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"…The people are exhausted from this change." Consequently, he says, the Saudi leadership should be cautious about the pace of reform. "After a while, the people simply say, 'Look, enough'." This interview was conducted partly in English and partly with a translator by producer Jihan El-Tahri on Sept. 2003 in Jeddah. A Saudi attorney, Bassim Alim was among a prominent group of Saudis who in early 2004 petitioned the royal family for reforms, including constitutional changes and a larger role for women. He discusses why young Saudis today are attracted to extremism and why political change is the strongest weapon for combating radical Islamists. Some of the clerics may have given in because they were convinced by the crown prince’s legal interpretations. Others appear to have succumbed to good old-fashioned intimidation.
Political power
By the time Saud died in 1814, his son and successor Abdullah ibn Saud had to contend with an Ottoman-Egyptian invasion in the Ottoman–Wahhabi War seeking to retake lost Ottoman Empire territory. The mainly Egyptian force succeeded in defeating Abdullah's forces, taking over the then-Saudi capital of Diriyyah in 1818. Abdullah was taken prisoner and was soon beheaded by the Ottomans in Constantinople, putting an end to the First Saudi State.
Vision 2030: Saudi Arabia’s Economic Model Struggles as Expenses Outpace Investments
Today, only his descendents are considered part of the "royal" family line and eligible to ascend the throne. The fact that U.S. troops are withdrawing from the kingdom makes no difference to Al Qaeda. On May 12, 2003 Al Qaeda militants attack three compounds in Riyadh that house hundreds of foreign workers. Thirty-five people are killed, including nine Americans. Shocked, Saudi society and the royal family begin to look inward and to question how their own citizens could have been behind the attacks.
Personal life and death
He also accuses the Saudi royal family of pocketing the national wealth. These unions produce 45 legitimate sons and an unknown number of daughters (daughters are not counted). Abd al-Aziz then begins consolidating power away from the brothers and cousins who helped him conquer the peninsula in favor of his own sons. Every Saudi king since has been a son of Abd al-Aziz ibn Saud. A more pragmatic approach is to make sure that the reforms he has instituted stick, and that the changes in Saudi culture become irreversible.
“We should not try to seek out people and prove charges against them,” he said. “You have to do it the way that the Prophet taught us how to do it.” The law will be enforced only against those so flagrant that they are practically demanding to take their lumps. The Ritz operation, MBS said, was a blitzkrieg against corruption, and wildly successful and popular because it started at the top and did not stop there.
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A group of 107 Wahhabi religious figures sends a 46-page "Memorandum of Advice" to King Fahd criticizing the government for corruption and human rights abuses and for allowing U.S. troops on Saudi soil. The document calls on the government to more strictly follow shari'a, or Islamic law, and end relations with Western governments. King Fahd dismisses seven of the 17 members of the ulama for refusing to denounce the memorandum.
The prince remains incarcerated, and his popular Twitter account, which boasts a 3.5 million followers, remains silent. The fate of the Prince is unknown and has led to unsubstantiated rumours of his death. Documentary series looking at the challenges facing the new Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, 32-year-old Mohammed bin Salman, who has pledged to transform the country. The story of notorious ISIS bride Shamima Begum told in her own words for the first time.
The royal family again turns to the ulama, the religious leaders of Saudi Arabia, and the clerics issue a fatwa based on verses from the Quran that allows the government to use all necessary force to retake the Great Mosque. The standoff lasts for several weeks before the Saudi military can remove the insurgents. More than 200 troops and dissidents are killed in the attacks and, to set an example, over sixty of the zealots are publicly beheaded in their hometowns. During the reign of King Khalid, hundreds of billions in oil revenue pours into Saudi Arabia. The tiny population, estimated at four million and with only half a million literate males, finds it hard to absorb such wealth. The government begins a frenzied pace of buying and building.
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Once again, the royal family turns to the ulama for a ruling or fatwa. With their approval, over half a million U.S. troops arrive in Saudi Arabia and neighboring countries. But almost every aspect of modernization brings the king into conflict with the religious establishment. To appease the conservatives, King Faisal allows Saudia Arabia to become a sanctuary for extremist Muslims from Egypt and Syria where the governments are cracking down on fundamentalist scholars and professionals. His decision will have far-reaching consequences; many of today's Saudi radicals studied under Egyptian and Syrian fundamentalists.
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But the Ritz guests had not, MBS said, been placed under arrest. That would imply that they had entered the court system and faced charges. Instead, he said, they had been invited to “negotiate”—and to his pleasure, 95 percent did so. Khalid died of a heart attack in 1982, and was succeeded by Fahd, the eldest of the powerful "Sudairi Seven", so-called because they were all sons of Ibn Saud by his wife Hassa Al Sudairi.
MBS said Neom is “not a copy of anything elsewhere,” not a xerox of Dubai. But it has more in common with the great globalized mainstream than with anything in the history of a country that, until recently, was remarkably successful at walling off its traditional culture from the blandishments of modernity. Now he was studying again, at a Saudi university, and planning to open his own business. He had already attended concerts, and he said his fondest wish was to listen to music in the open air and smoke a joint—just one, he promised. I said I did not think that was explicitly part of Vision 2030, but he’d probably get his wish.
Taif, a city an hour outside Mecca, was once the summer residence of the king and his family. The Prophet is thought to have visited there, and many Muslims supplement their pilgrimages to Mecca with side trips to other sites from the Prophet’s life. The Wahhabis have, historically, treated these visits as un-Islamic and reprehensible. Whenever pilgrimage sites have fallen into Wahhabi hands, they have methodically and remorselessly destroyed them by leveling monuments, grave markers, and other structures sacred to Muslims in other traditions.
“Here, smell this,” a former member of al-Qaeda commanded me, sticking under my nose a paper strip blotted with a chemical I could not identify. Another prisoner, at the Power-run prison canteen, offered me free frozen yogurt. As I walked around the prison, the yogurt began to melt, and my interpreter held it so I could take notes. Almost all the men wore thick beards, and many had a zabiba (literally “raisin”), the discolored, wrinkly spot one gets from pressing the head to the ground in prayer. Some of their products were artisanal and religious-themed. They led me into a tiny room, a factory for the production of perfumes for sale outside the prison, and to another room where they made prayer beads from olive pits.
As his father had decreed, King Faisal is succeeded by his half-brother Prince Khalid, who becomes the fourth king of Saudi Arabia. In the midst of the war, the U.S. airlifts supplies to Israel. The Arab League pressures Faisal for an oil boycott and Faisal acts, ordering Aramco to stop pumping. With Saudi oil kept off the market, world oil prices quadruple. President Nixon sends Secretary of State Henry Kissinger on an urgent mission to meet with Faisal. Kissinger says oil is a national security priority, and if necessary, the U.S. will intervene militarily.
Few nations have as many carried costs as Saudi Arabia, and Neom zeroes them out and starts afresh with a plan unburdened by the past. To any parts of the kingdom that cling to their old ways, it promises that the future is everything they are not. So far, Neom is less a city than an urbanist cargo cult. (The projected cost is in the hundreds of billions of dollars, a huge sum even for Saudi Arabia.) But many good ideas look crazy at first. What struck me was that Neom’s vision is really an anti-vision.
The two sons also enjoy the same cordial relationship which extends into business activities. The people of Mariupol share powerful, shocking stories of bravery and loss in a war zone. The history of Saudi Arabia and its ruling dynasty are one.
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