More Saudi Arabian women drove their cars in the streets of capital Riyadh Wednesday, continuing a campaign — largely rooted in social media — to push the kingdom into overturning a ban on female drivers. At the same time, one of the European Union’s top diplomats sent a long-requested message of support for their campaign.
The drivers were Sara Al-Khalidi, who was accompanied by her mother, and Azza Al-Shamasi, who was accompanied and filmed by blogger Eman Al Nafjan. The group was also filmed by Saudi media group Rotana.
Al Nafjan also filmed another drive on June 17, the original day the Women2Drive movement called for Saudi women with international licenses, or licenses issued by foreign countries, to drive their own cars. According to an email from Change.org Human Rights Editor Benjamin Joffe-Walt, someone later broke the car’s glass and left a note in English that said, “Don’t drive again, Bitch.R 21;
“This could have been a Saudi man or a hired driver worried about losing [his] job,” Joffe-Walt says.
MSNBC has a photo of a similar note attached to a smashed side mirror. The note appears to say “Plz Do Not Drive” on one side and “biatchhh” on the other. Al Nafjan’s family says it was placed as a warning after she was part of the June 22 drive through Riyadh, according to MSNBC. Al Nafjan could not be reached for comment.
The Saudi driving ban on women is not based on any written law, but religious rulings enforced by police have prevented most women — Saudi and foreign — from driving. This has caused Saudi women to rely on live-in drivers or male relatives for transportation, leading to the Women2Drive movement, which began picking up momentum on social media sites around two months ago.
Women did go driving on the designated date of June 17, even though key organizer Manal al-Sherif was arr ested and jailed for a...
