STOCK Saudi school students
Picture for illustrative purposes. Image Credit: SPA

Dubai: Saudi Arabia has reaffirmed that anyone who physically attacks a teacher or any staff member will be punished with 10 years in prison, and/or a fine of SR1 million, local media reported.

Those who abuse teachers verbally will also be covered by the law.

The rule has been put in place following a number of incidents in which teachers were brutally attacked. Last year, a high school student in Saudi Arabia beat up his teacher in broad daylight on a street while his friend filmed the ugly incident. A video that shows the moment the student confronts his teacher and starts slapping and punching him all over his body has gone viral on social media.

Also in 2018, a Saudi high school teacher was left bleeding and injured after one of his students punched him in class. The attack, which took place at a school located in Al Taif, went down when the educator was registering attendance.

When he got to the perpetrator’s desk, he called out the student’s name, who stood up and punched the victim.

The shocking incident went viral on Saudi Twitter after images of the teacher being treated by paramedics started circulating online. In the same year, a student hit his teacher with a rock, leaving him with a head injury, while in 2017, a student in the kingdom’s city of Dhahran also attacked his teacher, injuring him in the face.