SAUDI ARABIA: 'Pure' Islamic alternative to YouTube launched

In a move to preserve religious and moral values in cyberspace, a group of unidentified Saudis have launched a "clean" Islamic alternative to the leading video-sharing site YouTube. 

It's called NaqaTube.

Naqa means "pure" in Arabic. The website offers a collection of edited and Islamically "clean" clips from YouTube under the banner, “Participate with us in a clean website."

Site administrators censor video clips that express critical views of the government, Islamic scholars and members of the Saudi royal family. 

In keeping with Saudi Arabia's strict religious and moral codes, music videos and clips featuring women are also banned. Any music videos on NaqaTube must adhere to Islamic rules.  

YEMEN: Government troops battle Shiite rebels

Yemen kept up its military offensive today  against Shiite rebels in the northwest as troops, artillery and aircraft attacked a militant stronghold near the border with Saudi Arabia.

The mountainous Saada province shook with gunfire and explosions for a second day. The Sunni-led government, which claims the rebels have killed more than 330 people over the last year, said that militants had taken over schools and seized teachers. The Associated Press quoted a health official as saying that 12 people had been killed in the fighting.

The assault against the rebels comes as this poor nation has grown unstable with dangers on other fronts: a separatist insurgency in the south and an infusion of Al Qaeda fighters planning attacks across the Middle East. Such a scenario is an increasing concern for neighboring Saudi Arabia and its oilfields. 

QATAR: Public outrage rises with demand for Saudi maids

Residents of Qatar are outraged over media reports that 30 Saudi women have had to work in the same “humiliating” conditions that were formerly deemed acceptable only for foreign migrant workers.

The women, ages 20 to 45, arrived in Qatar to be placed with families as maids, earning about $400 per month, slightly more than their mostly Asian and African counterparts, according to the Middle East and North Africa Financial Network (MENAFN).

One maids agency told newspapers that the demand for Saudi women had gone up sharply due to widespread fears that foreign maids practiced magic.

SAUDI ARABIA: Closure of television station marks another censorship debate

Nearly a month after Mazen Abdul Jawad was arrested for discussing his sexual exploits on a Lebanese television station, Saudi officials closed two offices of the Lebanese Broadcasting Corportation (LBC), according to the Saudi Gazette, an English-Language daily based in the Kingdom.

On Saturday, the Ministry of Culture and Information closed the LBC's office in Abdul Jawad's hometown of Jeddah.  

On Monday, the Ministry closed the Riyadh office. 

Saudi courts have drawn up charges against Abdul Jawad and three other men who appeared in the segment. They could be charged with publicizing vice and promoting sinful behavior, which can carry both prison time and public flogging. 

Reuters reports that the charges could even carry the death penalty.

SAUDI ARABIA: Swinger's sexual confessions get him arrested by morals cops

Mazen Abdul Jawad learned the hard way that in Saudi Arabia, a guy shouldn’t kiss and tell. 

While appearing on “The Bold Red Line," a Lebanese television program last week, Abdul Jawad detailed his sexual exploits, beginning with when he had sex with a neighbor at the age of 14, according to the English-language Arab News.

On the program, Abdul Jawad discusses foreplay, sexual encounters with women and even gives a recipe for an aphrodisiac.

The 32-year-old Jeddah resident shows off his room as the theme song from the movie "Swingers" plays in the background. The red-themed room contains perfumes and an Arabic book, “101 Questions About Sex." 

At one point, Abdul Jawad whips out a sex toy.

Saudi authorities were not pleased. He was later arrested.  Saudi authorities said they received 100 complaints about the segment. 

The director of the religious police (officially the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice) in Mecca condemned the program and held everyone involved culpable: 

“The program presents anomalies and deviancy in society that are unacceptable and immoral and should be punished according to Shariah.”

MIDDLE EAST: Swine flu to limit hajj pilgrimage for elderly and young

To curtail the spread of swine flu, Arab health ministers from across the Middle East have agreed that elderly, young and chronically ill Muslims should be forbidden from traveling to Saudi Arabia for the upcoming hajj and umrah pilgrimages.

The decision came after a meeting of health ministers from Egypt, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Jordan in Cairo late Wednesday, which was part of a special session of the Regional Committee for World Health Organization on the H1N1 flu virus. Those banned from making the pilgrimage include anyone over 65 and under 12, as well as pregnant women and the chronically ill. 

SAUDI ARABIA: Amnesty International says anti-terror push has led to severe abuse

Amnesty International has charged that Saudi Arabia “has launched a sustained assault on human rights under the facade of countering terrorism.”

In a new report, the human-rights group claims the kingdom’s campaign to crush Al Qaeda and other terrorist elements has led to severe abuses in civil liberties. Statistics released by the Saudi Ministry of Justice show that 330 suspects have been tried for terror-related offenses, receiving penalties ranging from fines to death.

 Amnesty states that Saudi authorities are holding 3,100 people in detention and that “neither the names of those tried nor the details of the charges against them were disclosed, maintaining the extreme secrecy of the trial process.”

When asked about the Amnesty report, a Saudi Interior Ministry official, Abdulrahman Alhadlaq, told the Associated Press: "These are claims that have to be proven."

SAUDI ARABIA: A lawsuit against a genie

A family in Saudi Arabia has filed suit in a religious court against an unnamed genie, or jinn, who sounds most unpleasant: It steals cellphones, whispers threats and occasionally flings stones.

 “We began to hear strange sounds,” a family member who requested anonymity told the Saudi daily Al Watan. “At first we did not take it seriously, but then stranger things started to happen, and the children got particularly scared when the genie started throwing stones.”

The genie -- or genies -- had demands: “A woman spoke to me first, and then a man. They said we should get out of the house,” said the family member, adding that his clan fled their home near the city of Medina.

Jinns and genies are spirits born out of fire that have supernatural powers. They appear in the Koran and Arab mythology, creatures living between humanity and the elements. One of their most famous incarnations lived in Aladdin’s lamp.

SAUDI ARABIA: Saudi princes' feud goes public

Arab royalty is famous for its ability to resolve familial disputes in private, but that isn’t the case with Saudi princes Khaled and Al-Waleed bin Talal.

In an act of rare public criticism, Prince Khaled bin Talal openly criticized his billionaire brother for propagating vice, and attempting to change the traditionalist norms of the kingdom. In an interview with an Islamist blog, Prince Khaled said, “the objectives of Prince Al-Waleed and others are to open a wide range of intellectual, religious, and ethical changes.”

 He also leveled the charge of violating Shariah, or Islamic law, which makes up the majority of Saudi law.

Prince Al-Waleed is one of the better-known Saudi royals, due to his extensive financial power and his extravagant lifestyle. So extravagant that his 460,000-square-foot palace was featured on VH1.

He is also among the less-conservative Saudi princes and has suggested reforming the legal code to allow modest reforms such as allowing women to drive. This has put him at odds with conservative members of the Saudi royal family, as well as the Saudi clerical establishment.

SAUDI ARABIA: Cross-dressing men arrested at a drag party

Saudi Arabian authorities have charged 67 men detained at a party for reportedly wearing women’s clothing.

Most of the men were Filipino and were arrested while standing outside a private party held in a villa near  the Saudi capital, Riyadh, on the occasion of Philippine Independence Day.

According to the Saudi daily Al Riyadh, the police questioned the men after spotting “suspicious behavior” and then proceeded to raid the party. More women's clothing, cosmetics, and alcohol were reportedly found in further investigations.

The Philippines' vice consul in Riyadh, Roussell Reyes, confirmed the arrests. “Some of those arrested were reportedly wearing gowns and wigs and drinking liquor. It seems that there was a party,” Reyes reportedly told a radio station.