We made excuses for incidents outside the Kingdom and were ready to understand and explain the motives behind attacks on Western individuals and interests. What happened in Riyadh is a chance for us to understand its reasons. The very fear that is now present in our lives says so much about how we should deal with our problems. We usually hide from fear, waiting for some magic solution that will take place, but this time there is no magic solution and our lives and society are under threat. In Riyadh and in Jeddah after warnings of more bombs, people refused to go out of their houses and avoided going to places that were possible targets. Rumors were rife and something must now be done to restore calmness.

A friend noted that in Riyadh heightened security has brought relief to many nervous people, especially those who knew some of the victims. He said, “It is tiresome but definitely reassuring to know that the police are there all the time.” Yet rumors are still flying, and a sense of foreboding fills the air. We are afraid but our fears must be followed by some serious thinking and questioning. We must stop and look at what happened, analyze it and try to understand why it took place. Condemnation and refusal to accept facts won’t do us any good if they are not followed by an attempt to understand the deviant logic that makes such incidents happened. We ignored that logic after Sept. 11 and now it has come back and turned on us.

It seems that a big part of the problem is that we are not willing to tolerate different ideas and opinions. We teach our children to take a teacher’s word as unchallengeable law and dogma. Students are not encouraged, or even allowed, to think independently. They are expected to memorize and pass exams, whether they can think and analyze or not.

Thinking seems to have been sidelined as something a student does not need to do. Yet these students who have not been taught to think and analyze are the very ones who will have to face extremists and their fanatic ideas and beliefs later on.

How will they be able to deal with these misguided individuals if they are unable to discuss and understand? Will they just accept as fact whatever they are told?

In many families, discussion and argument are ruled out as misbehavior, lack of respect and rudeness. The attackers on Monday reflect this. They attacked those who differed from them: there was no place for either tolerance or argument. It was simply a case of “either you or us.”

Saudi society is so engrossed in itself that those who try to reach out are not taken seriously. Perhaps the first step we take will be with our children. We must encourage them to think for themselves, teach them how to argue and debate logically and analytically and teach them to be tolerant in the best traditions of Islam.

We must teach them how to listen to other people’s views, whether they agree with those views or not, and perhaps how to refute them in an intelligent and civilized way.

Then and only then can we begin to rid ourselves of fanatical prejudice and hatred. Those two evils can only thrive on ignorance. If ignorance is removed, the evils can be conquered.