'Illegal' Saudi women's gym shut

RIYADH — Health authorities in Jeddah have shut down an "illegal" women's fitness centre attached to a hospital, closing one of the few venues where Saudi women are able to exercise, local media said on Wednesday.

Although health officials have repeatedly blamed the high rates of heart disease and diabetes in the kingdom on poor diets and lack of exercise, health authorities said women's fitness centres were not allowed.

"Anyone who violates regulations governing the running of health facilities would be punished severely because this involves people's health," Jeddah health official Muhammed Abdul Jawad told the English-language Arab News.

The reports did not identify the Jeddah hospital affected, but a photograph in the Saudi Gazette showed an official sealing the club door with an announcement reading "Closed on the order of Jeddah Health Affairs."

While gyms for men in the gender-segregated conservative Islamic society are permitted, women's health clubs are forbidden, despite a clear demand shown by a surge in underground facilities in the past two years.

But last year a number of stand-alone women's gyms were shut, though some attached to or inside hospital premises continued to function.

The reports said the country's municipal and rural affairs ministry had recently closed two other gyms in the Red City of Jeddah and one in Dammam, eastern Saudi Arabia.

AFP-Google News

Wasted U.S. Spending in Iraq: $53 billion and Counting

Since the ouster of Saddam Hussein in 2003, the U.S. taxpayer has been rebuilding Iraq and – for just as long – I have been complaining about this being unnecessary and even counterproductive. (See here, here, and here for sample critiques.)

Comes a report today by Timothy Williams in the New York Times, "U.S. Fears Iraqis Will Not Keep Up Rebuilt Projects" that tops off my unhappiness. Excerpts:

In its largest reconstruction effort since the Marshall Plan, the United States government has spent $53 billion for relief and reconstruction in Iraq since the 2003 invasion, building tens of thousands of hospitals, water treatment plants, electricity substations, schools and bridges.

But there are growing concerns among American officials that Iraq will not be able to adequately maintain the facilities once the Americans have left, potentially wasting hundreds of millions of dollars and jeopardizing Iraq's ability to provide basic services to its people.

The projects run the gamut — from a cutting-edge, $270 million water treatment plant in Nasiriya that works at a fraction of its intended capacity because it is too sophisticated for Iraqi workers to operate, to a farmers' market that farmers cannot decide how to share, to a large American hospital closed immediately after it was handed over to Iraq because the government was unable to supply it with equipment, a medical staff or electricity. …

In hundreds of cases during the past two years, the Iraqi government has refused or delayed the transfer of American-built projects because it cannot staff or maintain them, Iraqi and American government officials say. Other facilities, including hospitals, schools and prisons built with American funds, have remained empty long after they were completed because there were not enough Iraqis trained to operate them.

"As large-scale construction projects — power plants, water-treatment systems and oil facilities — have been completed, there has been concern regarding the ability of Iraqis to maintain and fund their operations once they are handed over to the Iraqi authorities," said a recent analysis prepared for Congress by the Congressional Research Service. … Stuart W. Bowen Jr., inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, said his watchdog agency had "regularly raised concerns about the potential waste of U.S. taxpayer money resulting from reconstruction projects that were poorly planned, badly transferred, or insufficiently sustained by the Iraqi government."

Things will only get worse as the American occupiers "continue to depart in large numbers, taking with them their money, equipment and expertise."

The article provides some specific instances:

• In Hilla, 60 miles south of Baghdad, a recently completed $4 million maternity hospital built by the Americans is open, but the staff members cannot operate much of its equipment. "The building is fairly good and the Americans have provided the hospital with a variety of high-tech medical devices, but they did not pay attention to the training of doctors in how to use them," said Jawad al-Jubouri, a district officer.

• In Falluja, west of Baghdad, a $98 million wastewater treatment plant built by the United States serves only one-third of the homes it was intended to serve, because the Iraqi government has not supplied it with sufficient fuel, "raising the possibility that the U.S. effort has been wasted," according to a special inspector general's report.

• At Ibn Sina Hospital in Baghdad, which had been the American military's largest medical center in the country, Iraqi security forces took up guard positions even before the conclusion of a ceremonial transfer to the Iraqi government last month. The hospital, however, has been closed because the Health Ministry lacks the staff and equipment to reopen it, though the American military said it left $7.9 million in equipment behind.

• Iraq's most notorious reconstruction project might be the $165 million Basra Children's Hospital in the south, championed by Laura Bush when she was the first lady. Its completion has been delayed by more than four years, and the project is $115 million over budget. Once the hospital opens — perhaps next year — there will be too few doctors and other medical staff members to take advantage of much of its modern equipment. "It was supposed to open in March, but I don't think it will be ready," said Ahmed Qassim, the hospital's director. He added: "Maybe July, but we don't know. Maybe not July."

What gets my goat is that Iraqis don't even appreciate what they have been given. The Times article quotes Ali Ghalib Baban, Iraq's minister of planning, dismissing the $53 billion on the grounds that it has not had a discernible impact. "Maybe they spent it, but Iraq doesn't feel it."

Comment: One's tempted to blame Iraqis for this travesty but the real blame belongs with the George W. Bush administration which had a vision of "a free, … stable, democratic, and prosperous Iraq" and did not let realities get in the way of its fantasy.

As so often was the case with Bush, the motives were good but the implementation terrible.

Daniel Pipes

Netherlands: School backs down from halal-only Christmas meal

An elementary Catholic school in Weert (Netherlands) decided to serve just halal food this year for its Christmas meal. The school has about 400 students and about ten Muslim students. However, after some parents complained, the school backed down.

The Christmas meal is organized every year together with the parents association. According to principal Margo Janssen they decided for practical considerations to serve halal for everybody.

In previous years they took the Muslims into account and served them separate halal dishes, but this wouldn't be necessary if everybody is served halal. Janssen points out that this is also done in hospitals and prisons. This year they thought it would be simpler and cheaper to serve everybody halal.

According to Janssen this also follows Christian thought, which says you should take others into account. He says that there's no real reason to make a fuss about it. "It's the spirit of the times. We have no intention at all to give a signal with this. It's still a Christmas meal with a Christian background." They would have a nativity scene and a candle march. It all happened with the best of intentions, he says.

Jean Paul van der Donk, chairman of the parents association, says they've received eight complaints from angry parents. But, he says, those parents should understand that they didn't choose halal food for religious reasons, but purely for practical reasons. Catholics aren't forbidden to eat halal meat, while the opposite is the case for Muslims.

After getting complaints from parents the management decided to review the issue.

The school has since changed its mind and decided to offer every student a choice of what to eat. "We've been naive as a school," the school's site says.

They hope to now go back to having a festive Christmas meal, and hope the school's name won't be damaged by one not so well thought out decision.


Sources: Telegraaf, Trouw, Rorate (Dutch), h/t NRP

With thanks to Islam in Europe

Attorney: Hospital hearing set for Fort Hood suspect

SAN ANTONIO—An attorney for the Army psychiatrist charged in the mass shooting at Fort Hood says his client will have his first court hearing in his hospital room on Saturday.

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan's civilian attorney, John Galligan, said Friday that military prosecutors notified him of their plans for the hearing at the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio.

Hasan has been recovering there since the Nov. 5 rampage at Fort Hood that left 13 dead and more than 30 wounded. Hasan was shot by civilian members of Fort Hood's police force.

The hearing is to determine whether Hasan will be placed in pre-trial confinement -- which usually means jail. But Galligan says he'll argue that Hasan should remain in intensive care because he is paralyzed and still needs hospital care.

Fort Hood officials didn't immediately return a call about the hearing.

Boston Globe

U.K.: Hospital, female muslim medics in standoff over hygiene rules

HEALTH officials are having crisis talks with Muslim medical staff who have objected to hospital hygiene rules because of religious beliefs.

Women students at Liverpool's Alder Hey children's hospital have raised objections to removing their arm coverings in theatre and to rolling up their sleeves when washing their hands because it is regarded as immodest.

Minutes of a clinical academics' meeting at Liverpool University revealed that female Muslim students at Alder Hey children's hospital had objected to rolling up their sleeves to wear gowns.

Similar concerns have been raised at Leicester University, and Sheffield University also reported a case of a Muslim medic who refused to "scrub" as this left her forearms exposed.

Some students have said that they would prefer to quit the course rather than expose their arms, but hygiene experts said no exceptions should be made on religious grounds.

A Royal Liverpool hospital spokesman said they had experienced issues of Muslim staff not sanitising their forearms with alcohol gel although this had now been addressed.

Dr Steve Ryan, medical director at Alder Hey said that while the "bare below the elbows" dress code is a matter of patient safety, the trust would work with Muslim students to find a solution.

He said: "We specify bare below elbows, no wrist watches, nail varnish or false nails in clinical areas." Read more ...

Source: Liverpool Echo
H/T: Dhimmi Watch