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Mona Saudi: A Sculptor Once Accused of Seeking to Kill David Ben-Gurion

CrossFireArabia
July 5, 2026

In 1969, the visual artist Mona Saudi was arrested in Copenhagen, Denmark, on charges of involvement in the attempted assassination of Israeli ex-Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion. The attempt occurred while Ben-Gurion was already out of office and on a European tour to seek support for Israel.

This accusation stopped the 24-year-old artist from holding her exhibition at the Copenhagen Public Library. However, it was eventually held at another location in the city, according to the Amman Evening newspaper, which also reported that the accusation halted Saudi’s planned tour to the Netherlands and Sweden.

However, the life story of this pioneering visual artist, who confronted the challenges with a feminine chisel of silk, patience, and tenacity, reveals an early genius. Despite this incident and not yet thirty years old, she went on to hold artistic exhibitions in most European countries.

Between the Nakba and Naksa!

Mona Saudi was born in Amman in 1945. She received her early education at Zein Al-Sharaf School in Amman, then obtained her secondary school certificate from Cairo in the early 1960s, before heading to Paris to enroll at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, specializing in stone sculpture. She presented her first sculpture in 1965, its theme being motherhood. She held her first exhibitions in Amman in 1963, and in 1964, in Beirut, which was then a beacon of Arab culture. She held her first exhibition at the Capitol Hotel in Beirut.

Mona Al-Saudi’s connection to the Palestinian cause didn’t end with what happened to her in 1969. Her awareness of the Palestinian Nakba was awakened when her aunt and her family arrived in Amman as refugees from Majdal Gaza. After the June 1967 defeat, Mona Al-Saudi became active in Europe, collecting donations for Palestinian refugees who had joined their brethren displaced in 1948.

She also held an exhibition, selling all her paintings and donating the proceeds to the displaced people of her homeland after sending the funds through the International Red Cross. She then returned to Jordan and went to the camps to teach children to draw. Later, she held an exhibition in the Baqa’a camp that included her drawings alongside those of the camp’s children.

Skills, Talents

Mona Al-Saudi’s talents were not limited to painting and sculpture, she also forged her path to poetry. Living in Beirut at the time, she became acquainted with a select group of poets who shaped the modernist cultural climate of that era. She published poems in the “Shi’r” (Poetry) magazine that was founded by Yusuf Al-Khal, whose aim, it was said, was to liberate Arabic poetry from its meters, rhymes, and rigidity, and to embrace the prose style. In a poem published in 1968, titled “Peace Be Upon You, Traveling Birds,” she wrote:

Intoxicated by the air, the night, and the trees

Intoxicated, I traverse the seas of oblivion

I see the shores, then turn away from them with my sail

Towards the endless waters

I count the waves, one by one

I cry out to the sea: More distance… more distance on the weary shores!

Mona Saudi’s diverse talents formed a bridge between the arts. Her poetry and painting drew inspiration from the poems of Mahmoud Darwish, Unsi al-Hajj, Saint-Jean Perrès, and Adonis. She published two collections: “First Vision” in 1970 and “Ocean of the Dream” in 1993.

Her sculptures traveled the world.

Mona Saudi’s sculptures adorned several public squares in the Jordanian capital, Amman, since the 1960s, most notably the granite sculpture “Growth,” which has stood at the Sixth Circle in Amman since 1983. Other sculptures are located in several Arab and Gulf capitals. Her famous sculpture “The Architecture of the Soul” graces the courtyard of the Arab World Institute in Paris.

Throughout her career, spanning more than half a century in the visual arts, she held numerous exhibitions of her sculptures and paintings in the Arab world, Europe, the United States, and Asia. Her works are held in the collections of the British Museum, the National Gallery of Fine Arts in Jordan, the Guggenheim Museum and the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Art Institute of Detroit in Michigan.

Mona Saudi was once asked about the difference between painting and sculpture. With the eloquence of a seasoned artist and a sensitive poet, she replied: “There is speed in painting and a lightness of expression on paper, while sculpture is born from stone through a different process.

One might say that in painting, the artist chatters, while in sculpture one must follow the stone and its capacity to bear detail. This is why sculpture is reductionist to the extreme.” Indeed, Mona Saudi embodied this ultimate reduction in her sculptures, representing a woman who struggled for decades to make stones speak.

Mona Saudi (1945–2022) was a sculptor, writer, and poet. Born in Amman, she lived in Beirut until her death from cancer on February 16, 2022. She is considered one of the greatest sculptors in the Arab world.

Taken from Palestine Heritage

Features

Jordan 2007! Elections and Hiccups: Looking Backwards

CrossFireArabia
May 20, 2026

EDITOR’S NOTE: This article was written more than 18 years again in October 2007 for the 7iber.com online portal and is reprinted her

Its election time! As a good non-totalitarian democrat I love the elections, when they happen that is. What I really love about the elections is the time leading up to their finale when voters go up to the polling stations and vote. Although I’ve never voted in my life, I’ve always carefully watched election campaigns, right from start to finish. They are exciting days, of banners hoisted, constituency meets, mini-rallies and all the rest of it.

Prospective candidates, some running for the very first time and of which we are expected to know and vote for, hoist their banners across streets and roundabouts, screaming at the electorate to vote for them because they are the best candidates.

This is the 15th elections for the 15th Lower House, and parliament in Jordan has consistently been in session since 1989, after a long absence of parliamentary life in the country. I am proud to say I covered the 1993 elections, the 1997 ones, and just about missed the 2003 elections because of being away from Jordan.

In all these years, the excitement never faded. Islamic Action Front candidates continuously stood under the IAF banner, but this was never the case with the other political parties, such as the nationalists, the leftists, the middle-of-the-roaders and the tribalists. Although a lot of parties came on the scene after 1993, like Al Ahad, Al Yaqatha and Al Risala and still many others, for some reason or another, many of their candidates preferred to stand as independents arguing they are known for their own independent political personalities rather than as representatives of their parties.

Is this a wrong attitude? Well, maybe. However, once some of them were elected to the Lower House of Parliament, they revealed their true political colors and supposedly argued on party-political lines. Ironically, most of the electorate never knew what those lines were when the MP was just a candidate running for a seat. Many of these parliamentarians argued that they stood a better chance of getting into parliament as individuals rather than under the banner of their political parties. This is due to the belief that such organizations were still seen as relatively new and unknown, despite the fact that many, including leftists, Arab nationalists and Baathists parties, had existed in the 1960s and 1970s, but many of which were effectively banned.

They may of course have been right in their assumptions as political parties were just made legal in the early 1990s, and have thus needed time to be nurtured. As independents, the negative connotations of belonging to political parties would wither away among the electorates who needed to get used to voting for candidates on party political platforms. But the problem with running on independent tickets is that it actually perpetuated individualism, parochialism and depended on the appeal to family, kinship and tribal relations. In past Jordanian parliamentary elections, and even today, the tribal bloc vote has been very important in deciding who wins and who loses.

The effect of this frustrates the process of developing political parties, which, except for the Islamic Action Front, remains weak, ineffective and are no more than talking shop. They have even been used by established politicians to further their own individual political ends and causes. This stands contrary to the need for building modern, strong political parties designed to make democracy and the democratic experiment effective.

Realizing that there is a lot to say about the tribal vote, sometimes political candidates, even Islamists, have been known to appeal to kinship and family relationships as a means of getting into parliament. Once they do, they start the usual game of political party meandering under the parliamentary dome.

That may also be why election banners and slogans on roads are no more than hackneyed, clichéd phrases emptied from their political content. They are read for what they are: brief formulaic statements, lacking the resonance of strong, vibrant agendas and political manifestos that promise change and development, as is the case with elections in more mature democracies around the world.

Political parties in Europe, for instance, are big machines with national and local clout. Everyone, especially the main personalities, know who they are, what they stand for, and what they hope to do once they form the government, or become the party in the majority. In this part of the world, the political culture, machinations and value systems are different and have to be treated differently.

However, in the final analysis, a political party is a political party in which ever part of the world it belongs to; sharing little differences with its counterparts. That’s why such parties have to be strong, come out of their closed shops and enclosures, and appeal to the masses; become broad-based with clout in order to be listened to by decision-makers.

In all fairness however, we have to be gentle with our political parties by understanding the history and the context of where they came from. It took political parties in the western world, centuries to develop and become the national institutions they are today.
They emerged through political struggles and a great deal of pushing and shoving.

But does that mean we have to take that long? Not necessarily, the element of transition from one era to another can take place quickly, but it has to be supported by the state and government. There has to be a political will for democracy, where parties are nurtured rather than left alone.

Jordan is doing well despite different hiccups, but the Arab world in general has to pull itself by the bootstraps if it is to enter into a meaningful political era where representation, democracy and political pluralism is seen as healthy for a society. Our problem now is to move faster in order to catch up with the rest of the world, and develop politically.

In the meantime, let’s for a minute stop and enjoy the political actions of the electoral campaign.

News

Jordan Police: 73 Reports of Falling Debris

CrossFireArabia
February 28, 2026

The Civil Defence Department (CDD) and police personnel responded to 54 reports of falling objects and shrapnel in Amman, Zarqa, Jerash, Madaba, Irbid and West Balqa between the morning hours and 7:00 p.m. on Saturday.

The Public Security Directorate (PSD) said the incidents resulted in material damage only, with no injuries reported.

The PSD urged Jordanians to comply with the safety guidelines issued by authorities and to immediately contact the unified emergency number (911) if they observe any suspicious activity.

It called for not approaching any suspicious objects under any circumstances due to the danger they may pose according to the Jordan News Agency, Petra.

Later in the day the Jordan police said they received 73 reports of debris falling on different areas of the Kingdom.

Opinion

The Muslim World – An Obituary

CrossFireArabia
August 6, 2025

By Junaid S Ahmad

How does one speak of a “Muslim World” when the supposed collective is either silent, complicit, or supine in the face of genocide? When Muslims from Gaza to Kashmir, from Sudan to Syria, are being brutalized with impunity, and the so-called leaders of Muslim-majority states are either polishing boots in Washington or mumbling their dissent into the sand? Perhaps it’s time to recite the Fatiha over the concept of a unified “Muslim World.” If nothing else, a proper funeral might finally clear the air.

The phrase “Muslim World” once conjured images of a vast, vibrant ummah stretching from Jakarta to Casablanca, a spiritual and civilizational brotherhood united by faith and a shared moral vision. Today, that term feels like a cruel joke, the geopolitical equivalent of a sticker slapped onto a broken mirror. The nations that populate this imagined collective can barely agree on the date of Eid, let alone mount a coherent response to the systematic annihilation of their brethren. If this is the “Muslim World,” then it is one in hospice care, wheezing out platitudes as realpolitik pulls the plug.

Let us be honest: most Muslim-majority governments today are client states, marionettes in a puppet theatre directed by Western powers, primarily the United States. Iran is the notable exception, though even it often walks the tightrope between pragmatism and defiance. The rest? From Riyadh to Rabat, from Islamabad to Amman, their foreign policies are either written in Washington or blessed by it. One could argue that the only difference between the State Department and the foreign ministries of many Muslim states is the choice of drapes.

Take, for instance, the case of Pakistan. Its military—the true center of power—has for decades played the role of loyal valet to American interests, occasionally barking in protest, but always fetching the slippers when the master whistles. General Asim Munir, the current Chief of Army Staff, may feel compelled to issue a tepid statement condemning Israel’s rampage in Gaza, but no one is fooled. The servility runs so deep it has become muscle memory. If a U.S. diplomat sneezes, half the GHQ catches a cold.

But the problem runs deeper than cowardice or corruption. The real crisis is conceptual. The phrase “Muslim World” implies unity—political, moral, spiritual. But what unity can there be when Muslim regimes routinely trade in their principles for arms deals and IMF loans? When the defense of al-Aqsa becomes a photo-op and the plight of Muslim refugees is met with monastic silence? When loyalty to Washington counts for more than loyalty to the ummah? The term “Muslim World” no longer describes a coherent political bloc, let alone a moral one. It is an empty husk, a sentimental relic best abandoned.

And perhaps that abandonment is not a tragedy, but a liberation.

In fact, letting go of the mirage of the “Muslim World” may allow us to reorient our political compass. We can stop pretending that shared religious identity guarantees moral solidarity, and instead adopt a sharper, more principled political framework—one that distinguishes friends from enemies not by slogans, but by their actions. Here, the German political theorist Carl Schmitt might be unexpectedly useful. Schmitt famously argued that the essence of the political lies in the distinction between friend and enemy. In a world where Muslim rulers shake hands with tyrants while quoting the Qur’an at summits, such clarity is sorely needed.

In Schmittian terms, the real question is this: Who stands with Pharaoh, and who stands with Moses and the slaves?

Nearly every ruler today bows to Pharaoh. The gold-plated palaces of the Gulf, the military barracks of Islamabad, the ceremonial thrones of North Africa—all pay homage to power, not principle. They genuflect before the American imperium, whispering prayers for stability while Gaza burns. But the prophetic tradition—the real one, not the one trotted out for PR—stands with the oppressed, even when doing so is costly, unfashionable, or dangerous. It was Moses who stood against Pharaoh, not because it was strategic, but because it was right. The prophetic path doesn’t calculate risks; it obeys moral imperatives.

This is where a new politics must begin. A prophetic politics. One that refuses to be seduced by the theatrics of summitry and diplomatic fictions. One that understands that sometimes the friend is not the one who shares your name, your language, or even your religion, but the one who stands with the oppressed and speaks truth to power. Conversely, the enemy is not always the infidel; sometimes he wears a keffiyeh and speaks flawless Arabic but signs arms deals with Zion.

It is a bitter pill to swallow, but the truth often is. The idea of the “Muslim World” as a political community is dead. What survives is a scattered multitude of Muslims, some noble, many fearful, and a good number complicit. But therein lies the hope. Because when the fiction falls away, reality can begin. The ummah, in its truest sense, has never been about flags or borders, embassies or trade deals. It is a moral and spiritual community. And perhaps, in this age of disillusionment, it can finally reclaim that identity.

Let us stop appealing to kings and generals and start building solidarities from the ground up. Let us forge alliances not with “Muslim nations,” but with the oppressed, the truthful, the just—whoever they may be. The Palestinian teenager throwing a stone, the Sudanese doctor tending to wounds, the Syrian child clutching a torn schoolbook amid rubble—these are the citizens of the real ummah. Their resistance is not just political; it is sacred.

This kind of realignment also invites a rethinking of what leadership looks like. We must resist the temptation to look upward to palaces and parliaments and instead look laterally—at the poets, scholars, youth activists, and organizers who speak with prophetic moral clarity. We must build communities of resistance that transcend national boundaries and language barriers, and that unite under a banner not of nationalism, but of justice. We must build the ummah from the ashes, with no illusions, but with fierce hope. And we must cultivate a political imagination that allows us to see past failed institutions toward radical alternatives rooted in dignity and accountability.

Of course, the path forward is daunting. There are no oil revenues to fund this movement, no standing armies to defend it, no state institutions to give it legitimacy. But that is the point. The prophetic tradition has always begun on the margins—with a man in a cave, a voice in the wilderness, a staff in the hand of a fugitive. It has always been the path of those who would rather be right with God than comfortable with Pharaoh.

So let us bury the illusion of the “Muslim World” with dignity. Let us write its obituary, recite its funeral prayer, and move on. Not in despair, but in defiant hope. Because when the idols fall, even the golden ones shaped in our image, the possibility of true worship begins. We may not have presidents or prime ministers on our side, but we have the legacy of prophets. And that, in the end, may be enough.

We stand today at a political and moral crossroads. We can continue to genuflect before the thrones of compromised leaders, hoping for scraps of righteousness from tables drenched in blood. Or we can rise, like Moses, like Muhammad, like Malcolm, and say no. No to Pharaoh, no to injustice, no to complicity disguised as diplomacy.

The “Muslim World” is dead. Long live the ummah of the oppressed, the just, and the free.

Prof. Junaid S. Ahmad teaches Law, Religion, and Global Politics and is the Director of the Center for the Study of Islam and Decolonization (CSID), Islamabad, Pakistan. He is a member of the International Movement for a Just World (JUST – https://just–international.org/), Movement for Liberation from Nakba (MLN – https://nakbaliberation.com/), and Saving Humanity and Planet Earth (SHAPE – https://www.theshapeproject.com/).

Countercurrents

News

Gaza: A Starvation Nightmare

CrossFireArabia
July 23, 2025

UN humanitarian workers said that alarming reports of UN staff members in the Gaza Strip fainting from hunger and exhaustion over the past 48 hours have heightened fears for the lives of the population in the besieged enclave.

“Doctors, nurses, journalists, and humanitarian workers, including UNRWA staff, are suffering from hunger… fainting from hunger and exhaustion while carrying out their duties,” said Juliette Touma, Director of Communications and Public Information for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).

Speaking from Amman, Touma emphasized that the search for food has “become as deadly as the bombing.”

More than 1,000 Palestinians Killed

This development comes as the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights announced that more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli army while trying to access food in Gaza since the so-called Gaza Humanitarian Facility began operating on 27 May.

“As of 21 July, we have recorded 1,054 people killed in Gaza while trying to access food; 766 of them near GHF sites, and 288 near UN and other humanitarian aid convoys,” said UNHCR spokesperson Thamin Al-Khaitan.

The US- and Israeli-backed organization began operating in the Strip on May 27, bypassing the UN and other established NGOs.

“Aid work is not for mercenaries”

“GHF’s so-called distribution scheme is a sadistic death trap, where snipers fire indiscriminately into crowds, as if they have been given a license to kill,” Ms. Touma said.

Quoting UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini, Ms. Touma described the scheme as “a mass hunt for people with complete impunity.” She added: “This cannot be the new normal. Humanitarian assistance is not the work of mercenaries.”

The UNRWA spokesperson emphasized that the United Nations and its humanitarian partners have the expertise, experience, and resources available to provide safe, dignified, and large-scale assistance. “We have proven this time and again during the recent ceasefire,” she said.

Famine-like conditions
Living conditions in the Gaza Strip have reached a new low, with prices for basic goods increasing by nearly 4,000%. Gazans, who have lost their homes and been displaced multiple times, are left without income and are completely deprived of essentials.

Ms. Touma highlighted the testimony of a colleague on the ground who had to walk for hours to buy a bag of lentils and some flour, paying nearly $200 for it.

The World Food Programme has confirmed that a quarter of Gaza’s population is facing famine-like conditions, with nearly 100,000 women and children suffering from severe acute malnutrition and in need of urgent treatment.

Everyday staples such as diapers are scarce and expensive, costing around $3 each. Mothers have resorted to using plastic bags instead, while one father said he “had to cut up one of his last shirts to give his daughter sanitary pads,” Ms. Touma said.

Ms. Touma emphasized, “UNRWA has stockpiles of hygiene supplies, including baby and adult diapers, waiting outside the gates of Gaza.” She emphasized that the agency has 6,000 trucks loaded with food, medicine, and hygiene supplies waiting in Egypt and Jordan for entry into the Strip.

Urgent appeal for a ceasefire

She reiterated the UN’s calls for “an agreement that would achieve a ceasefire, release the hostages, and allow the regular flow of humanitarian supplies into Gaza under UN management, including UNRWA.”

For his part, World Health Organization spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic said that humanitarian operations in the Strip are being pushed into “an ever-shrinking space.” In a briefing to journalists in Geneva, he condemned three attacks on Monday on a building housing the organization’s staff in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza, as well as “the mistreatment of those present and the destruction of its main warehouse.”

“Staff and their families, including children, were exposed to grave danger and trauma after the airstrikes caused a fire and extensive damage,” said Mr. Jasarevic, adding that the Israeli military entered the building, “forcing women and children to evacuate on foot” toward the coastal area of Mawasi amidst intense fighting.

UN staff member detained…searched at gunpoint

A WHO spokesperson said that staff and their family members were “handcuffed, stripped, and subjected to immediate interrogation and searches at gunpoint.” Two staff members and two family members were also arrested. While three were later released, one WHO staff member remains in detention for unknown reasons.

Mr. Jasarevic called for the release of the detained staff member, emphasizing that “no one should be detained without charge or due process.”

Mr. Jasarevic added that the recent evacuation order for the area had affected many WHO buildings and weakened its field presence, “paralyzing efforts to maintain a collapsed health system and putting survival beyond the reach of more than two million people.”

According to health authorities in Gaza, approximately 1,500 health workers have been killed in the Strip since the war began in October 2023. Mr. Jasarevic said that approximately 94% of all health facilities have been damaged, and that half of Gaza’s hospitals are “completely non-functional.”

He emphasized that “the opportunity to prevent loss of life and reverse the massive damage to the health system is closing by the day.”

A Nightmare That Must End

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk described the nightmare facing the people of Gaza as worsening following the latest Israeli evacuation orders, followed by intensified attacks on southwest Deir al-Balah, which “added further misery to the suffering of starving Palestinians.”

He warned in a statement that the risk of unlawful killings and other serious violations of international humanitarian law is extremely high, “given the concentration of civilians in the area and the means and methods of warfare used by Israel to date.”

He continued: “Homes have already been destroyed, and thousands have been forced to flee the area once again. Their only option is to go to the ever-shrinking areas of Gaza, where hundreds of thousands are forced to congregate, making any attempt to deliver humanitarian aid difficult. Even these areas are not safe. I remind Israel that the permanent displacement of people living under its occupation would constitute an unlawful transfer, a war crime, and, under certain circumstances, may also constitute a crime against humanity.”

The High Commissioner said that Israel, as the occupying power, must ensure the provision of food, medicine, and other supplies to the population, and must immediately and unconditionally allow humanitarian aid to enter and be distributed to all those in need. He added: “Instead of launching round after round of new military attacks, the killing, destruction, and widespread violations of international law must stop immediately. More and more countries are joining the calls to extricate us from this nightmare.”

UN News