July 15, 2008 – 8:20 p.m.
Despite promises to the contrary, the Saudi Arabian government has made little headway in expunging religious intolerance from its K-12 textbooks over the past year, a new report says.
And a Virginia congressman on Tuesday asked the State Department to determine before the start of the 2008 academic year whether textbooks used at the Islamic Saudi Academy in his state promote violence or intolerance.
The 2008 update of the report from the Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom and the Washington-based Institute for Gulf Affairs, titled “Saudi Arabia’s Curriculum of Intolerance,” found that the same violent and intolerant teachings against non-Wahhabi religious believers noted in 2006 remain in the Saudi Ministry of Education’s current textbooks.
The report comes as the fall deadline for a comprehensive revision of the Saudi government curriculum nears. In 2006, after extensive bilateral negotiations, the State Department announced an agreement with Saudi Arabia to reform its educational materials.
Those materials are based on the fundamentalist interpretation of Islam espoused by Wahhabism — the official Saudi religion — and are widely blamed for stoking religious hatred and giving rise to the violent Islamist ideology that has led to major incidents of terrorism, including the Sept. 11 attacks.
Recently, the Saudi government-run academy in Northern Virginia has come under intense scrutiny for similar teachings in its textbooks.
On Tuesday, Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., wrote a letter to Secretary of State
Wolf specifically asked Rice to hold a meeting of State Department officials, representatives of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, and expert interpreters to resolve the issue. The letter references a report issued last month by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) on the academy’s textbooks.
“With the start of the 2008 school year rapidly approaching, the timely resolution of this matter is of the utmost importance,” Wolf wrote. “If, in fact, the students at ISA [Islamic Saudi Academy] are not being taught or exposed to texts that incite hatred and intolerance, then in all fairness to them and to the teachers and parents associated with the Academy, the cloud of suspicion presently surrounding the school should be lifted. If, however, the content of the textbooks is consistent with USCIRF’s findings outlined in its June 11 report, then urgent action is required. Both scenarios require State Department involvement, in collaboration with USCIRF.”
Wolf wrote Rice last month asking that the State Department provide a complete translation of the school’s textbooks and issue an official assessment of the material contained in the books.
Matt Korade can be reached at mkorade@cq.com.