Al-Qahtani was present at the historic September 2013 trial of Saudi dissidents Mohammad Fahad al-Qahtani and Abdullah al-Hamid in Riyadh, and used her Twitter account to post an ongoing account of the trial.[1] Trials in Saudi Arabia are frequently held in private, so gaining access to the courtroom was "a matter of luck", she said. The court was unprepared for the number of people who showed up. Those who had gained access to the courtroom tweeted the progress of the trial, while many more monitored the trial online.