Will The Saudi Fatwa Stop The Jihadis?
Michael Jacobson at the excellent Counterterrorism Blog reports that the most influential cleric in Wahhabist Saudi Arabia has published a fatwa ordering would-be jihadists to stay at home rather than travel for holy war. Sheikh Abdel-Aziz Al-Asheikh appears to have contradicted Saudi government insistence that their subjects have not contributed to the terrorism in Iraq, and may embarrass the royal family into making a better effort at stopping the traffic in terrorists (via Instapundit):
Earlier this week, Sheikh Abdel-Aziz Al-Asheikh – the most senior Wahhabi cleric in Saudi Arabia -- released a rather surprising religious edict. In this fatwa, the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia instructed Saudis not to leave the Kingdom to participate in jihad – a statement directed primarily at those considering going to Iraq. Al-Asheikh said that he decided to speak up, “after it was clear that over several years Saudis have been leaving for jihad” and that “our youth…became tools carrying out heinous acts.” Perhaps even most significantly, Al-Asheikh also addressed potential donors, urging them to “be careful about where [their money is] spent so it does not damage young Muslims.”Al-Asheikh’s fatwa stands out for several reasons. First, it helps corroborate a number of statements made recently by US government officials about terrorists and terrorist financing emanating from the Kingdom ...
The Grand Mufti’s statements were also notable for another reason. The Saudis are generally reluctant to concede either that Saudi Arabia is a source of terrorism or that Saudi counterterrorism efforts are inadequate.
Certainly, it helps to have Wahhabist clerics demanding an end to the flow of terrorists out of Saudi Arabia. One has to wonder what that might mean internally to the royal family, however. As Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia, one has to assume that al-Sheikh has the blessing of the royal family for his edicts, but I'm not quite as optimistic as CTB in thinking that the royal family has suddenly decided to clamp down on terrorism for the sake of Iraq or the US. The royal family has its own axe to grind in this case.
The problem of jihadis in Saudi Arabia is more complicated than people think. Many point out that most of the "muscle" hijackers on 9/11 came from Saudi Arabia and believe that Saudi-sponsored Wahhabism is the proximate cause of al-Qaeda. The fact that Osama bin Laden came from a prominent Saudi family lends credence to that assumption. However, most of those 15 hijackers were ethnic Yemenis from territory under dispute between Riyadh and Sanaa. That dispute did not get settled until 2000, and mostly in favor of the Saudis, as maps at this site explain.
That puts the value of this edict in some doubt. It can't hurt, of course, but it may not address the real sources of radical jihad in Saudi Arabia. The Yemenis in this territory seem unlikely to accept the edicts of the government's imam as binding, and jihadists produced from the area will both be officially Saudi and defiant to Saudi authority. Osama was clever enough to exploit the anger of those ethnic Yemenis for his own purposes, even after the settlement in 2000 -- or perhaps especially after the settlement.
In fact, the Saudis may be more honest than people think when they claim that their problem is jihadists coming home. The US surge in Iraq has succeeded in pushing AQI to the borders, in serious disarray and with lines of communication all but demolished. The jihadis that survived may be looking to re-enter Saudi Arabia, and the Yemenis among them whom the Saudis were happy to see leave. They will have their hands full if the Yemenis start making trouble for them in the disputed area along the Yemeni border.
As I stated earlier, any time an influential Wahhabist cleric speaks out against violent jihad, it's good news. In this case, it may not be as influential as we'd hope, and indeed may be more self-serving than anything else.
Posted by Ed Morrissey on October 4, 2007 7:29 AM | Comments (8) | TrackBacks (1)
Comments (8)
Posted by skeneogden | October 4, 2007 8:33 AM
Osama's father was a native Yememi and devout Muslim.
Posted by NahnCee | October 4, 2007 8:37 AM
Saudi policy when we repatriate terrorists from Gitmo has always been to interview them and then to release them, claiming that they've been de-programmed.
Likewise, Saudi doesn't really have a justice system per se, so that depending what your name is and who you're related to, you may not be charged for ANY infractions up to and including filmed rape, murder and torture resulting in amputations.
I have to wonder how many young stupid Saudi's total have become dead from following their jihad, and how many Saudi moms and dads may be grieving for their dead chicklets. I don't think there is the peer disapproval of poor parenting like we saw with the parents of the Columbine killers, but I also don't think there is the celebration of martyrhood in Saudi that we see with the dreadful Palestinians.
Saudi was having a problem there for a while with uppity jihadists blowing shit up inside the Kingdom, including the head of the Security Department and attempts at the American Embassy. But I get the feeling those were not "real" Saudi's and may have been out-of-state foreigners, and the Saud government *does* appear to have been pretty successful at having killed all or most of them.
Which leads me back to wondering if Big Chief Cleric al-Whoozit might not be responding to internal pressure from rich parents to DO SOMETHING to keep their kids from running off to get themselves hamburglerized. Maybe Arabs just never imagined four years ago that American soldiers would turn out to be so very very good at helping them along in their path to martyrhood.
Posted by gene | October 4, 2007 9:02 AM
I agree with Nancee that the Saudis pick and choose who to punish and jail and who not to. I worked there for many years and it's unbelieveable how much corruption and graft there is. I've heard from some Saudi friends that even the beheadings that happen so often there are not Saudis but some unfortunate smuck from Bangladish or Yemen that has been in jail in the Kingdom for a matter of things. They show the pictures of Saudis and their names but in reality they were replaced by one of the unfortunate. They have no written laws and heaven forbid if a foreigner has a confrontation with a Saudi. You can guess who the winner is.
Posted by RKV | October 4, 2007 9:17 AM
A "surplus" of young males is produced in polygamous societies (Mormon or Muslim) and something must be done with them. The disaffected, poor and/or psychotic can be easily dealt with in a religiously approved manner via jihadi violence. Exporting the surplus provides internal hygiene to the Saudi state, and once the surplus builds up again, the flow of these young men will be turned on once more.
Posted by Dale Michaud aka TexasDude | October 4, 2007 10:54 AM
Why not do what we have historically threatened to Saudi Arabia, invade them?
Posted by DCM | October 4, 2007 11:07 AM
Osama bin Laden was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia but his father, the late Muhammed Awad bin Laden, immigrated from Hadhramaut, on the south coast of Yemen, so Osama is an ethnic Yemeni as well.
Sheikh Abdel-Aziz Al-Asheikh appears to be more concerned that the young Muslim jihadists are getting killed at an increasing rate and not all that upset that they were going to Iraq to kill Americans. We should not be releasing Saudi jihadists to Saudi Arabia and we need to start getting much tougher with our Saudi “friends” who use our oil payments to support Wahhabist jihadists who are killing our troops.
Posted by mrlynn | October 4, 2007 7:59 PM
If we were really serious, we'd stop ALL Saudi funding of mosques and religious schools in America.
/Mr Lynn
Posted by justafriend | October 5, 2007 10:33 AM
A fatwa needs only to be followed, if you are a follower of the cleric issuing the fatwa. To all others, it is basically meaningless