This past school year, Saudi Arabia sent 66,000 students to U.S. universities, four times the number before the 2001 attacks…Terrorism works. via Saudi Students Flood In as U.S. Reopens Door – WSJ.com. h/t DP
WASHINGTON—Dressed in caps and gowns, the
college students packing a graduation ceremony in suburban Washington,
D.C., acted like excited graduates anywhere in the United States.
Except, perhaps, when the men broke into
tribal line dances. Or when the women, wearing headscarves, burst forth
with zagareet, soaring trills of their tongues, in celebration.
The more than 300 graduates gathered at a
hotel overlooking the Potomac River were all from Saudi Arabia, part of a
massive government-paid foreign study program to earn bachelor’s,
master’s and doctorate degrees and return home to help run their
country.
“You are the best of the best, and the
future of our country,” Saudi Arabia’s cultural attaché, Mohammed al
Issa, declared at the May event.
In the years following the security
crackdown on Arab travelers after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist
attacks—in which 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi Arabian—tough
restrictions kept most Arab students away from the U.S. In 2004, only
about 1,000 Saudis were studying in the U.S., according to the U.S.
State Department.
This past school year, Saudi Arabia sent 66,000 students to U.S. universities, four times the number before the 2001 attacks
and the fastest-growing source of foreign students in the U.S., ahead
of China, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education. The Saudi
influx is part of a broader increase in international students in the
U.S. as American universities seek to raise tuition revenues. Some
723,277 foreign students enrolled during the 2010-2011 school year, up
32% from a decade ago.
The numbers reported here don’t jive with the 66,000 reported by the WSJ
To accommodate the new Saudi
students, Central Washington administrators offered to provide halal
food prepared in accordance with Islamic law, or set aside space on
campus for a mosque. The Saudi students declined, preferring to eat at town cafes like everyone else, Mr. Launius said.
The Saudi contingent “doesn’t seem to have
caused any kind of consternation and stir at all,” said Mr. Launius. “I
think this is a good exposure to what these folks are actually like.”
Saudi Arabia’s international scholarship
program, launched when Saudi King Abdullah took the throne in 2005, is a
key part of his efforts to equip future generations in handling the
country’s main challenges, including a fast-growing population and
declining oil reserves.
Since taking over, the Saudi king has
emphasized scientific education and exposure to foreign countries as
keys to combat religious extremism and transform Saudi Arabia into a
modern state. This year, the scholarship program has about 130,000 young
people studying around the world, at an estimated cost of at least $5
billion since the program began.
The king’s efforts to modernize, including
the scholarship program, have led to constant tension between
Western-influenced Saudis and a religiously educated core who hold heavy
sway over society and reject modernization because it is associated
with the West.
That internal tension was on display this
month when Saudi Arabia, under threat of a ban from the Olympic Games,
finally ended its status as the last Olympic nation to refuse to include
women on its teams.
And the U.S. enforced sharia law for them segregating men and womens interview rooms and makeshift mosques. See pics below.
Male only prayer space
Female only interview rooms
King Abdullah, who is in his late 80s and
was educated by clerics in a mosque, initiated the scholarship program
after persuading U.S. officials, particularly President George W. Bush,
to reopen the student visa service after 9/11. At a pivotal meeting in
2005 at the president’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, the King convinced Mr.
Bush that the education program was crucial for the two countries’
long-term relationship.
That relationship consists primarily on oil supply, right? What else do the Saudi’s have to offer?
“The impassioned plea that the King made
for this, and the long-term importance of the relationship, really made
an impression on President Bush,” said Frances Townsend, former homeland
security adviser, who attended the 2005 meeting.
Bush approved it, Obama has exploited it.
Again the number don’t jive with the WSJ’s 66,000
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