Influence
Al Watan became a forum for reformist issues in the early 2003. Columnists initiated a discussion regarding whether the teachings of strict Muslim scholars were granted too much credence within Saudi society. They also began to challenge the authority of the mutaween, the religious police force. Late Interior Minister Prince Nayef, who effectively controlled the press in Saudi Arabia, clearly showed his distaste for the new discussions taking place. As a result of its progressive approach, religious conservatives began to call Al Watan Al-Wathan, that means "the idol" in Arabic. The paper is regarded as the youngest and one of the highest distribution papers in Saudi Arabia.
Read more about this topic: Al-Watan (Saudi Arabia)
Famous quotes containing the word influence:
“Modern Western thought will pass into history and be incorporated in it, will have its influence and its place, just as our body will pass into the composition of grass, of sheep, of cutlets, and of men. We do not like that kind of immortality, but what is to be done about it?”
—Alexander Herzen (1812–1870)
“The woman who can’t influence her husband to vote the way she wants ought to be ashamed of herself.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)
“I am not sure but I should betake myself in extremities to the liberal divinities of Greece, rather than to my country’s God. Jehovah, though with us he has acquired new attributes, is more absolute and unapproachable, but hardly more divine, than Jove. He is not so much of a gentleman, not so gracious and catholic, he does not exert so intimate and genial an influence on nature, as many a god of the Greeks.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)