Saudi Gazette

RIYADH — Perturbed by the world reeling under the scourges of terrorism, extremism and hate speech, a Saudi student in the US has launched an initiative to promote peace and tolerance in society.

Nayef Alharbi founded a group called "Saudis for Peace" about four months ago to spread a culture of peace and tolerance among all peoples of the world regardless of their region, race, nationality and cultural background.

To elaborate more on that initiative, Saudi Gazette has

In an interview with Saudi Gazette, Walid Alkulaib, the group's public relations representative, elaborated on the mechanism and objectives of "Saudis for Peace" and the value it can add to the world.

"We are confronting terrorism and extremism in a peaceful way. We need to live peacefully and tolerate one another on this planet," Alkulaib said.

"The urgent need for all of us to coexist pushed us to think differently and out of the box on how to spread tolerance. We decided to shoulder the responsibility to increase people's awareness on the significance of coexistence and tolerance. We need to stop throwing judgments on the face of others because of their religion, race or nationality. Yes, it is our responsibility. The world has been suffering from different types of intolerance and hatred. We need to raise our future generations in a healthier world where they can contribute to its growth," Alkulaib said.

The group has 30 male and female members aged between 19 and 45 years. "That gave us a better opportunity to benefit from the experience of different age groups and allow us to target people of different generations as well. We use five different languages to speak to the world including English, French and Persian. We plan to expand to cover all languages of the world," Alkulaib said.

He said the majority of the group's members lived in the Kingdom. "We have some members who are on scholarships and live oversees. We also plan to speak to the Saudi students who live abroad to join our group and become envoys of the peace as well," he said.

Speaking about the mechanism of work they follow, Alkulaib said: "First of all, I need to emphasize that we are all volunteers. What we have in common is that we want to spread the message of peace and tolerance worldwide. Each one of us has a specialization in something. We have lots of sub groups such as: content, translation, graphics and film making. Each person volunteers on what they are specialized in the first place."

"Saudis for Peace" also uses social media platforms to achieve its objectives. "We plan to go beyond this. We will have films, photos, articles to deliver our key messages. We will go everywhere. We know that the Kingdom has been pushing for world peace. It has been staunchly fighting terrorism and extremism in all its forms. We are honored to reflect this image in our own way," Alkulaib said.