International Women's Week: A Saudi Awakening?

With International Women’s Day (IWD) Centenary hours away, I tip my hat to 18 vocal and active Saudi women who are overtly campaigning for change and reform in their country. They joined 101 Saudi academics, activists, liberal reformers and businessmen in signing last week’s “Declaration for National Reform.”

Cynical Sundays: And was there ever a better source of cynicism than academia, particularly when coupled with money and dictatorships?

Admits Layla, "The irony that I shirked a career in journalism due to an aversion to corruption and chose academia, rarely fails to surface on occasions such as these."

Our Maid in Dubai has the last laugh:

For few days I very busy. Some guest is come. Full family. They staying almost one week. I am doing so much clothes wash and dry and iron like full day I is doing that only. My maam is too much particular about clothes wash. We not having dryer so full day I am put clothes in washing machine and putting outside for dry. It so dusty also so I having to bring clothes inside sometime. Inside outside inside outside ironing washing. I just whole day doing clothes....

I laughing because I not the one who mix up. I having fun. I knowing exact what I is doing.

From Haaretz's Hebrew coverage of the Sheikh Jarrah protests, we see Ilan Baruch, the diplomat who lately resigned in protest of Netanyahu policies, saying Israeli policies are alienating the country from the world's good opinion. He was wounded in the war of attrition (Thanks to Ofer).