""As for the money, Ahmed writes, it came from Saudi
Arabia, which was locked in a "fierce rivalry, dubbed the Arab Cold War,"
with Nasser's Egypt. Beginning in the mid-1960s, the Saudi government funded
various organizations it saw as bulwarks against socialism and/or secularism. A
condition of much of these funds was a strict adherence to the gender
segregation that is a cornerstone of Wahhabi doctrine, and to the gender
hierarchy that such segregation entails. Because of its nearly unlimited supply
of cash, the influence of Wahhabi Islam spread throughout the Muslim world and
had a homogenizing effect on clothing in the entire region."" (thanks "Ibn Rushd")