Today on Twitter @ZiaGe, or “Patricia G”, posted a picture of herself behind the wheel of a Lexus dressed in her hijab in act of defiance. Saudi Arabia is a country where women are banned from driving.

She is one of the hundreds of Saudi women using the hash tag #women2drive to mobilize a campaign in an attempt to get a green light on paving the way to this new freedom.

Saudi Arabia is the only Muslim country that does not allow women to drive, and although it is not an official law, it is culturally unacceptable. Religious rulings typically enforced by police have the same effect as a ban, and women must rely on chauffeurs or male relatives for transportation.

Al Jazeera English Stream explains the situation:

Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world in which women cannot drive. Additional prohibitions against taking buses, riding bikes, and appearing in public alone essentially rule out independent travel for women

In 1990, 47 women took to the streets to challenge this ban by taking their families’ cars out for a drive. They were placed in jail for a day and their passports were taken.

32-year-old Manal al-Sherif, a key figure in Women2Drive movement, faced a similar fate last month.

Ms. Sharif was arrested for nine days after she drove two times and they were highly publicized on Youtube; she also highlighted them on the Facebook and Twitter campaigns she helped organize.

In the video featured at the end of this article, Al Sharif says women need to learn how to drive in order to protect themselves and their families. Additionally, not all women can afford to hire private drivers, she says.

This all comes in light of the recent Arab Spring uprisings, where social media is a popular tool to help mobilize campaigns and movements.

The Women2Drive campaign encourages Saudi women all across Saudi Arabia to participate in a collective protest scheduled for June 17.

Arab Studies Institute Jadaliyya has some more information regarding campaign plans, which included:

• Encouraging women with international driver’s licenses (or those from other countries) to drive their cars on June 17.
• Taking photographs and videos to be posted on Facebook in support of the cause.
• Adhering to the dress code (hijab) while driving.▪ We will obey the traffic laws and will not challenge the authorities if we are stopped for questioning.
• If we are pulled over we will firmly demand to be informed of which laws have been violated. Until now there is not one traffic law that prohibits a woman from driving her own vehicle herself.

The campaigns, which had attracted thousands of supporters — more than 12,000 on the Facebook page —have been blocked in the kingdom. In spite this, a few Youtube videos that have been posted, along with gaining national and international support.

 

There has been an online petition addressed to King Abdullah, asking him to grant women the right to drive, which gathered signatures from more than 600 men and women; and today, Princess Ameerah al stated in an interview that she herself wants to drive and promises a women’s revolution.

Alternatively, the Saudi Women for Driving, the coalition of Saudi women’s rights activists, bloggers and academics campaigning for the right to drive, sent a letter to Clinton and to her European Union counterpart, Catherine Ashton.

“Where are you when we need you most?” they asked 
in the letter which the State Department told reporters Monday it had just received, it continues: “In the context of the Arab Spring and U.S. commitments to support women’s rights, is this not something the United States’ top diplomat would want to publicly support?”

One reporter questioned that the Secretary is more concerned about not estranging relations with Saudi Arabia when the U.S. needs help on Yemen and Bahrain, more than about defending women’s rights. State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland defended Clinton, saying the Secretary “has been engaged in quiet diplomacy.”

More importantly, Saudi women are taking this movement, and their empowerment, into their own hands by coordinating their grassroots campaign using online tools.