McLean, USA - Fairfax County officials are reviewing Arabic-language textbooks at a private Islamic school following a federal panel's recommendation that the school be shut down.
The county does not expect to find any problems with the textbooks at the Islamic Saudi Academy, but wants to study the issue "to put the matter to rest," Fairfax County spokeswoman Merni Fitzgerald said Monday.
Earlier this month, a federal human-rights panel recommended that the State Department prevail on the Saudi government to shut the school down until the school's textbooks can be reviewed and procedures are put in place to ensure the school's independence from the Saudi Embassy.
The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom said in a report issued Oct. 17 that it had no direct evidence of a problem at the academy, but was concerned that the school closely mimics a typical Saudi education, which some critics say promotes intolerance against Christians, Jews and Shiite Muslims.
The commission, a creation of Congress, has no power to implement policy on its own. Instead, it makes recommendations to other agencies.
Judith Ingram, a commission spokeswoman, told the (Washington, D.C.) Examiner that the county review of the textbooks wouldn't necessarily suffice to allay the commission's concerns.
The academy, subsidized by the Saudi government, has nearly 1,000 students in grades K-12 at two campuses in Alexandria and Fairfax. The Alexandria site is leased from Fairfax County.
The school said it has modified its curriculum to remove problematic passages from the textbooks. The academy also said it would have provided copies of its textbooks to the federal commission had it requested them. Commission officials have acknowledged that they did not approach the school directly to request a review of its textbooks.
Fitzgerald said the county is not concerned about the books' contents, but because it is the academy's landlord it wants to investigate in light of the commission's report.
"In order to put the issue to rest, these actions are being taken," Fitzgerald said. "I'm sure there won't be anything in there that people would find objectionable."