Saudis mobilise thousands of troops to quell growing revolt

Saudis mobilise thousands of troops to quell growing revolt
By Robert Fisk, Middle East Correspondent

Saturday, 5 March 2011
 

Saudi security forces in armoured vehicles responding to the threat of a Shia 
uprising this week
	*  More pictures  
 
Saudi Arabia was yesterday drafting up to 10,000 security personnel into its    
north-eastern Shia Muslim provinces, clogging the highways into Dammam and    
other cities with busloads of troops in fear of next week's "day of rage"    by 
what is now called the "Hunayn Revolution". 

Saudi Arabia's worst nightmare – the arrival of the new Arab awakening of    
rebellion and insurrection in the kingdom – is now casting its long shadow    
over the House of Saud. Provoked by the Shia majority uprising in the    
neighbouring Sunni-dominated island of Bahrain, where protesters are calling    
for the overthrow of the ruling al-Khalifa family, King Abdullah of Saudi    
Arabia is widely reported to have told the Bahraini authorities that if they    
do not crush their Shia revolt, his own forces will. 

The opposition is expecting at least 20,000 Saudis to gather in Riyadh and in    
the Shia Muslim provinces of the north-east of the country in six days, to    
demand an end to corruption and, if necessary, the overthrow of the House of    
Saud. Saudi security forces have deployed troops and armed police across the    
Qatif area – where most of Saudi Arabia's Shia Muslims live – and yesterday    
would-be protesters circulated photographs of armoured vehicles and buses of    
the state-security police on a highway near the port city of Dammam. 

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Although desperate to avoid any outside news of the extent of the protests    
spreading, Saudi security officials have known for more than a month that    the 
revolt of Shia Muslims in the tiny island of Bahrain was expected to    spread 
to Saudi Arabia. Within the Saudi kingdom, thousands of emails and    Facebook 
messages have encouraged Saudi Sunni Muslims to join the planned    
demonstrations across the "conservative" and highly corrupt    kingdom. They 
suggest – and this idea is clearly co-ordinated – that during    confrontations 
with armed police or the army next Friday, Saudi women should    be placed among 
the front ranks of the protesters to dissuade the Saudi    security forces from 
opening fire. 

If the Saudi royal family decides to use maximum violence against    
demonstrators, US President Barack Obama will be confronted by one of the    
most sensitive Middle East decisions of his administration. In Egypt, he    only 
supported the demonstrators after the police used unrestrained    firepower 
against protesters. But in Saudi Arabia – supposedly a "key    ally" of the US 
and one of the world's principal oil producers – he    will be loath to protect 
the innocent. 

So far, the Saudi authorities have tried to dissuade their own people from    
supporting the 11 March demonstrations on the grounds that many protesters    
are "Iraqis and Iranians". It's the same old story used by Ben Ali    of Tunisia 
and Mubarak of Egypt and Bouteflika of Algeria and Saleh of Yemen    and the 
al-Khalifas of Bahrain: "foreign hands" are behind every    democratic 
insurrection in the Middle East. 

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Mr Obama will be gritting their    
teeth next Friday in the hope that either the protesters appear in small    
numbers or that the Saudis "restrain" their cops and security;    history 
suggests this is unlikely. When Saudi academics have in the past    merely 
called for reforms, they have been harassed or arrested. King    Abdullah, 
albeit a very old man, does not brook rebel lords or restive serfs    telling 
him to make concessions to youth. His £27bn bribe of improved    education and 
housing subsidies is unlikely to meet their demands. 

An indication of the seriousness of the revolt against the Saudi royal family    
comes in its chosen title: Hunayn. This is a valley near Mecca, the scene of    
one of the last major battles of the Prophet Mohamed against a confederation    
of Bedouins in AD630. The Prophet won a tight victory after his men were    
fearful of their opponents. The reference in the Koran, 9: 25-26, as    
translated by Tarif el-Khalidi, contains a lesson for the Saudi princes: "God    
gave you victory on many battlefields. Recall the day of Hunayn when you    
fancied your great numbers. 

"So the earth, with all its wide expanse, narrowed before you and you    turned 
tail and fled. Then God made his serenity to descend upon his    Messenger and 
the believers, and sent down troops you did not see – and    punished the 
unbelievers." The unbelievers, of course, are supposed –    in the eyes of the 
Hunayn Revolution – to be the King and his thousand    princes. 

Like almost every other Arab potentate over the past three months, King    
Abdullah of Saudi Arabia suddenly produced economic bribes and promised    
reforms when his enemy was at the gates. Can the Arabs be bribed? Their    
leaders can, perhaps, especially when, in the case of Egypt, Washington was    
offering it the largest handout of dollars – $1.5bn (£800m) – after Israel.    
But when the money rarely trickles down to impoverished and increasingly    
educated youth, past promises are recalled and mocked. With oil prices    
touching $120 a barrel and the Libyan debacle lowering its production by up    
to 75 per cent, the serious economic – and moral, should this interest the    
Western powers – question, is how long the "civilised world"    can go on 
supporting the nation whose citizens made up almost all of the    suicide 
killers of 9/11? 

The Arabian peninsula gave the world the Prophet and the Arab Revolt against    
the Ottomans and the Taliban and 9/11 and – let us speak the truth –    
al-Qa'ida. This week's protests in the kingdom will therefore affect us all    – 
but none more so than the supposedly conservative and definitely    hypocritical 
pseudo-state, run by a company without shareholders called the    House of Saud.