Kippah-Gate a Sign of Saudi Power Struggle    

Rabbi Abraham Cooper got a nasty reminder on his recent trip to Saudi Arabia that despite Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s modernizing reforms, there remains an entrenched opposition in the desert kingdom that is willing to stir up international discord just to show opposition to his controversial leadership.

Rabbi Cooper, chairman of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) and director of the Global Social Action Agenda for the Simon Wiesenthal Center, was visiting Saudi Arabia in an official capacity, touring a historic heritage site, when a local official told him to remove his yarmulke.

“The first evening we were invited by someone from the Foreign Ministry to visit a beautiful UNESCO-protected site called Diriyah,” recounts Rabbi Cooper to Mishpacha. “About a third of the way through the tour, a phone was handed to me. And the person on the phone said, ‘We have a law in Saudi Arabia that prohibits the display of faith symbols of other religions in public. So we’re asking you to remove your kippah.’

“So I said, with respect, ‘This is the first I’ve heard of such a request.’ Then I had two reactions. I told him: ‘Number one, what you’re asking is like asking a person from Saudi Arabia to remove her hijab. My kippah is part of who I am. It’s not any kind of political statement. And number two, I was in the Soviet Union 50 years ago. I didn’t remove it for a month there, so I’m not removing it for you. But please’—and I didn’t raise my voice—‘please check again, because I’m here officially, as the head of the United States delegation on religious freedom.’