Adrienne McPhail, Special to Arab News

RIYADH, 12 January 2004 — As I prepare to leave the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, I find myself reviewing the past two years I have spent here.

I have kept a binder with the articles I wrote that were published by the Arab News during the past year and I just re-read them reflecting on the year 2003 not only as a journalist but also as an American who has lived inside the Arab world.

When I first approached Khaled Al-Maeena, the editor-and-chief of Arab News, about contributing articles to the newspaper, it was with the idea that Arab-American relationships could and should be improved. The idea that a different American viewpoint should be included in this publication did not deter Mr. Al-Maeena. He openly embraced it and so, my relationship with the newspaper began.

It started with a piece in which I argued that Jerusalem should be an international city. It ended with my article in December that detailed Al-Qaeda’s movements inside Iraq.

Although, Arab News publishes many articles written by American journalists, they are primarily from writers for American newspapers, who I believe have never stepped foot on Arabian soil. Most of these opinion pieces are and have been critical of the Bush administrations policies here in the Middle East and few, if any, have presented what I refer to as “the other American viewpoint”.

As a person who does not believe in polarization, I prefer this term to the overused and negative term “neoconservative viewpoint”.

What I have tried to present is a balanced argument that attempted to explain why this administration made the decisions that they made and why they undertook the actions that have resulted in the invasion of two Muslim countries — Afghanistan and Iraq.

This has not been an easy task but it has been a rewarding one.

As I worked on this task, I learned to view the US from a different vantage point. I listened to some Europeans expound on the aggressive, arrogant, and dangerous Bush administration policies, that they were and are convinced will result in the destruction of the entire Middle East.

I read news reports and opinion pieces from Europe, the US and the Middle East. I found the vast majority of these articles presented a picture of the United States as a “wounded lion,” raging throughout this region, completely isolated and out of control.

The many expatriates I have spoken with, range in diversity from Romanians who expressed an undying gratitude for American support during the Cold War to Pakistanis who simply do not understand why Americans must always interfere where they are not wanted and do not belong and just about everything in between. I have had quiet conversations with Saudi intellectuals about the merits of democracy and verbal confrontations with Americans who considered me a traitor because I wrote articles for an Arab newspaper.

I discovered that the Palestinians, Indonesians, Filipinos and Egyptian waiters at my local restaurant read Arab News everyday and could hardly contain themselves if I would just sit and discuss any and all news items with them. This discovery made me ashamed to think that at home in America the average American does not even read a newspaper.

One of the most interesting questions I have been asked is, “How come an Arab newspaper would let a woman write for them?”

To this I always answered because it simply did not make any difference. What Arab News wanted from me was the other American viewpoint and the fact that I am a woman really never came up in conversation.

This shocks a great many people, especially Americans, who have the misconception that Saudi society is riddled with male chauvinists. My experience here has proven that is simply not true.

The Arab News deserves a great deal of credit for publishing my articles, many of which were controversial enough to provoke some angry letters from their readers. My favorite letter ran at the top of that section of the newspaper and was entitled “McPhail’s Terrorists”. It was in response to an article I had written about Syrian policies that I doubt any other newspaper would have had the courage or commitment to publish, including the New York Times or the Washington Post.

I will be leaving here shortly and moving to the Far East, to Japan but I know that I will never be the same person that I was prior to living in Saudi Arabia. I am writing a book, called The Tribe. It is my contribution to the Arab world and its people.

It is my most sincere wish that my book would be a fitting tribute to this country.

— Adrienne McPhail is an American journalist and writer.