Posted on 10/27/2001 6:33:03 AM PDT by ml/nj
From Chapter 1, Historical Outline:
In the year 622, on the invitation of the Ansar - a group of pagans converted to Islam - Muhammad and his small band of followers left Mecca for Yathrib (Medina). The population then consisted of polytheistic clans, of Jewish tribes that had long been established in Arabia, and Arabs converted to Judaism. ...
The arrival of Muhammad and his followers provoked no opposition from the Jews. ...
In 624 Muhammad, joined by more followers, called upon the Qaynuqa, one of the Jewish tribes of Medina, to recognize his prophetic mission. When they refused, he besieged and overcame them. On the intercession of one of their protectors - a recent convert to Islam - their lives were spared, but they were expelled from the city, their lands and a part of their possessions being confiscated by the Muslims. The following year the Jewish Nadir tribe suffered a similar fate: Muhammad burned down their palm groves and divided all their fields and houses among the community of Believers. [footnote]
In 627 the Meccans sent a united force to lay siege to the Muslims in Medina, but they withdrew suddenly on a stormy night without fighting. However, guided by the angel Gabriel, Muhammad then turned his host against the Jewish tribe of the Qurayza who had been neutral during the seige. Because the Jews refused conversion, Muhammad attacked and overwhelmed them. Trenches were then dug in the marketplace of Medina, and the Jews - six to nine hundred of them, according to traditional Muslim sources - were led forth in batches and decapitated. All the menfolk perished in this way, with the exception of one convert to Islam. The Prophet then divided the women, children, houses, and chattels among the Muslims.[footnote]
... In 628, taking advantage of a treaty of nonbelligerency (Hudaybiya) with the Meccans[footnote], he attacked the oasis of Khaybar, one hundred and forty kilometers northwest of Medina, cultivated by another Jewish tribe. The assailants came to the oasis at night and in the morning attacked the peasants as they were coming out to work in the fields, carrying spades and baskets.[footnote] Their palm groves were burned down. After a siege lasting month and a half, the inhabitants surrendered under the terms of a treaty known as the dhimma. According to the agreement Muhammad allowed the Jews to continue cultivating their oasis, on the condition that they ceded to him half of their produce; he also reserved the right to break the agreement and expel them whenever he wished.[footnote] Subsequently, all the Jewish and Christian communities of Arabia submitted to the Muslims under the terms of a dhimma similar to that granted at Khaybar. ...
Sheikh Ghassan spoke to at IIR's 2nd Annual Forum on Saudisation in February 2001. The event was a tremendous success with over 80 delegates in attendance from throughout the GCC. If you would like to receive the documentation from that event which includes presentations from the Sheikh and other leading industry professionals then just email us at documentation@iirgulf.com
Saudisation...
Ghassan Al Sulaiman is a man who speaks his mind. He addresses thorny issues which he believes are at the core of Saudi Arabia's emerging unemployment crisis. And he doesn't flinch from uncomfortable conclusions.
On Education: "Too much money into cement and too little into skills."
On Attitudes: "The work ethic of most Saudis is poor"
On Government Jobs: "The chances of being fired were one in a million."
He was speaking to Th-E News from Jeddah after his keynote address to IIR's 2nd Annual Forum on Saudisation in February 2001 - the process of building the Kingdom's national workforce and lessening dependence on expatriate labour.
As Board chairman of the Jeddah Training Centre - a subsidiary of the Chamber of Commerce - no-one is better placed than Sheikh Ghassan to explain Saudisation: "Put simply it is a scheme to replace expat workers with Saudi nationals to eventually achieve a ratio of 75 per cent Saudi and 25 per cent expat. We expect a five percent growth in the Saudi workforce each year.
"The Government does not want to replace the expat workforce entirely. Even in 2010 there will actually be more expat workers than there are now. But because of the rapid growth in the Saudi population, the ratio of expats to nationals will be lower. Saudisation is about redressing the balance - getting more of the national population into work."
But he has strong reservations. "I am in favour of Saudisation - but not in the way it is implemented. It is designed to force the private sector into hiring Saudis simply because they are Saudis. It should have been achieved by building the skills of the Saudi population to enable them to compete fairly and squarely for the best jobs. That should have been the long-term national strategy.
"The problem now is that we are reacting to a crisis with the lesser of two evils"
If we don't create jobs quickly there will be large-scale unemployment and all the social problems that it would bring. There is no social security system here. If someone is unemployed and has no-one to support him, there is no safety net. Therefore it is in the interests of everyone, including the expat population, to resolve this quickly.
"Work is critical to the social and moral fibre of the nation"
So how did a nation blessed with massive oil wealth fail to develop it's own people's talents?. "Bad planning", he answers instantly. "Not lack of investment. The highest budget we had next to Defence was Education. But we didn't use the money wisely. We channeled too much money into buildings and infrastructure and not enough into people. Too much into cement - and too little into teaching skills."
Have Gulf countries grown lazy, asks Th-E News, on the riches of oil?.
"There is a lot of truth in that", says Sheikh Ghassan. "The work ethic of Saudis and Gulf nationals in general is very poor. The last 30 years have had a negative impact in that sense. However there is a misconception that most Saudis are rich. Most are not - and most of the unemployed are very poor. Unemployment has mushroomed over the past two years and that has changed things dramatically.
"Until two or three years ago, jobs were very easy to find. Any Saudi who wanted to work in a Government Department could find a job. And the chances of ever being fired from that job were a million to one. So it was the ability to find and keep a job, rather than lots of money in the bank, that gave Saudis security. But now the Government's coffers are empty. They can no longer support large numbers of jobs in the public sector. Most of the Government's budget was spent on paying people's wages. And it was no secret that many Government agencies could cut their workforce by 50 percent without any ill-effect.
"But the oil riches that came to the Gulf also put the population in a different mindset than existed before. Many Saudis and Gulf nationals refuse to handle certain jobs - in the service sector for example. There is this arrogance, particularly among the young, that certain jobs are not suitable for a Saudi or an Emirati. They forget that 30 or 40 years ago, these jobs were done by nationals.
"You have a whole new generation around now with a mindset that is wrong - and everyone knows it is wrong. It will take a long time to change that mindset - but we must do it. We must create a pride in work - a pride in the job".
But Sheikh Ghassan does see encouraging signs too. "Many Saudis, when put in the right environment, work very hard and to great effect. An excellent example is the workforce of ARAMCO which has a strong motivational culture. That's the culture we need to develop nationally."
But that takes time and jobs are needed quickly. "I think I'm right in saying that 50 per cent of Saudis are 18 or younger - and our population growth is among the highest in the world. This puts intense pressure on the economy to find jobs for these future workers. Saudisation is not the whole answer or even the long-term answer. It is a short-term measure to tackle a crisis situation. The real answers lie in education; in training; in job creation; in planning for the long-term. There is a strong need to look at the big picture."
Sheikh Ghassan believes that Saudisation needs to be handled with a deft touch and not a heavy hand. "That's absolutely essential. You see, there's a Catch 22 to all this. Job creation will not occur if Saudi companies are not prospering. And one of the things that will prevent Saudi companies from prospering is Saudisation. If you force companies to hire people on the grounds of nationality rather than ability, that will be reflected in their performance. That is what will happen if Saudisation is enforced too rigidly. It must be handled like a precision tool - not a blunt instrument".
Sheikh Ghassan spoke to at IIR's 2nd Annual Forum on Saudisation in February 2001. The event was a tremendous success with over 80 delegates in attendance from throughout the GCC. If you would like to receive the documentation from that event which includes presentations from the Sheikh and other leading industry professionals then just email us at documentation@iirgulf.com
So it would be fair to say that the products are mostly sh*t and dried seawater, right? I'm not particularly impressed.
Anything on the tech side? Anything inventive? Anything a little less mindless?
What was that "light manufacturing" about? Tents?
I only started reading from the Koran, the Al-Hadish and about the life of the prophet this past month and a half. Before, I just thought of Islam as a variation of Judaism (the dietary laws, the language, the monotheism...).
Now, I am quite alarmed at this thing called Islam. Just a clear reading gives indications of a cult of murder, hate, and perversion. It would hearten me tremendously if the erstwhile "moderates" would appear in vocal force to support our country and explain why Islam itself is not a threat to us.
But it is NOT HAPPENING. One day, I hear from some moderate Imam, then the next day he is out of the country giving crazy statements about the culpability of Jews!
It is not reasonable to expect that Muslims will be supportive of the US at the expense of seeming disloyal to their faith in the eyes of other Muslims. I just don't belive that we will ever see an outpouring of support from these ersatz "moderates."
Wonder if Bush sees this, too, and is just being canny?
Either moderates are ineffectual, or are quietly sympathetic to the terrorists.
Then tell them to stop trying to destroy little Israel and throw the Jews into the sea.
Daniel 11
37 He shall give no heed to the gods of his fathers, [Chemosh, Molech] or to the one beloved by women; [Ashtoreth] he shall not give heed to any other god, for he shall magnify himself above all.
38 He shall honor the god of fortresses instead of these; [Allah] a god whom his fathers did not know he shall honor with gold and silver, with precious stones and costly gifts.
39 He shall deal with the strongest fortresses by the help of a foreign god; [Allah] those who acknowledge him he shall magnify with honor. He shall make them rulers over many and shall divide the land for a price.
2 Kings 23
13 The king also desecrated the high places that were east of Jerusalem on the south of the Hill of Corruption--the ones Solomon king of Israel had built for Ashtoreth the vile goddess of the Sidonians, for Chemosh the vile god of Moab, and for Molech the detestable god of the people of Ammon.
Psalm 83
Numbers 24
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You're right, I just don't know about how he received the Koran. Either he made the whole thing up (difficult to do I would think since he was an illiterate caravan hijacker...a warlord thief and not a scholar) and dictated the work from his own imagination, basing it on what he'd already heard about Christianity and Judaism. Christianity was thriving in the middles east at this time. Ancient Churches were solidly established at Memphis, Antioch, Philadelphia, Yemen and many other places. They had already received the Gospel and had no need for a 'new' and 'final' prophet.
The other possibility is that an angel DID appear to Mo, but it wasn't Gabriel. It was Lucifer.
Investments in development like Yanbu and Jubail are such a stimulous.
Imagine _ Inspite of the oil revenues Saudi Arabia could have turned into another chaotic mess like some of those countries in Africa that have terrific natural resources. Saudi success has been about their leadership, Islam and friendship with regular America businessmen as opposed to US government.
And instead they managed to produce the wahhabis and very possibly the instigator of World War III. How clever of them.
You're absolutely right! 1500 years of hate and murder and pure evil ahve come around to the destruction of islam. About time.
Whod they side with in WWII? That's more telling about their character.
28 Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.
29 But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now.
30 Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman.
31 So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free.
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