Date: Fri, 07 Dec 2001 00:23:26 +1100
Subject: The Saudi Connection 


The Saudi Connection
Stephen Schwartz
Spectator (The Dominion 13 Oct 2001)

The first thing to do when trying to understand "Islamic suicide bombers" 
is to forget the cliches about the Muslim taste for martyrdom.
It does exist, of course, but the desire for paradise is not a safe guide 
to what motivated last month's suicide attacks. Throughout
history, political extremists of all faiths have willingly given up their 
lives simply in the belief that by doing so, whether in bombings or in
other forms of terror, they would change the course of history, or at least 
win an advantage for their cause. Tamils blow themselves up
in their war on the government of Sri Lanka; Japanese kamikaze pilots in 
World War II flew their fighters into United States aircraft
carriers.

The Islamic-fascist ideology of Osama Bin Laden and those closest to him, 
such as the Egyptian and Algerian "Islamic Groups", is no
more intrinsically linked to Islam or Islamic civilisation than Pearl 
Harbor was to Buddhism, or Ulster terrorists - whatever they may
profess - are to Christianity. Serious Christians don't go around killing 
and maiming the innocent; devout Muslims do not prepare for
paradise by hanging out in strip bars and getting drunk, as one of last 
month's terrorist pilots was reported to have done. However,
numerical preponderance of Muslims as perpetrators of these ghastly 
incidents is no coincidence. So we have to ask what has made
these men into the monsters they are'? What has so galvanised violent 
tendencies in the worId's second largest religion (and, in the
US the fastest-growing faith)?

For Westerners, it seems natural to look for answers in the distant past, 
beginning with the Crusades. But if you ask educated, pious,
traditional but forward-looking Muslims what has driven their umma, or 
global community, in this direction, many of them will answer you
with one word: Wahhabism. This is a strain of Islam that emerged less than 
two centuries ago in Arabia and is the official theology of
the Gulf states. It is violent, it is intolerant and it is fanatical beyond 
measure. Wahhabism is the most extreme form of Islamic
fundamentalism, and its followers are called Wahhabis. Not all Muslims are 
suicide bombers, but all Muslim suicide bombers are
Wahhabis - except, perhaps, for some disciples of atheist leftists posing 
as Muslims in the interests of personal power, such as Yasser
rafat or Saddam Hussein.

Wahhabism is the Islamic equivalent or the most extreme Protestant 
sectarianism. It is puritan, demanding punishment for those who
enjoy any form of music except the drum. and severe punishment up to death 
for drinking or sexual transgressions. It condemns as
unbelievers those who do not pray, a view that never previously existed in 
mainstream Islam. It is stripped-down Islam, calling for
simple, short prayers, undecorated mosques and the uprooting of grave- 
stones (since decorated mosques and graveyards lend
themselves to veneration, which is idolatry in the Wahhabi mind. Wahhabis 
do not even permit the name of the Prophet Muhammad to
be inscribed in mosques or his birthday to be celebrated. Above all, they 
hate ostentatious spirituality, much as Protestants detest the
veneration' of miracles and saints in the Catholic Church. Ibn Abdul Wahhab 
(1703-92), the founder of this totalitarian Islamism, was
born in Uyaynah, in the part of Arabia known as Nejd, where Riyadh is 
today, and which Mohammed notably warned would be a
source of corruption and confusion. (Anti-Wahhabi Muslims refer to 
Wahhabism as fitna an Najdiyyah or "the trouble out of Nejd".)

 From the beginning of Wahhab's dispensation, in the late 18th century, his 
cult was associated with the mass murder of all who
opposed it. For example, the Wahhabis fell upon the city of Qarbala in 1801 
and killed 2000 ordinary citizens in the streets and
markets. In the 19th century, Wahhabism took the form of Arab nationalism 
versus the Turks. The founder of the Saudi kingdom, Ibn
Saud, established Wahhabism as its official creed. Much has been made of 
the role of the US in "creating" Osama bin Laden through
subsidies to the Afghan mujahedin, but as much or more could be said in 
reproach of Britain which, three generations before,
supported the Wahhabi Arabs in their revolt against the Ottomans. Arab 
hatred of the Turks fused with Wahhabi ranting against the
"decadence" of Ottoman Islam. The truth is that the Ottoman khalifa reigned 
over a multinational Islamic umma in which vast
differences in local culture and tra- dition were tolerated. No such 
tolerance exists in Wahhabism, which is why the concept of US
troops on Saudi soil so inflames bin Laden.

Serious Christians don't go around killing and maiming the innocent; devout 
Muslims do not prepare for paradise by hanging out in strip
bars and getting drunk, as one of last month's terrorist pilots was 
reported to have done. Bin Laden is a Wahhabi. So are the suicide
bombers in Israel. So are his Egyptian allies, who exulted as they stabbed 
foreign tourists to death at Luxor not many years ago,
bathing in blood up to their elbows and emitting blasphemous cries of 
ecstasy. So are the Algerian Islamist terrorists whose contribution
to the purification of the world consisted of murdering people for such 
sins as running a movie projector or reading secular
newspapers. The Iranians are not Wahhabis, which partially explains their 
slow, but undeniable, movement toward moderation. The
Taleban practise a variant of Wahhabism. In the Wahhabi fashion they employ 
ancient punishments - such as execution for moral
offences - and they have a primitive and fearful view of women. The same is 
true of Saudi Arabia's rulers. None of this extremism has
been inspired by US fumblings in the world, and it has little to do with 
the tragedies that have beset Israelis and Palestinians.

But the Wahhabis have two weaknesses of which the West is largely, unaware. 
The first is that the vast majority of Muslims in the
world are peaceful people who would prefer the installation of Western 
democracy in their own countries. They loathe Wahhabism for
the same reason any patriarchal culture rejects a violent break with 
tradition. Bin Laden and other Wahhabis are not defending Islamic
tradition; they represent an ultra-radical break in the direction of a 
sectarian utopia. Thus, they are best described as Islamo-fascists. In
the US, 80 per cent of mosques are estimated by the Sufi Hisham al-Kabbani, 
born in Lebanon and now living in the US, to be under
the control of Wahhabi imams, who preach extremism, and this leads to the 
other point of vulnerability: Wahhabism is subsidised by
Saudi Arabia, even though bin Laden has sworn to destroy the Saudi royal 
family. The Saudis have played a double game for years,
more or less as Stalin did with the West during World War II.

They pretended to be allies in a common struggle against Saddam Hussein 
while they spread Wahhabi ideology,, just as Stalin
promoted an "antifascist" coalition with the US while carrying out 
espionage and subversion on US territory. The motive was the
same: the belief that the West was or is decadent and doomed.

ONE key question is never asked in US discussions of Arab terrorism: what 
is the role of Saudi Arabia? The question cannot be asked
because US companies depend too much on the continued flow of Saudi oil, 
while US politicians have become too eosy with the
Saudi rulers. Another reason it is not asked is that to expose the extent 
of Saudi and Wahhabi influence on American Muslims would
deeply compromise many Islamic clerics in the US. But it is the most 
significant question Americans should be asking themselves
today. If we get rid of bin Laden, who do we then have to deal with? The 
answer was eloquently Put by Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr,
professor of political science at the University of California at San 
Diego, and author of an authoritative volume on Islamic extremism in
Pakistan, when he said: "If the US wants to do something about radical 
Islam it has to deal with Saudi Arabia. The 'rogue states' (Iraq,
Libya, and so on) are less important in the radicalisation of Islam than 
Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is the single most import- ant cause
and supporter of radicalisation, ideologisation, and the general 
fanaticisation of Islam."

 From what we now know, it appears not a single one of the suicide pilots 
in New York and Washington was Palestinian. They all seem
to have been Saudis, citizens of the Gulf states, Egyptian or Algerian. Two 
are reported to have been the sons of the former second
secretary of the Saudi embassy in Washing- ton. They were planted in the US 
long before the outbreak of the latest Palestinian
intifada; in fact, they seem to have begun their conspiracy while the 
Middle East peace process was in full, if short, bloom. Anti-terror
experts and politicians in the West must now consider the Saudi connection. 
- The Spectator

Here are two links which 'unveil' Wahhabism from interwoven perspectives:

The first from the Institute of Islamic Information (US): 
http://www.iiie.net/Articles/Wahabism.html

The second extensively cited article in many Islamic sites: 
http://www.sultan.org/articles/wahabism.html

You need to look very carefully at the thinking in these two articles and 
take careful stock of what Stephen Schwartz was saying
about Islam in the US.

Here is a fatwah against Wahhabism 
http://www.hizmetbooks.org/Advice_for_the_Muslim/w ah-31.htm"




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