Wednesday, May 02, 2012

Insulting Saudi King

"Gizawy’s case it not unique in Saudi Arabia. The Egyptian Organization for Human Rights published this month a list of 35 political prisoners imprisoned in Saudi jails without trial among a total of 1,401 Egyptians imprisoned in the kingdom. On the other hand, following the Egyptian uprising of 2011, the Saudi Embassy in Cairo said it was investigating the cases of the 10 Saudi prisoners in Egyptian jails who were allegedly tortured.  Saudi is the second Gulf state this year to witness a setback in relations with Egypt following the publicly played out tensions between the United Arab Emirates and Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood officials. However, unlike the UAE, the tensions with Saudi seem to have significant popular support that played out heavily on social media — such as the “Screw you your majestyFacebook page — whereas the UAE-Muslim Brotherhood spat barely registered among Egyptians. Twitter users wondered why Saudi Arabia did not shut down its embassy in Denmark after controversial cartoons of Prophet Mohamed were printed, but was quick to close its embassy in Egypt following offenses to King Abdullah."