On Saudi Arabia Quotes

“Saudis of all sorts recent having to beg princes for favors to secure services that should be a public right”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“The United States has a rich history of sticking with losers too long.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“Ask not what you can do for your country but what your country can do for you” is the mentality of most Saudi youth.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“The Al Saud believe they have an asset more powerful than the ballot box: they have Allah.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“What unites conservatives and modernizers and young and old, is a hunger not for freedom but for justice; for genuine rule of law, not rule by royal whim. They want a government that is a transparent and accountable, one that provides standards services such as are available in far less wealthy societies: good education, job, affordable housing , and decent health care.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“Like Khalid al Bawadi, Muhammad has found something he admires about America. Holding his new iPhone in his hand, he displays a photo of his new baby boy. “This is the best thing America ever made,” he says, holding the iPhone aloft for emphasis.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“One of every three people in Saudi Arabia is a foreigner. Two out of every three people with a job of any sort are foreign. And in Saudi Arabia’s anemic private sector, fully nine out of ten people holding jobs are non-Saudi. To the extent that there is enterprise in the kingdom, it is almost entirely imported.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“Invading a country is easier than changing educational curriculum,” the late Ghazi al Gosaibi, a confidant of King Abdullah, quipped when asked why the king couldn’t make more progress with his education reform agenda.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“The prince watches football for entertainment but also because he sees in the sport lessons for his country’s somnolent, riskless society. “In the United States, ‘we tried’ is a compliment,” he explains. “Here we focus on failure, not on trying. Saudis don’t take risks because we are so hard on failure. But if you don’t risk much, you can’t accomplish much.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“(Women pray at home, as the strict segregation of sexes means they are not permitted in mosques, even though they were during the Prophet’s time.)”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“Religion is very easy and whoever overburdens himself in his religion will not be able to continue in that way. So you should not be extremists, but try to be near to perfection and receive the good tidings that you will be rewarded. —PROPHET MUHAMMAD, SAHIH BUKHARI HADITH, VOL. 1, BK. 21, NO. 38”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“What unites conservatives and modernizers, and young and old, is a hunger not for freedom but for justice; for genuine rule of law, not rule by royal whim. They want a government that is transparent and accountable, one that provides standard services such as are available in far less wealthy societies: good education, jobs, affordable housing, and decent health care.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“This book focuses on the lives of individual Saudis and how they are shaped and suppressed by traditions and authorities, whether religious figures, tribal elders, or princely rulers. This web of traditions and rules means that women are not free but neither are men. Both sexes are trapped by societal expectations. As a result, individual initiative and enterprise are virtually nonexistent.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“Not surprisingly, this depressing history has bred a political fatalism down through the centuries among many Muslims who believe that if just rule couldn’t be established even when the Prophet’s example was so fresh, there’s no possibility that it could happen now. This resignation to living under corrupt temporal leaders and focusing not on improving life on earth but rather on securing a better life in the hereafter helps explain why oppressive and greedy rulers reign for so long in so many Arab countries.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“The old ways of rearing kids won’t work anymore,” he says, explaining why new efforts at guiding youth are essential. “This age group has enormous energy, and it can either be constructive or destructive, but you can’t suppress it. And they are a thousand times more exposed to the world than their parents.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“They obviously aren’t terrorist leaders. They are the willing foot soldiers bred by a society that protects the young from learning to think and judge issues for themselves by wrapping them in a straitjacket of religious rules that, as often as not, they see prominent Saudis, including religious officials and royal rulers, violate. Accustomed to following without thinking, the young are susceptible to the siren song of jihad as a route to authenticity in life and paradise in death. Belatedly,”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“He is not a perfect Muslim who eats his fill and lets his neighbor go hungry,” the Prophet said in an often-quoted hadith. Based on that admonition, the Prophet would not feel much at home in modern Saudi Arabia.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“If the ruler is ruling by Islam, even if he got there illegally, he must be obeyed.” THE”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“Even today, religious scholars issue fatwas attempting to govern women’s menstruation, makeup, and even the length of their nails.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“I suffer not the good deeds of any to go to waste be he man or woman: the one of you is of the other. —KORAN 3:195 O”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“So questioning “how” or “why” became forbidden and remains so in Wahhabi Islam. Glaring”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“Saudis vividly demonstrate Karl Marx’s axiom that religion is the “opium” of the people. The”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“The female half of the Saudi population remains sheltered, subjugated, and frustrated. Saudis”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“These days, however, the old magic of divide and conquer, the majesty of appropriated religion, and even the soothing balm of money, lots of money, are not enough to blind a new generation of Saudis to the decay rotting the very foundations of their society”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“This web of traditions and rules means that women are not free but neither are men. Both sexes are trapped by societal expectations.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“On the other hand, he continues, “splitting off the Eastern Province, with its large Shiite population, might be doable.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“The country is rich but weak. It owns massive amounts of modern military equipment but has almost no military might.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“Beyond that, many Saudi citizens want a more open society, still devoutly Islamic but free of some of the restraints imposed by religious fundamentalists and absent the daily harassment of the religious police.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“It is wishful thinking that an anti-extremism campaign will work when this country was founded on puritanical Islam. We have to grow out of this, like England had to grow out of the Church of England with an archbishop who could veto whatever he opposed.”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future

“His U.S. interrogators wanted to know why he and others turned to terrorism. “If you are someone with no job, no family, and you find someone who says ‘I have the way,’ it is easy to follow,” he says, though he had both a job and a family. (Saudis often fail to see the obvious contradictions in their conversations.)”
― Karen Elliott House, On Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines - and Future