(CNN)A stand-up comedian and women’s right-to-drive activist, Fahad al-Butairi and Loujain al-Hathloul, were once seen as a groundbreaking Saudi power couple in a country that was rapidly relaxing its strict social rules.
Since then, both have been arrested, and a Twitter thread detailing their disappearance has gone viral, keeping alive a debate about the Kingdom’s crackdown on dissidents. That debate reached a fever pitch after the October killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.
American writer and television producer Kirk Rudell tweeted about his friendship with Butairi, who was widely known as the “Jerry Seinfeld of Saudi Arabia,” and Hathloul, an internationally-known advocate for ending the prohibition of women driving in the country, on January 2.
