Ping Pong Rehabilitation

During the 1980s, the Saudi government encouraged Islamic militants to fight against the Soviets in the Afghan War. They even subsidized their flights. Their efforts, in part, came back to haunt them when several former mujahideen built a small but powerful movement that would soon threaten the existence of the monarchy. (I’m talking about al-Qaeda, of course.) The Saudis have since become somewhat more cautious. With a population that’s largely under the age of 30, and with a war raging in neighboring Iraq, the monarchy is hoping to restrict the growth of a violence-prone group of Iraq-trained militants who might, someday, turn their attention to the un-Islamic transgressions of the government itself.

Enter the de-radicalization “resorts.” Like a number of other governments in the region (including Egypt and Yemen), the Saudis are trying to reprogram militants to reject violence. It’s an odd program, and has been received with both mild interest and downright scorn. Shiraz Maher, over at The Sunday Times, has one of the most detailed accounts of the de-radicalization efforts that I’ve seen to date, and he highlights some of the campaign’s eccentricities:

It has been called the Betty Ford clinic for jihadists and within minutes of arriving at the Care Rehabilitation Centre on the outskirts of Riyadh, you can see why. The small complex, where the Saudi Arabian government is exploring a new way of reforming its wayward radicals, feels more like an exclusive boarding school than a Saudi jail.

Inmates have access to swimming pools, table tennis and PlayStations. In the evenings, guards and prisoners play football. An air-conditioned tent sits adjacent to the sports field, serving as a dining hall and common room where, when I visited, the prisoners were tucking into rice and lamb with fresh fruit for pudding.

In return for this privileged treatment, the prisoners – Islamic extremists, some of whom are convicted murderers – are obliged to attend lessons based around Islamic law and the jurisprudence of jihad. A team of psychologists teaches detainees how they should manage their emotions, particularly when reacting to world events.

Art therapy classes help inmates to “reveal their softer side”. And it is not just the artwork that is surreal. It is quite a sight to see men in flowing robes, with unkempt beards and their trousers hoisted above their ankles, sit down with a pack of crayons to express themselves. “The unconscious mind holds a lot of things,” said the therapist.

It’s easy to laugh off these efforts as naive or overly-ambitious — and there is certainly room for that — but it’s also true that the verdict remains out on their success. As Saudi blogger John Burgess has written, “So far, the Saudis report no recidivism, but the first people to go through the program are just now being released into the general population.” What’s particularly interesting is that the Saudis appear to honestly believe, as do several other governments in the region, that militancy can be “cured” through religious discussion and debate. And, of course, it’s not entirely out of the question. Since militants base their views on a certain reading of the Islamic texts, why should they not reconsider that interpretation when confronted with the divergent opinions of more moderate Islamic scholars?

The Egyptians, for example, claim success in their efforts. In 1998, the Islamic Group — a violent jihadi movement that was responsible for hundreds of Egyptians deaths during the 1990s, including those of the Luxor Massacre — publicly renounced violence after months of government-directed prison debates. Interestingly, most accounts I’ve read suggest that the overwhelming majority of the militants appear to have genuinely undergone an ideological shift. The author Lawrence Wright interviewed several Islamic Group members and he has written that they appear firmly opposed to – and ashamed of – their former militancy.

All in all, playing ping pong, drawing with crayons, and talking religion is an unusual approach to criminal justice and rehabilitation. Which makes it worth paying attention to.