"REAL PEOPLE TOUR": STUDENTS PROVIDE TOUR OF

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 JEDDAH 000099

SIPDIS

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RIYADH, PLEASE PASS TO DHAHRAN; PARIS FOR ZEYA; LONDON FOR
TSOU; DEPARTMENT FOR NEA/ARP; DEPARTMENT FOR PDAS CHENEY

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/15/2016
TAGS: KISL CVIS PTER SCUL PREL SA
SUBJECT: "REAL PEOPLE TOUR": STUDENTS PROVIDE TOUR OF
ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY

REF: A. JEDDAH 64


B. JEDDAH 67

C. JEDDAH 84

Classified By: CONSUL GENERAL TATIANA C. GFOELLER FOR REASONS
1.4 (b) AND (d).


1. (C) SUMMARY. As Post previously reported, Poloff visited
on January 22 the central campus of Um al-Qura University,
known as a center of Islamic learning in the Kingdom, in the
heart of the Islamic holy city of Mecca and met with
University Rector Dr. Nasir A. al-Saleh and several
administrators and members of the faculty (Ref. A). After
the visit, Poloff called a student acquaintance who urged
Poloff to return the following week so he could provide
Poloff with a "real people tour" of the university. Poloff
subsequently visited the "new campus" of Um al-Qura on
January 30, with students showing off a modern campus with
excellent facilities and a student body decidedly more
religious than Jeddah's major colleges like King Abdulaziz
University (KAAU),the College of Business Administration
(CBA),Arab Open University, Effat College, and Dar al-Hekma.
END SUMMARY.

"THE REAL TOUR" AT NEW CAMPUS


2. (C) Mecca's Um al-Qura University is one of the Western
Region's largest universities, with over 27,000 students
(approximately 60% of whom are male). The school has three
campuses: 1) the "old campus" in the center of Mecca, which
Poloff visited on January 22 (Ref. A); 2) the "girls'
campus"; and 3) the "new campus," a modern facility which
Poloff visited on January 30 built on a freeway adjacent to
the Hajj site of Arafat outside Mecca. The university is
well-known in Saudi Arabia, and across the Muslim world, as a
center of Islamic learning, enhanced by its location in the
Islamic holy city.


3. (C) Meeting an undergraduate acquaintance and his Jeddawi
friend at the "new campus" on January 30, the students showed
Poloff a modern campus with excellent facilities. One of the
young men explained that the campus was built in the last few
years. Arriving at the library during the afternoon "asr"
prayer, the young men took a break from the tour to perform
the prayers with other students studying in the library. The
young men showed Poloff several sections of books, most of
which were in Arabic but which also included English language
legal and engineering books. A tour of various classrooms in
the engineering building and the "sharia" (Islamic law)
building revealed modern lecture halls replete with
multi-media equipment. The Um al-Qura student's Jeddawi
friend, who attends a Jeddah college, jokingly role-played a
Saudi professor. "Look, this is a Saudi professor," he
declared at the front of the empty classroom. "Everyone sit
down! The late ones get out! I don't want to see you!" the
young man barked in jest. Pretending to take a call on his
cellular phone, he added: "Oh, there will be girls there? I
am coming. Students, I need to go for an important
emergency," he said to laughter.

STUDENTS KNOWN FOR RELIGIOSITY


4. (C) While Saudi students have consistently told Poloff
that "all Saudi universities are Islamic," Um al-Qura, with
its reputation as a center of Islamic learning, is known for
approaching education from a distinctly religious
perspective, more so than Jeddah's major colleges. The young
men told Poloff that Um al-Qura students are known for their
religious nature, a sentiment Poloff has often heard from
young Jeddawis (NOTE: For example, speaking at the Consulate
on January 30 with a 27-year-old Um al-Qura graduate named
Hassan who is applying to participate in an international
visitors exchange program, the young man stressed the
"Islamic nature" of Um al-Qura. "It depends on the
department you are in, but everything we study there stresses
religion and the religious viewpoint," he said. END NOTE).
"Look around you, everyone is wearing a thobe. You don't see
jeans here," the Jeddawi student said. The Um al-Qura
undergraduate, who is studying engineering, agreed: "This is
true. If you wear jeans here, the people running the school
and the professors can get upset and talk to you about it."


5. (C) The young men met several friends on the campus. The
undergraduate asked his friends if they have received their
grades yet, which they can access on-line, from recently

JEDDAH 00000099 002 OF 002


concluded examinations. "We are all happy. We are getting
B at the worst, so far," the young man said cheerfully.
After one young man sporting an unkept beard approached the
Jeddawi student and exchanged greetings, the Jeddawi young
man told Poloff: "This is a neighbor of mine from Jeddah. Do
you see that long beard? I am going to remember his face,
and maybe one day we will see his face in the newspaper as a
terrorist. These people are extremists, it's not good," he
said earnestly. Poloff saw significantly more students
walking around Um al-Qura with unkept beards and with a Saudi
headdress foregoing the "iqal" (black circular ring worn with
Saudi male headdress),a look that many Jeddawis associate
with religious extremists, than at Jeddah's major colleges.

YOUNG MEN ATTACK DENMARK


6. (C) Throughout the campus, Poloff saw signs in Arabic
encouraging students to boycott Danish products, in response
to the ongoing controversy over caricatures of the Prophet
Muhammad that ran in a Danish newspaper last fall (Refs. B &
C). One sheet of paper posted on a door stated the amount of
money Danish companies are allegedly losing through boycotts
each day in Mecca alone. "What Denmark did is very bad," one
young man opined. "And they don't even say sorry. (Egyptian
President) Hosni Mubarak tried to get them to say sorry, and
still they say no. Ya akhee (my brother),why they don't say
they are sorry? If they make fun of our religion, we are
nothing, because we are nothing without our religion," he
concluded.

SAUDIS MAKING DECISIONS


7. (C) The students were proud of the modern campus, and
asked Poloff if it looked like colleges in the US. Taking
pictures of each other on the campus, they talked about SAG
scholarships to study at American universities and stated
they hope they can pursue master's degrees in the US. The
young men also spent several minutes arguing over what kind
of food they wanted to eat. When one conclusively said
"Chinese," his friend laughed. "Allah-ham-dul-ilah (Thank
God),a Saudi makes a decision. In the time it takes for a
Saudi to make a decision, the Japanese have built a car," he
joked.
Gfoeller