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Exclusive - 80,000 Arabic, Persian, Hebrew Manuscripts at King Fahad National Library

The King Fahad National Library is a treasure trove of original and rare manuscripts. (SPA)
The King Fahad National Library is a treasure trove of original and rare manuscripts. (SPA)
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Exclusive - 80,000 Arabic, Persian, Hebrew Manuscripts at King Fahad National Library

The King Fahad National Library is a treasure trove of original and rare manuscripts. (SPA)
The King Fahad National Library is a treasure trove of original and rare manuscripts. (SPA)

Manuscripts are an intellectual and literary treasure that have documented human life since man began to write. They are an honest record of the history of peoples, their traditions, activities and culture through the ages. Countries competed in writing down and preserving manuscripts that are collected by libraries around the world and protected by projects that aim at safeguarding man’s written cultural heritage.

The King Fahad National Library in Riyadh is among the libraries that have sought to collect manuscripts, prioritizing rare ones. It boasts 80,000 manuscripts: 6,000 original and 74,000 illuminated ones. The library set up a department for manuscripts and rarities. It collected manuscripts that were offered for sale and several unique donations from private libraries and individuals. The manuscripts cover a wide range of topics, such as religion, politics, economy and others. The library also acquired several non-Arabic manuscripts, most notably in Persian and Hebrew.

The majority of the manuscripts are written on regular paper, while a rare few are written on papyrus, vellum and parchment. The library has also acquired films, photographs and microfilms.

Secretary General of the King Fahad National Library Mohammad bin Abdulaziz Al-Rashid told Asharq Al-Awsat that the library has become a well-known cultural landmark. It is a vessel for the literary production, organization and documentation in Saudi Arabia.

Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman bin Abdulaziz had shown this library special attention since it was established in 1983, he added, saying it now rivals national libraries the world over.

Al-Rashid said the King Fahad National Library boasts several different and significant references on the Kingdom’s heritage given that it is responsible for preserving the Saudi national heritage. Among these sources are Saudi books, university theses, periodicals and the Saudi Arabian Information Center that boasts more than 70,000 photos that document the history of the Kingdom.

The library boasts more than 6,000 rare original manuscripts, including the Zad al-Maad by Ibn Qayyim. The manuscript was written by Suleiman bin Abdullah Ibn al-Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulwahhab and dates back to the Hijri year 1220. Other manuscripts in the library’s collection include a Kufic Quran written on vellum and dating back to the third century Hijri, as well as Safavid, Mamluk and Andalusian Qurans. Among the rare manuscripts are parts of the Sahih al-Bukhari, written on vellum and dating to Andalusia in the year 570 Hijri.

In addition, the King Fahad National Library has acquired microfilms of one of the most important Arabic manuscripts from Princeton University Library in the United States. It also has photos of manuscripts from the American Jewish University. Moreover, all 792 manuscripts of the Public Saudi Riyadh Library were moved to the King Fahad National Library at the orders of King Salman when he was Governor of Riyadh and general supervisor of the library.

Al-Rashid said the library has a department for the sterilization and restoration of manuscripts. It is considered one of the best restoration centers in the region. It has granted access to the manuscripts to researchers and students through microfilm and microfiche devices. The King Fahad National Library constantly works on serving researchers, giving them easy access to information and offering its services 24 hours a day. It provides 14 electronic library services available online for users through its website.

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Varieties

Snowstorm Paralyzes Vienna Airport

People wait at a tram stop after heavy snowfalls in Vienna, Austria, February 20, 2026. REUTERS/Elisabeth Mandl
People wait at a tram stop after heavy snowfalls in Vienna, Austria, February 20, 2026. REUTERS/Elisabeth Mandl
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Snowstorm Paralyzes Vienna Airport

People wait at a tram stop after heavy snowfalls in Vienna, Austria, February 20, 2026. REUTERS/Elisabeth Mandl
People wait at a tram stop after heavy snowfalls in Vienna, Austria, February 20, 2026. REUTERS/Elisabeth Mandl

Massive snowstorms caused power outages and transport chaos in Austria on Friday, forcing the Vienna airport to temporarily halt all flights.

Flights departing from the capital, a major European hub, were cancelled or delayed, and more than 230 arrivals were similarly disrupted or rerouted.

"Passengers whose flights have been delayed are asked not to come to the airport," the facility said in a statement.

The area received 20 centimeters (nearly eight inches) of snow, national news agency APA reported.

The main highway south of Vienna was closed for several hours, and other sections of highway were temporarily inaccessible because of snowdrift, stranded lorries or poor visibility, said the national automobile association, OAMTC.

According to AFP, electric companies reported power outages in several regions in the south and east, including Styria, where 30,000 homes lost electricity.

The weather was forecast to improve from around midday, but the risk of avalanches remained high.

Varieties

NASA Delivers Harsh Assessment of Botched Boeing Starliner Test Flight

NASA duo Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams were stuck on the ISS for nine months. Handout / NASA TV/AFP/File
NASA duo Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams were stuck on the ISS for nine months. Handout / NASA TV/AFP/File
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NASA Delivers Harsh Assessment of Botched Boeing Starliner Test Flight

NASA duo Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams were stuck on the ISS for nine months. Handout / NASA TV/AFP/File
NASA duo Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams were stuck on the ISS for nine months. Handout / NASA TV/AFP/File

NASA on Thursday blamed what it called engineering vulnerabilities in Boeing's Starliner spacecraft along with internal agency mistakes in a sharply critical report assessing a botched mission that left two astronauts stranded in space.

The US space agency labeled the 2024 test flight of the Starliner capsule a "Type A" mishap -- the same classification as the deadly Challenger and Columbia shuttle disasters -- a category that reflects the "potential for a significant mishap," it said.

The failures left a pair of NASA astronauts stranded aboard the International Space Station for nine months in a mission that captured global attention and became a political flashpoint.

"Starliner has design and engineering deficiencies that must be corrected, but the most troubling failure revealed by this investigation is not hardware. It's decision-making and leadership," said NASA administrator Jared Isaacman in a briefing.

"If left unchecked," he said, this mismanagement "could create a culture incompatible with human spaceflight."

The top space official said the investigation found that a concern for the reputation of Boeing's Starliner clouded an earlier internal probe into the incident.

"Programmatic advocacy exceeded reasonable bounds and place the mission, the crew and America's space program at risk in ways that were not fully understood at the time," Isaacman said.

He said Starliner currently "is less reliable for crew survival than other crewed vehicles" and that "NASA will not fly another crew on Starliner until technical causes are understood and corrected" and a problematic propulsion system is fixed.

But the administrator insisted that "NASA will continue to work with Boeing, as we do all of our partners that are undertaking test flights."

In a statement, Boeing said it has "made substantial progress on corrective actions for technical challenges we encountered and driven significant cultural changes across the team that directly align with the findings in the report."

- 'We failed them' -

Isaacman also had harsh words for internal conduct at NASA.

"We managed the contract. We accepted the vehicle, we launched the crew to space. We made decisions from docking through post-mission actions," he told journalists.

"A considerable portion of the responsibility and accountability rests here."

In June 2024 Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams embarked on what was meant to be an eight-to-14-day mission. But this turned into nine months after propulsion problems emerged in orbit and the Starliner spacecraft was deemed unfit to fly them back.

The ex-Navy pilots were reassigned to the NASA-SpaceX Crew-9 mission. A Dragon spacecraft flew to the ISS that September with a team of two, rather than the usual four, to make room for the stranded pair.

The duo, both now retired, were finally able to arrive home safely in March 2025.

"They have so much grace, and they're so competent, the two of them, and we failed them," NASA associate administrator Amit Kshatriya told Thursday's briefing.

"The agency failed them."

Kshatriya said the details of the report were "hard to hear" but that "transparency" was the only path forward.

"This is not about pointing fingers," he said. "It's about making sure that we are holding each other accountable."

Both Boeing and SpaceX were commissioned to handle missions to the ISS more than a decade ago.

Varieties

Abandoned Baby Monkey Finds Comfort in Stuffed Orangutan

A baby Japanese macaque named Punch sits next to a stuffed orangutan at Ichikawa City Zoo, in Ichikawa, Chiba Prefecture, Japan, February 19, 2026. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon
A baby Japanese macaque named Punch sits next to a stuffed orangutan at Ichikawa City Zoo, in Ichikawa, Chiba Prefecture, Japan, February 19, 2026. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon
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Abandoned Baby Monkey Finds Comfort in Stuffed Orangutan

A baby Japanese macaque named Punch sits next to a stuffed orangutan at Ichikawa City Zoo, in Ichikawa, Chiba Prefecture, Japan, February 19, 2026. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon
A baby Japanese macaque named Punch sits next to a stuffed orangutan at Ichikawa City Zoo, in Ichikawa, Chiba Prefecture, Japan, February 19, 2026. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon

At a zoo outside Tokyo, the monkey enclosure has become a must-see attraction thanks to an inseparable pair: Punch, a baby Japanese macaque, and his stuffed orangutan companion.

Punch's mother abandoned the macaque when he was born seven months ago at the Ichikawa City Zoo and when an onlooker noticed and alerted zookeepers, they swung into action.

Japanese baby macaques typically cling to their mothers to build muscle strength and for a ‌sense of security, ‌so Punch needed a swift intervention, zookeeper ‌Kosuke ⁠Shikano said. The keepers ⁠experimented with substitutes including rolled-up towels and other stuffed animals before settling on the orange, bug-eyed orangutan, sold by Swedish furniture brand IKEA.

“This stuffed animal has relatively long hair and several easy places to hold," Shikano said. "We thought that its resemblance to a monkey might help ⁠Punch integrate back into the troop later ‌on, and that’s why ‌we chose it."

Punch has rarely been seen without it since, ‌dragging the cuddly toy everywhere even though it is ‌bigger than him, and delighting fans who have flocked to the zoo since videos of the two went viral, Reuters reported.

“Seeing Punch on social media, abandoned by his parents but still trying ‌so hard, really moved me," said 26-year-old nurse Miyu Igarashi. "So when I got the ⁠chance to ⁠meet up with a friend today, I suggested we go see Punch together.”

Shikano thinks Punch's mother abandoned him because of the extreme heat in July when she gave birth.

Punch has had some differences with the other monkeys as he has tried to communicate with them, but zookeepers say that is part of the learning process and he is steadily integrating with the troop.

"I think there will come a day when he no longer needs his stuffed toy," Shikano said.