The Himaya (Protection) Society is investigating the case of a woman who was viciously attacked by her husband with a screwdriver. The 35-year-old woman is mother of two small girls and is in her first few months of pregnancy. The Director General of Social Affairs in Makkah, Abdullah Aal Taawi, has ordered the immediate arrest of the woman's husband. He also ordered the woman be paid “a monthly salary to assist her in securing a residence, as she does not want to stay in the social care home”. The husband has been beating the woman for years, according to the woman's sister. She said: “My sister's trouble began from the very first year of her marriage. Her husband divorced her twice, but she returned fearing society's view toward divorced women and because she could not bear being parted from her two daughters.” She revealed that the victim lived in a state of constant terror and was regularly beaten by her husband in front of her daughters, Al-Watan newspaper reported Wednesday. “On the day of the most recent assault, I was phoned by my sister's neighbor. I rushed to the house and found my sister unconscious. I immediately took her to the hospital.” The victim has recently moved to Jeddah from the Asir region. “The first time she went out of the house was to the ICU at King Fahd Hospital after being beaten by her husband for five hours with a screwdriver,” the woman's sister said. The National Society for Human Rights has tasked a female legal researcher and social worker to prepare a report on the woman's psychological condition as a result of the incident. The woman is now under strict guard in the ICU of King Fahd Hospital. According to visitors to the hospital, the woman “could not talk due to the severe wounds on her body. She could only cry.”
