RIYADH, 11 October 2007 — Osama Bin Laden is to team up with sultry Arab singers Haifa Wehbe and Nancy Ajram in the form of fireworks to light up the skies of the Kingdom when it celebrates the end of Ramadan later this week.
The fireworks named after the two Lebanese singers and the chief of Al-Qaeda haven proven to be very popular due to their unique names. The fireworks had to be smuggled into the country as the devices are banned on safety grounds, according to local newspapers.
Tons of fireworks have been smuggled hidden in sacks of barley.
Eid Al-Fitr, which starts this year in Saudi Arabia on Friday or Saturday, is a feast celebrated throughout the Islamic world following the end of the holy dawn-to-dusk fasting month of Ramadan. Al-Watan newspaper said a Yemeni had smuggled in a truck full of fireworks, including “B-52s” named after the massive strategic bomber, into the western region of Jeddah.
“That load could have blown up a whole district,” it said, adding that Saudi civil defense workers had been busy disposing of large quantities of confiscated fireworks.