second or two she becomes curious about me, this little fetus nestled so stubbornly inside her.  She sighs, wondering whether I am a girl or a boy, big or small, dark or fair.  Sadly, the idea of my life is so disagreeable to mother that she forces herself to shove aside personal details of what I might be.  I know that she is trying to push back her conscience.

Mother is wrong to try and kill me.

Although I am only a young and physically undeveloped fetus, I am so close to my mother that I can sense her every thought and action.  I am a part of her and can feel her every move.  I can hear every noise she makes.  I can hear everything that my mother hears.  I understand when mother reminds herself of her big problems.  She is in a very difficult marriage and there are many financial problems.  These very real tribulations have caused my mother to turn away from having more children.  She wrongly believes that another child will make her life even more impossible.

I long to tell her that I'll be a good baby and I won't cry or be too mischievous, but I can't communicate with words, at least not yet.

Mother becomes more angry because she is mired in an unwelcome battle of wills with me, an obstinate fetus.  Mother just wants me to go away, but I won't.  Mother grunts from low in her throat, and the sound inside her body reverberates as a roar.  I admit that his new noise frightens me.

Mother cries out to no one in particular, "Has any unborn child of a woman ever been so determined to live?"

That's when she starts to consider all options.  What else might she do to rid herself of me, an unwanted child?

Mother suddenly recalls a long-ago story about a desperate woman who had succeeded in firing an unwanted fetus out of her womb by using excessive heat.  Mother can't recall the details of the procedure, but does remember that extreme heat had dislodged that woman's fetus.

I'm terrified by this latest idea, but mother becomes excited and clicks her tongue, wondering what she might do to heat up her insides.

With a new plan in mind, mother lifts herself from the floor, gathers the bags of rice and goes into the kitchen.  She takes her new electric iron out of its special storage spot in the small room off the kitchen, plugs it into the single electrical socket in the kitchen, and waits.

I wait, too.  While waiting, my tiny heart begins to pound loudly.  This is a new sound coming from within my own body and I am truly frightened.

Mother splashes droplets of water on the underside of the iron until the drops spin into wee water balls that sizzle off the iron.  She then presses the hot iron firmly against her abdomen.  Her cotton dress provides only scant protection between the iron and her bare skin so I can feel the heat almost instantly.  Mother does not seem to notice the heat, and indeed, moves the iron from one spot to another on her abdomen until a sheen of sweat wraps her face and chest.

Trying to protect myself, I draw into a teeny flesh ball, keeping the heat away from as much of my tiny body as possible.  Mother thinks that this unrelenting heat will drive me to turn loose, to give up the nest I so love.  But I hang tight.  I'm not going anywhere!  I like it here.

After long minutes pass, mother's entire body is fuming hot.  She lifts her dress to see that her stomach is redder than the red poppies in her flower garden.  Still she detests no distress from me.  This warmth is not as uncomfortable as mother had hoped.  The liquid in the sac surrounding me is quite warm but thus far, I am mainly unaffected.

I hear mother sigh deeply then she mutters, "Allah, help me.  I cannot have another child."

Does mother truly believe that God will help her to expunge a fetus?

I don't think so.

Finally mother unplugs the iron and leaves it on the counter to cool.  I know that she is searching for other ideas.  She has a thought about a sharp instrument that she might use to dislodge me.  This is a very dangerous plan.  I might not be able to squeeze myself small enough to avoid a sharp knife.  Thankfully mother is queasy with this idea and she moves on to other plots.  Mother's eyes gleam at the sight of a large sack of yellow onions.  She recalls another story she had once heard.  These onions might give her the result she is seeking.

Oh me.

Mother fills a large pot with water and sets the pot on the stove to heat.  She selects ten of the largest onions and peels away the diaphanous skin before placing the onions in the boiling water.  She grimaces as the revolting odor saturates her immaculate home.  After thirty minutes of boiling, mother selects her largest handled cup and dips it into the onion broth, blowing the liquid to cool it, then takes a big drink.  She makes a face that carves deep furrows on her cheeks.  The juice must taste really vile.

But I'm not bothered in the slightest by this onion juice.  I can't taste the stuff.  Mother is wasting her time.

Still, she forces herself to drink the entire pot of onion juice.  That's when she begins to gag.  Then she starts heaving and throws up all the juice.

This is no fun for me, but it's nothing compared to the fall down the stairs.

Mother feels very sick, but enjoys a haze of pleasure over her wretched

condition.  She truly believes that all this violent retching and vomiting will

discharge the fetus that torments her.

I yawn.

Mother is miserable, but I'm calm in my little sac.

Mother stares at the clock.  She only has an hour before her four children will return home.  She has an eleven-year-old daughter, Alia, an eight-year-old son, Ra'ad, and four-year-old twins, Sa'ad and Muna.  Earlier in the day mother had left her four children in the care of a good neighbor.  Mother told the neighbor that she had an important doctor's appointment that she could not break.

My mother has begun to lie.  Lies?  Murder?  Where is this ill-advised adventure leading my sweet mother?

Mother is stubborn.  Her thoughts return to the problem at hand.  She believes that she cannot fail.  Her nostrils tense with frustration.  She gives another noisy groan that causes me to wiggle in distress.

I hate all this loud noise.

I know that mother is a young woman, only thirty-three years old, although with four children and a demanding husband, she is beginning to feel very old.  She believes that a fifth child will make her feel older still.

I don't agree.

Mother promptly decides that she must take stronger measures.  I soon overhear her talking to another woman, someone in the neighborhood who makes extra money by selling illegal drugs to other women, drugs that will abort pregnancies without harming the mothers.

Mother doesn't want to die.

She only wants me to die.

I brace myself.

I know that my mother would have never believed she would resort to such measures to murder her unborn child.  She is a woman who loves children.  But since the massacre of the royal family four years ago, along with the loss of father's furniture factory during the same turbulent time, mother's troubles have increased greatly.  Now the prospect of an additional child feels like a burdensome yoke tethered to her neck, rather than as a joy gathered at her bosom.

I am so sad, for I want to bring pleasure to my mother.  I want to be a source of joy, not despair.

Mother happily receives the pills she requests, promising the woman that she will pay her with the following week's grocery money.  I guess my siblings will go hungry so that mother can get rid of me.

Mother returns home with those deadly pills, so carefully folded into her handkerchief.  She walks with a relieved bounce to her step.

I bounce, too.

Mother makes her plans.  Tomorrow morning she will take care of me, the problem, once and for all.  After Alia and Ra'ad are sent off to school, she will put the twins down for their naps before swallowing the pills, one by one.  By tomorrow evening, I will be gone.  I will be sacrificed for the good of the family.

Or so she thinks.

I don't plan on going anywhere.

I'm so tired after all the jumping, rolling, and heaving, that I sleep soundly through the night.

The following morning, mother goes into action.  Her plan goes smoothly.  She gets her oldest off to school.  She plays with the twins until they are tired.  She puts them down for a nap.  She swallows four white pills.

I am tiny so it doesn't take a large dose of chemicals to put me out.  I go to sleep very quickly.

There's a lot of ongoing action while I sleep.

I later hear that when my older siblings return from school that they make an alarming discovery.  The twins are scampering and squealing unattended in the house.  Mother sprawls unconscious on the floor.

Ra'ad cries out an alarm and close neighbors rush into our home, speeding mother to the nearest hospital.

I become aware nearly at the same moment mother is aroused into consciousness.

The head physician's voice is gentle, and his sing-song tone too low for mother to hear clearly.

But I hear.

"Kafia.  Kafia.  This is the doctor. You are in the hospital.  Do you remember what happened to you?"

Mother's memory is blurred along with her vision.  For many long moments she stares mutely at the doctor's shadowy face, struggling to understand his words.

I give her a good kick, hoping to bring her to her senses.  She must tell the doctor about those pills.

Mother's muddled mind fails to connect with the present time.  But she is thinking, and that is a good sign.  She asks, "Where am I? Where are my children?"

My tiny heart plunges.  Mother is thinking of everyone but me, the fetus she tried to kill.  In fact, she has forgotten all about me.

When the physician gently feels mother's abdomen, her memory suddenly returns.  She can't decide whether or not to tell the doctor about those pills.

I leap about as much as I can, which isn't much, considering my tiny size and the miniature compartment confining me.  But my movements have the obvious desired effect, for mother suddenly remembers her previous actions.

Poison pills come to her mind.  Fearful for her own life, and the real possibility that she might leave her children alone without a mother, she gestures to the physician that she has taken pills.

Mother wants to live.

I want mother to live, as well, for the sake of two lives.

The doctor asks, "You are pregnant?"

"Yes."

"And you took something to end the pregnancy?"

"Yes."

"What did you take, Kafia?"

"Four white pills."

Seeing the worried look in the doctor's eyes, Mother pleads with the doctor to save her, that she must live for her four children.  She even starts to pray.

Mother doesn't pray for me.  She truly has forgotten me.  I feel so sad.  That's when I feel something trickling down my teeny cheeks.  What is this new thing?  Then I realize that I am crying, the same way I've seen mother cry she when thinks about me, and how she doesn't want me.

The physicians use all their medical skills to save mother.  While treating her, my family, along with various neighbors are waiting in terror, worried by mother's well-being.  Mother is the person who takes care for the entire household. None can imagine life without her.

Of course, they don't know about me yet.  But they will.

Many are the times I've been told about that unfolding scene in the hospital waiting area.

Each person sits silent, lost in confused fears, unable to understand this latest catastrophe.

My father is the most agitated.  From the first moment father saw mother, he loved her.  Mother was a beautiful Kurdish woman, and over the years, her exciting personality had stamped his life with a pleasure he had never believed would be his own.  Now he sits and wonders:  How can I live without my Kafia.  He is frantic as he paces, his hands clasped behind his back, waiting.

My oldest brother, Ra'ad, is the only member of the family whose intuition tells him that his mother's recent peculiar behavior might explain the current crisis.  Over the past week, my older brother had witnessed much of what I had lived.  He had slipped away from the inattentive neighbor to sneak back to see what his mother might be doing.  My poor brother was frightened when he witnessed his mother jump from the dining room table, and then throw herself down the stairs.  But he was most terrified when he watched his mother tried to iron herself to death.  All these bewildering things go through his mind, and when he tries to explain these happenings to other family members, they quickly dismiss his wild descriptions as nothing more than silly childhood fantasies.

Soon a youthful intern with eyelids narrowed over two restless eyes seeks out the family.  He fills the role of inexperienced doctor perfectly.  He is wearing a blood-stained doctor's white coat and slouching through the hallway behind a face pasted with futility.  Nothing about his appearance is reassuring, but my family is so eager to leave mother's fate that they excuse his unkempt appearance.

The intern's spongy lips flap.  "The al-Askari family?"

A neighbor points out my father.  The intern does not know that my father is deaf.  My father concentrates, trying to read the young man's malleable lips.

"Mr. al-Askari, there is uncertainty as to your wife's fate."  The intern gestures carelessly with his long fingers.  "She might live.  She might die.  At this time the attending physician is unsure."  Without further explanation, the insensitive intern swivels on his heels and slouches back to where he had come, leaving mother's family and friends in a great state of alarm.  The doctor had failed to tell them the medical problem, only that she might live, or she might die!

Father is so stunned that he retreats to a corner of the long hallway facing the emergency area.  His breathing becomes so labored that he begins to pant.

My father, Mohammed al-Askari, had lived a life of enormous challenges.  At only seven years of age, he was struck with scarlet fever which left him wholly deaf.  His early deafness affected his speech and soon he was unable to verbalize his thoughts.  His speech grew so muddled that he ceased speaking, accepting as his mantle the deaf and mute son of Ali Ridha al-Askari.  Such a malady would be a tragedy for any child in any country, but proved to be a serious handicap in a land where such deficiencies are often ridiculed.  Time after time, my sensitive father was humiliated, which sowed a permanent sorrow in his demeanor.  After the onset of this double affliction, father was sent abroad to France for special schooling.  Those years had offered father a measure of relief, but after returning to Iraq, a permanent sadness triggered by society's ignorance once again clouded his life.

He has other problems.  The specter of physical danger has hung over my family since July 1958, when the Iraqi royal family was overthrown, with many members of the family brutally murdered.  The youthful king Faisal II had been gunned down.  The young king was adored by my father and the entire al-Askari family.

My father's family had enjoyed a special connection to the King Faisal, as they had been intimately linked with the royal family from the moment of Iraq's formation during the time of World War I.  Father, along with all the al-Askari's was a resolute supporter of the regime.  Thus he was targeted.  In the violence that followed the massacre of the royal family, an angry mob burned down father's cherished furniture factory, the only one of its kind in the entire country.  Father and mother and their four children were turned out of their home, finding themselves in dire financial straits.  Father had never recovered from that dreadful time filled with human loss and economic disaster.  Now he is fearful that he will lose his beloved wife, my mother.

After the passing of yet another long hour, punctuated by the cries of tired toddlers and the typical commotion of a busy hospital waiting room, another doctor seeks out my family to tell them what they have so feverishly prayed to hear.

"Mr. al-Askari?"

My father bends his head forward, exposing his scalp.  His hair is plastered against his skull in some places and sticks out wildly at others, for in his worry and despair, he has been pulling at his hair with his hands.

"Mr. al-Askari, your wife is going to live."

Father's spine straightens.

"Mr. al-Askari, the infant lived as well."

And so my family finally discovers my existence.  There is a chorus of gasps.  They don't appear to be pleased.

My father's face darkens at this unexpected bit of news.  He clasps his hands rightly.  His wife has kept an important secret from him.

The doctor's surprising announcement continues to set off a buzz of excitement from the family and friends and neighbors now gathering closer.  All claim that they knew nothing of me.  Mother has been very sly and secretive.

The doctor, finally realizing that my father can neither hear nor speak, pitches his voice more loudly.  He begins to shout, as though volume alone might be the problem of the one deaf.  "Mr. al-Askari, your wife took medicine to abort the child.  She almost killed herself, but the infant seems perfectly normal."  He smiles, "This unborn child of yours is a little warrior baby, the victor of many violent assaults."

For sure I've been fighting bravely, but only now does someone else recognize my courage and determination.

My father is not happy.  His face suddenly furrows and he staggers backward, struck by the unknowns of mother's life.  He simply cannot believe the message he has been given.  His wife is the most devoted mother, loving her children with marked tenderness.  He cannot believe that his gentle wife could plot to murder her unborn child.

He should have seen mother tumbling down those stairs.  Then he would have believed it!

Seeing father's bewildered expression, the kindly physician finally realizes that my father was unaware of my existence.  "You can see your wife in a few minutes.  The nurse will come for you."

Then the doctor nods at the large crowd of onlookers with some puzzlement before turning away.  He tucks his head into his slumped shoulders as he threads his way past hospital equipment that litters the narrow hallway.

My stunned father sits down, staring ahead, trying his best to absorb the shocking information.

Now well settled into a hospital room, mother is finally conscious.  She is propped up in her hospital bed, relieved to find herself alive.  She is comforted, as well, by the belief that she is no longer with child.

But I am still alive and none the worse for the experience.  Mother just doesn't know it yet.

Mother's plan had worked, nearly too well, she thinks grimly as she worries what the doctor might reveal to her husband.  She stretches her neck to look past the slightly cracked door, willing the doctor to appear, knowing that she must ask him to keep her secret.  To keep peace in her marriage, she will urge the doctor to tell her husband a small lie.  She must say or do whatever she must to convince the doctor that it is not necessary to reveal a pregnancy that is no more.

"Ha!"

The doctor soon steps into her room.  He's a funny looking man.  The loose skin of his forehead folds forward over his eyes like a visor, his face ruggedly lined from a challenging life of a low paying job, long hours, and gloomy outcomes.

Before mother can open her mouth to voice what she believes is a reasonable request, the doctor begins to lecture her.

He stares severely at mother and when he speaks, those skin folds move along with his words!  "Kafia, you nearly killed yourself.  You would have left four innocent children without a mother.  You tried to discard an innocent being."  He paused before starting up again, "But I believe that God sent an angel to protect this baby, for your baby is a strong warrior, and he, or she, is thriving.  Your baby is healthy, Kafia, unharmed by your foolish behavior.  Now, you will go home tomorrow and you will not consider this foolishness again.  Be happy for this child.  Your baby's character is well formed and this baby is brave and stubborn. He, or she, is bound to bring you great joy.

I listen carefully to his words.  Thank goodness someone wants me to be born!  When I am called a warrior baby, I puff out my little chest with pride.

Mother would not have been more surprised if the doctor had told her that she had suddenly sprouted another head!  The fetus is still living? How can that be?  Mother knew that she, a full grown and healthy adult, had nearly died.  And a tiny fetus survived?  Mother is so stunned that she cannot speak.  She sinks back against the pillows, her face frozen in disappointment.

Tear gather for a second time in my eyes because my mother is disappointed that I have not simply vanished from her life.

The doctor's words gather in harshness, "If you try this again, Kafia, you will die.  Is that what you want?  To die?"

Mother gives a faint shake of her head.  Her real feelings remain unspoken.  She believes that no one can understand her insufferable life.

The annoyed doctor blasts his words, "Answer me, Kafia!  Do you want to die?"

Mother does not want to die.

She only wants me to die.

"No," she whispers.  "No, I must live.  I have children who need me.  I must live."  But her mind is racing.  How will she cope with an infant?  And, what if she has another set of twins?  She squirms at the possibility.  I squirm with her.  But I do wish I could whisper in her ear and tell her that her fears are unfounded.  I am in the womb alone, a tiny girl.  How much trouble can I be?

But to mother, Sa'ad and Muna together are too much for one woman.  Although Alia and Ra'ad are bigger, they are not big enough to help around the house.  Now there will be a new baby.  Mother grunts, suddenly engrossed in yet a second hazardous scheme.  Her solution is simple.  She decides that if the doctor tells her she is having twins yet for a second time, she will throw herself into the Tigris River!  That will take care of the problem once and for all!

I shiver with terror.  Submerged deep inside mother's body, I will not be able to swim to safety.

Truly, I fear that I will not get out of this womb alive.

The doctor relents a bit and pats mother's hand.

I feel what mother feels, and now she feels so tired, old with the knowledge that too soon I will cause her to bloat, and then after the birth, she will begin to wither.

I'm sorry!

Mother mutters, "A woman's life is filled with burdens."

Hmmmm.  This knowledge gives me pause for I am female and one day I will be a woman, too, just like my mother.  For the first time I feel a quiver of sympathy for my mother's situation.

Suddenly mother remembers the rest of her family, all waiting to come to her, all expecting an explanation for their fright.  Mother looks into the doctor's yellowed face, a man who obviously works too many hours, all indoors.  "What did you tell my husband? Mother asks.

His voice is stern once again.  "What do you think I told him?  I told your husband the truth.  It's important for your family to know what you are capable of.  Now they will take care to prevent you from trying such a dangerous stunt again!"

Mother's shoulders slump.  It's no use struggling anymore, she decides in a flash.  She has no choice.  She will deliver this child.  But there will be no more, she determines with a jut of her angular chin, though she wonders how she might stop my father's desire for the marriage bed.

I don't yet know what that is about.

The doctor turns abruptly and quickly walks away, his energy somehow renewed by lashing out at mother.  Without turning back to face her, he promises, "I will send in your family."  He slams the door behind him.

Mother stares at her abdomen in shock.  She wishes for x-ray eyes to look to her insides, to view me, a super fetus who has blocked her at every turn.  Mother sighs loudly.  There is nothing else she can do.  She must have this baby.

I sigh deeply, the sigh of the saved.  Feeling secure for the first time in days, I nestle quietly, snuggling safely in my mother's womb, the first crisis of my life finally past.

Mother is not so comfy.  She stares at the closed door.  Now that father knows the truth, she is dreading facing him.  My father is a kindly man who loves all his children.  He will be disappointed, she knows.  Mother has spent her entire married life trying to please her husband.  How will he accept her actions?  Unexpected behavior that he will consider unspeakable?

Mother has been married to my father for eleven years now, in an arranged marriage to a man who cannot hear nor speak.  The union has been very difficult for mother, for she had wed against her will.  In truth, her heart had long before been stirred by another, a handsome young man in her village who had believed that the beautiful Kafia Hasoon would one day be his bride.  But marriages in Kurdistan are never arranged in consideration of young hearts, but rather for advantageous mergers of family alliances.  Mother's family believed that an inter-alliance with the influential Baghdadi al-Askari's would enhance their own status, and so she was given in marriage to a man she has never met.

Mother was miserably sad to be forced into marriage with someone she did not know, and someone who lived so far removed from her own family that she would be lucky to see them once a year.  But the years had revealed my father's goodness, and over time mother grew to respect him, even to feel surges of affection on occasion.

Father is a good man.  I can't wait to meet him.

Mother's quiet hospital room suddenly fills with people and noise.  Her family and friends are so noisy that I cannot sleep, although I am exhausted.  Streams of family and friends and neighbors pour into the room, all with friendly passion to convey their relief at mother's recovery.

Several friends shout out their congratulations on my upcoming birth, something that excites me.

"Kafia!  Thanks be to God that you are well."

"Kafia!  You are a picture of health!"

Mother and father glance at once another, then break their connecting gazes.

Father is too kindly to rebuke his wife, yet his eyes speak his emotions.  He stands quietly.  Tears well in his eyes as he stares at his wife, his vast love now bordered with fear.

Mother waits, expecting to see his hands flash in angry sign language, but nothing is expressed.

Mother's spirits struggle up.

Suddenly I realize that my frightening battle for life has ensured me a special spot in the hearts of all who now know about me.  I have become a family legend and I am not yet born!

Whispered words travel through the community about the event, and the tenacity of my mother's unborn child.  The doctor's prediction of the unborn child's warrior spirit is a favorite tale of the neighborhood.  Stories abound of my strength and determination to come into their world.  The neighbors considered the most wise calmly predict that I am a strong male, a boy who will grow to be a warrior.  Supposedly I will make Iraqis proud, as had my famous Uncle, Jafar Pasha al-Askari.  This uncle had proved himself to be a confirmed military genius of World War I, a post-war diplomat, and a treasured friend of many leading Europeans and Iraqis.  Jafar Pasha was an extraordinary man for any country or any century, and each time a son was born into the large al-Askari family, hope sprouted that the genetic combination that had produced Jafar Pasha would re-emerge in yet a new child in the extended family.

I hope I won't disappoint.

My mother's early actions to abort me arouses a silent vigilance from every family member, close family friends, and knowing neighbors.  Mother is rarely alone to generate further mischief, should she be so inclined.  My arrival is awaited with breathless excitement.

Even mother succumbs to the mounting anticipation and begins to enjoy the unusual amount of attention.  Enormous excitement erupts when mother reports on my active moments, with my every thump and kick seriously evaluated.

"Yes!  This one is a strong boy, a warrior," my mother agrees, much to my amusement.

I may be a girl, but I know that I have a warrior spirit.  I believe the words I am hearing.  I begin to practice balling my little fingers into fists.  I'm a fighter!  I practice powerful kicks, as least as powerful as one can manage while in a small womb.

Mother reports that I am more active than the twins.

I give an especially strong kick each time I hear mother brag about my strength.

Six months go by.  Soon I am nine months in the womb.  I am getting crowded in here and am impatient to be born, to pop out of my nest and take a look at the world.  I am too small for my sac and I begin to push and strain.  My movements create the first pangs of childbirth and mother sounds a cry that is answered by many.  Engrossed family and friends and neighbors rush throughout the neighborhood banging on doors and shouting the long-anticipated news, "Kafia's baby is coming!"

One old man who had served as a soldier in the Arab Revolt and is still devoted to his general, my uncle Jafa Pasha who had led the Arabs to victory over the Ottoman Turks, struck out to run in a tight circle, happily shouting, "The warrior Jafar Pasha is returning!"

Several people rush to alert my father, to tell him to leave his work and come quickly to the hospital.  It is believed that he is a lucky man who is about to embrace a favored son.

I can't wait to see his face.  Thus far, I've only seen him through mother's vision.

The neighborhood buzzes like a party, and with a sense of celebration and happiness, my mother and I am rushed to the hospital.

Started hospital staff wrongly believe that a dangerous riot or tragic fire has occurred when tens of people stream into the hospital.  They are astonished to learn that an entire neighborhood has accompanied one lone woman about to give birth.

As mother had feared, my birthing is more protracted and more grueling than that of my siblings.  I'm tiny but my little elbows and knees are especially sharp.

Mother screeches, "This one is equipped with razors!"

I try not to cause so much pain for my mother, but I'm confused by all the noise and activity.  I only want to get this over with so I try to paddle out with my arms and legs.

Mother screeches even louder!

I screech with her!  I want to shout, "Let me out!"

My family awaits, each lost in their personal reflections.

Father sits with his four children. He has never raised the topic of mother's misdeeds, yet he is often plagued by the memory that the sweet-mothering Kaifa tried so hard to halt my birth, and my life.  My entrance today is bringing back my father's pain, but he suffers, as always, in silence and isolation.

My big brother Ra'ad squirms uncomfortably when he hears a neighbor stridently proclaim his desire for our mother to produce a big boy, a warrior.  Brother Ra'ad is a gentle soul, loving his mother deeply.  He only wants his mother to be safe, caring little whether I am a boy or a girl.  My precious brother will one day prove himself to be the protector of my family.

My big sister Ali wishes for a little girl.  My poor sister has been emotionally wounded time and again by the words and actions of our paternal grandmother, Mirriam.  Grandmother Mirriam detests

Alia simply for being born female.  She mocks Alia at every turn for her useless existence.  Simply because Alia knows that her cruel grandmother is praying for a big boy, Alia is praying for a delicate girl.

All wait, all draped in their explicit emotions.

Finally I push through every obstacle and pop out into the world.  I'm bewildered at the tremendous noise and I howl in protest.  Too many hands are grabbing at me.  People I do not know are rubbing rough cloths over my face and body.  There are bright lights glowing and the unexpected brightness hurts my eyes.  Suddenly strange hands squeeze me tight!  I'm confused and frightened.  This outside world is nothing as I thought and I'm scared.  I want to go back inside my mother, to snuggle in the dark and warmth, but I cannot.  I am stuck in this loud new world!

I wiggle my legs and arms and scream at the top of my lungs.  Everyone is talking loudly and I hear the loudest nurse proclaim.  "She is too tiny to be this strong!"  I kick and scream some more, alerting them to the danger, that indeed, they are in the presence of a little warrior!

Okay!  I've warned them! Watch out!  I'm a warrior baby.  Back away!

Only after I'm wrapped snugly in a soft cloth do I calm down.

My mother is taken away into another room and I'm cradled in the arms of someone whose voice I've never heard.  This is not good.  Suddenly I'm being bounced in this stranger's arms as she waltzes through a doorway and into an area where there is even more noise and confusion.

My family sees a tall, brawny nurse holding a newborn walking in their direction.

I have decided that I do not like this nurse, even though her arms are muscular and she is holding me safely.  I only want to find my father.  I've heard his grunts, his struggles to speak, so many times that I'm bound to instantly know him.  I begin to writhe so powerfully that I threaten to wiggle away.  A few female friends of the family squeal their concern but a hushed silence of nervous expectation falls over the rest of the crowd.

The nurse beams a big smile.  "You have a beautiful little daughter, Mr. al-Askari."

There is a concert of gasps.  Kafia's little warrior, her troublemaker, is a girl?

Big sister Alia laughs loudly.

Big brother Ra'ad smiles broadly.

Everyone crowds around, craning their necks for the best possible view.  I am the center of everyone's attention and I bask in the adulation.

When they catch a glimpse of my little body, everyone gets their second shock.  Not only is the warrior they were expecting a female, the warrior baby is tiny.

I gurgle, laughing inside at their surprise.  Just wait until I get the chance to give each of them a powerful kick.

Then I see my father's face for the first time.  No one has to tell me that it is him. I know him instantly.  He gratefully accepts me into his massive hands.  He is gentle.  I love him.  I've never felt so safe.  I instantly calm down.

Just because babies cannot talk, does not mean that they cannot understand.  I can read my father's mind through the expression in his eyes.  To him, I am a miracle baby.  I am perfection.  My father is an emotional man and wet streams move down his face.  Yes, I recognize that wetness as tears, for I have wept while in the womb.  Father then lifts me high above his head so that everyone present can admire me.

"She is far too exquisite to be a warrior," one person whispers.

"Yes. She is a unique beauty.  Look how petite she is."

"That creamy skin is the color of ivory."

"Look at that delicate face!"

"No!  It is the hair.  That black hair will make her a star.  She has hair just as beautiful as Kafia's beautiful mane."

I yawn and raise my tiny fists.  I smile, then try to laugh.  But I can't really smile or laugh, not just yet.  But I wiggle in excitement.

I hear laughter and more praise.  I begin to kick my feet and wave my arms.  I'm happy one minute but miserable the next after several women step in to tighten the white cloths around my body.

I can't bear to be restricted!  I want to be free!  I scream as loudly as I can.

"She is threatening us," someone says approvingly.

"Our little warrior baby," another remarks with a gentle laugh.

Hady, a kind and gentle young man who I learn is a distant relative, speaks, "This baby is no warrior.  She is a great beauty.  She is so beautiful that she must be given a very special name."  Hady pauses to scan the faces surrounding him, then announces, "Her name should be Joanna."

In the Kurdish language, Joanna translates into beautiful.

I like the name and I wiggle and gurgle, drawing all attention to myself.  I've waited for this moment for many long months, a moment I almost missed, and now I want to milk it for all its worth.

The joy of my new life is infectious.  I now decide that I like the outside world!

When my father takes me back to my mother, I am as happy as I have ever been.  Everyone is rejoicing that I am alive.

Mother surprises me when she expresses joy.  The quiet accumulation of my mother's love is soon firmly affixed to me, and my life suddenly has meaning for her.

The following hours bring more happiness.  My siblings can't get enough of me.  Everyone wants to stroke my soft skin or my long black hair.  Best of all, though, mother gazes only at me, ignoring my siblings.  First she examines my tiny fingers and toes.  Then she looks intently into my little face.

I'm startled and confused when mother starts slapping her own face!

"Oh Allah!" she cries out.

Since her previous actions to try and kill me are not a secret, indeed, her plots of murder are now known by everyone in the family and the neighborhood, she surprises all when she professes shame and guilt that she tried so hard to murder me.  "Did I really try to get rid of this precious baby? She exclaims.

I look into her eyes and long to say, "I told you so," but mother is unable to read my mind the way I can read her mind.

But I'm so very happy to realize that finally, my mother truly does love me.

Thankfully, I am greatly loved by many others, as well.  And so it is with the greatest happiness when my father and mother and my four siblings escort me from the hospital to our home.

My nickname sticks and I'm known for all time as "little warrior baby."  I like it.

But most of all, I'm really glad that I fought so hard to live.

Living the human life is going to be a lot of fun!

AUTHOR'S NOTE:  I hope all of you get to read Joanna's true life story, which was very exciting and is told in LOVE IN A TORN LAND, available in eb00ks and in paperback.

Warrior Baby grows up to be a beautiful women

Memories of Kuwait and Kuwaitis and the making of THE RAPE OF KUWAIT flooded back to me upon the sad death of Saud Nasser al-Sabah

 

Meeting up with the Kuwaiti Crown Prince again in Kuwait City

A good Kuwaiti friend notified me today that the former Ambassador to the USA and Kuwaiti royal Saud Nasser al-Sabah died over the weekend.  He passed away after a valiant battle against cancer.  I haven't seen the former Ambassador in years, but I always thought highly of him, and feel very sad that he has died.  My heart goes out to his family.  I'd like to share a few of my memories of someone I found to be a true gentleman, and a very kindly human being.

(Above photo:  Here I am with the Ambassador and the Crown Prince after arriving in Kuwait City on the FREEDOM FLIGHT)

Like most Americans, the first time I heard of Saud Nasser al-Sabah, Kuwaiti Ambassador in Washington, was in August 1990, a few days after the Iraqi Army invaded Kuwait.  Although I had lived in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia for many years, I was in the USA when Iraq invaded their neighbor, and watched the drama unfold with the rest of the world.  The youthful looking Ambassador with the very serious persona was being interviewed by nearly every important media outlet in the country.  

Since a young age, I was always a news junkie, as well as someone who suffers along with others who are suffering.  It was emotional to watch all the human turmoil as terrified people ran away from the a huge military machine wracking havoc on a small and peaceful country.  I felt compelled to check out for myself what was happening.  After I decided to travel back to the area to interview refugees escaping Kuwait, I thought about how I might win the trust of Kuwaitis and others who had fled the small oil kingdom.  After living in the Middle East for nearly twelve years, I knew that few Kuwaitis would feel at ease speaking with a stranger about that day, and how their lives were affected.  That's when I made a quick decision to approach the Kuwaiti Ambassador and ask for a simple piece of paper:  a letter from the Kuwaiti government advising citizens that the government had no problem if Kuwaitis told this writer about their personal experiences on the day of the invasion.

And so I called the Kuwaiti Embassy and arranged a meeting with the Ambassador.  I was in Washington a few days later.  When I told him my plans, that on the way back to Riyadh that I was going to visit London and Cairo for the purpose of interviewing Kuwaiti refugees,  the Ambassador didn't think but a moment before agreeing to prepare a letter for if they wanted to talk, that the Government of Kuwait would like for them to tell Jean Sasson of their experiences on the day of the invasion.  There were no guidelines anyone had to follow, but I knew that letter would make any and all Kuwaitis feel more comfortable.

As I observed Saud Nasser al-Sabah, I could easily tell that he was a man who was carrying a terrible weight on his shoulders.  As the most senior representative of his government in America, it was up to him to convince the world's super power that the Iraqi invasion would not be tolerated.  Before I left, he surprised me when he told me that he had personal worries.  His wife and children had returned to Kuwait the previous week.  If memory serves me correctly, I believe that he said one of their children were getting married in Kuwait City and that his wife and daughter had returned to Kuwait, and that he had been set to join them within a few days.  Of course, the Iraqi invasion changed the plans of every person living in Kuwait.

And so I left the United States and flew to London, where I went to the Kuwaiti Embassy and started arranging interviews with Kuwaitis who were going in and out of the embassy to sort out documents and papers.  While in London I was introduced to Souad al-Sabah, the famous Kuwaiti poet and writer, and the wife of Mubarak the Great's only surviving son.  (Mubarak the Great was the former Emir of Kuwait, and the man who had helped Abdul Aziz al-Sa'ud return to Riyadh and fight to form the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.  So there is a lot of history between the two countries.)  Souad introduced me to other Kuwaiti royals who were in London when the invasion occurred, or who had fled to London after the invasion.  It was a most interesting time.

After London, I flew to Cairo where there were a large number of Kuwaiti refugees and all wanted to tell me their spine-tingling stories of escape and rescue.  After Cairo, it was back to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia where there was great excitement in the air.  Kuwaitis and others were fleeing to safety into the desert kingdom.  Many of the refugees were women and children who poured across the desert roads.  Many vehicles were driven by Kuwaiti women, a situation which created as much of an uproar as the actual Iraqi invasion.  I hung around with Kuwaiti women for nearly a week and got to know so many of their personal stories.

I learned from Kuwaitis that the Kuwaiti Emir, Crown Prince, and other Kuwaiti government officials had set up their government in Taif.  The Kuwaiti Ambassador to Saudi Arabia gave me the telephone number and told me to call them.

I was staying with my ex-husband Peter and his wife, Julie, in Riyadh, so I used their phone to call the Kuwaiti government offices in Taif.   I was caught off-guard when the Minister of Information personally answered the phone number I had been given.  After I got over the shock that the Minister was answering phones, I told him that I wanted to interview the Emir and the Crown Prince, he surprised me even more when he said, "Yes. Of course.  We will send a plane to get you!"

I told the Minister that I didn't need a private plane ride, but instead I would book a commercial flight from Riyadh to Taif.  I arrived the following morning to be met by a young and handsome Kuwaiti man who said he was my driver to take me to the government offices for my interviews.  That young man had personality plus.  Along the way he kept repeating that he wanted to be in my book and told me that he would tell me his story if I wanted it.  With my mind on the Emir and Crown Prince, I smiled and said, "Maybe."  Years later when I went to visit the new Kuwaiti Ambassador in Washington, I got the shock of my life when the Ambassador asked me, "Do you remember me?"  I had to confess that I did not.  He replied, "I was your driver when you arrived in Taif to interview the Emir and Crown Prince.  I asked you to tell my story and you didn't."   He laughed, and I laughed, although I admit that I regretted not paying more attention to my "member of the royal family" driver!

After interviewing the Emir and the Crown Prince, I interviewed a few other officials, but left for Riyadh the following day.

I was a little concerned that I would receive queries from Kuwaiti government officials as I wrote the book, but I heard nothing.  No one called to asked me the slant my book was taking, or anything about the people I met.  From taped interviews, I wrote the book in approximately six to eight weeks and turned it over to my publisher, who was handling all details of printing and publicity.

A week or so after the book was printed, I was listening to a journalist interviewing American and British soldiers based in Saudi Arabia, getting ready to go into Kuwait.  A number of those soldiers made the comment that they had no clue what it was they were going to be fighting for.

A week later I was in Washington, DC to get ready for book tour.  While there, I called the Kuwaiti Embassy and made an appointment to see the Ambassador once again.  I surprised him when I presented him with a copy of my book, THE RAPE OF KUWAIT.  His worried look faded and a big smile broke out on his face.  He was very happy to see a book that told about the personal sufferings of Kuwaiti citizens and others who had survived the invasion.  I'm sure he wanted to give a copy to everyone in Washington, and I can't blame him.  He had a big job to convince the world of the injustice occurring in Kuwait.

While there, I chatted about my trip to interview various Kuwaitis, and at the same time, I related the story of the soldiers who seemed confused as to why they were in the area, waiting to fight.  I can't recall my exact words, but I told the Ambassador, "What a pity they can't read this book, and all the stories.  Then they would know why they are there."

Obviously my words got the Ambassador to thinking.  Before my trip was over, he had asked the publisher to visit him in Washington.  That's when then Ambassador ordered copies of the book to send to Saudi Arabia to be made available to any soldier interested in reading the book.

While the Ambassador seemed relieved that soldiers were gathering in Saudi Arabia to make a military drive into his country to fight the Iraqi army, he repeated more than once his frustration that the Iraqis had been given such a long period of time to leave.  I remember his words, "Jean, it is the same as if a bunch of thieves have broken into your home and the police give those thieves a few months to stay there, to decide whether or not to leave!  During this time, the Iraqis are robbing Kuwait and Kuwaitis of everything.  During this time the Iraqis are killing innocent Kuwaitis."

He was a man ready for his home to be freed of thieves.  I agreed with him completely, and still do.

Former Ambassador al-Sabah in his home in Kuwait City feeling sad about his wrecked home

(Above photo:  The Ambassador was right.  Kuwait was totally looted.  This is the Ambassador in his own home.  Nothing was left of the family's valuables.  Most sad of all, all greatly loved pets belonging to all Kuwaitis had been turned out to die.)

THE RAPE OF KUWAIT was a simply written book, telling many compelling human stories of fear and pain and grief.  Since my book was the only book that told what happened to people on the day of the invasion, it was warmly received by readers.  There were a number of critics, but the most damning critics were those who didn't believe that America or England or any other country should help the Kuwaitis push back the Iraqis out of their country.

The book was not released until the week of the invasion, so the fact is that my book didn't convince any government to invade and drive out the Iraqis.  That decision had been made by governments in London and Washington and Riyadh long before they knew about the existence of my book.

Once the book was released, I admit that I was not prepared for the number of wild lies told about me, and my book.  One columnist reported that I was a hired lobbyist for President George Bush!  Another very angry journalist said that the Kuwaitis had paid me one million dollars to write the book!  (The Kuwaitis didn't pay me a single cent, they never offered any money, and I never expected any money.  It was all made up angry accusations by journalists who were violently opposed to America going to war for Kuwait.)  I was most surprised when I received a call from a friend who had been listening to their favorite NPR program, and I was told that NPR had some wild talking journalist on their show telling exactly how I was paid a million dollars by the Kuwaitis to write the book.  Perhaps this journalist had read the false accusations of the first journalist.  Of course, NPR didn't call me so that I could appear on the show and defend myself against such a damning lie.

I was shocked, to say the least.  Many media outlets became so bold that they were making up stuff and it got so bad that Ambassador al-Sabah told me that he refused all interviews unless they were broadcast live.  Otherwise, reporters twisted everything he said.

Once Kuwait was finally free, I saw the Ambassador on several occasions.  There was a huge celebration in New Orleans where we sat and watched a big parade.  He told me that night that Americans were lucky to have such a unique country.  He said that when he was younger, and before the days he became an Ambassador, that he used to rent a motorhome and he and his friends would drive across the country and park their motorhome and get to know the average and normal Americans who were touring their country.  He said that those were some of the best days of his life.  I was amazed, to tell you the truth, at the joy he found from such a simple pleasure.

Soon after the war was over, the Kuwaiti Embassy arranged a FREEDOM FLIGHT and invited various Washington officials and journalists to go into Kuwait to see for themselves the damage and to hear the stories of survivors.  I was happy to be invited.

While on that trip I saw the Ambassador with his wife and daughter.  It was clear they were relieved that the country was free once again, although terribly sad at the devastation we all saw.  All of us went to the burning oil fields and had difficulty breathing.  All of us viewed the vandalized shops and homes.  All of us heard Kuwaitis telling about the execution and murders of their loved one.

I'm posting a few photos of that FREEDOM FLIGHT.  I have many more, but wanted to post a few of the Ambassador.

Ambassador, his daughter and his wife after viewing the burning oil fires of Kuwait

These photos are in memory of a man who was once in the middle of a great firestorm that affected nearly the entire world.  In my opinion, Sheik Saud Nasser al-Sabah performed his duties with dignity and integrity.

 

PHOTO TO THE RIGHT:  All of us in the touring group were weeping after witnessing the horrific damage to the small country of Kuwait.  The oil fires had to be seen, and the foul air tasted to be believed.  Such wanton destruction done in the name of revenge because Saddam was not allowed to keep someone else's country!