What’s Happening in Saudi Arabia?

Amitava Mukherjee

(Amitava Mukherjee is a senior journalist and commentator.

He can be contacted at amitavamukherjee253@gmail.com)

Now it will be interesting to watch what attitude the Donald Trump administration in the United States takes towards the latest report by Agnes Callamard, the special rapporteur for the United Nations human rights agency, that Saudi Arabia is responsible for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi and that there is credible evidence justifying an investigation into the role of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) in it. As Saudi Arabia is the United States’ principal pawn in the Arab World and in the latter’s present war cry against Iran, the above-mentioned UN report is not likely to stir up much water in the US administration. A deeper analysis would, however, reveal that powerful churnings are now taking place within the most powerful Sheikhdom in the world.

The murder of Jamal Khashoggi has much wider international connotations. It forms an important landmark in the tussle for supremacy in the Muslim world between the Shias led by Iran and the Sunni power led by Saudi Arabia. Through this murder MBS wants to send a message across that he would not tolerate even any criticism of the theological and temporal power base of the Sunni world and the Saudi monarchy, which is the prime mover in the OPEC, the Gulf Cooperation Council and a conglomeration of Sunni nations that includes itself, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

Khashoggi’s murder has brought to fore the limit the Saudi kingdom can reach up to for trampling upon any kind of dissent. However, very little is known about the conditions that now exist within Saudi Arabia. The kingdom has now become desperate to stamp out the growing opposition against theocracy, corruption and accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few members of the royal family. The most internationally known face of such an opposition to the house of Al-Saud is Raif Badawi, a secular-minded activist and writer who used to run a website named Free Saudi Liberals. Raif has openly castigated religion-based states and, in line with it, has called into question the religion-based policies of the Saudi kingdom. But Raif and his sister Samar Badawi have been arrested. Raif has been sentenced to long years in prison and 1,000 lashes. He has already received 60 of them. His wife Ensaf Haider has fled to Canada with their three children.

In this year’s World Press Freedom Index compiled by Reporters Without Borders, Saudi Arabia’s position is 172 out of the 180 countries in reckoning. Last year Riyadh’s position was 169. That Saudi Arabia has further slipped down the order should not be surprising given the fact that the royal house has no other way but to stifle internal voices of dissent against its involvement in costly wars in Yemen and against several proxies of Iran in the region which is bleeding the country’s economy. With the price of oil hovering around USD 65 a barrel, the Saudi budget deficit this year is likely to reach the frightening level of seven per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which was 4.6 per cent in 2018. Ominously, for the Saudi King Salman and the Crown Prince MBS, a new line of liberal clergy, opposed to the fundamentalist theocratic group loyal to the royal household, is appearing. This group is opposed to the royal household’s theocratic line of thinking.

This crack in the block of clergy has unnerved the royal establishment. Leading this dissident line is Salman-al-Odah, a cleric known for his extreme views and who demands political reform. That Odah commands 14 million Twitter followers indicate that days are not really smooth for King Salman and the Crown Prince MBS. He is supported by two other liberal Sunni clerics, named Awad-al-Qarni and Ali-al-Omari. Qarni has more than two million followers. All the three have been arrested and are being tried on charges of terrorism. International diplomatic circles are worried over the information that the Saudi government has already decided to execute all the three.

The Saudi socio-political structure is now trudging along carrying the heavy burden of history on its shoulder. The royal household is a direct beneficiary of the fundamentalist Wahabi school of thought as the kingdom is the result of cooperation between the Al-Saud dynasty and a group of Muslim clergy in 1744. While the Al-Saud dynasty was represented by Muhammed-ibn-Saud, the clergy was headed by Muhammed-ibn-Abdul-al-Wahab. In the 1920s and the 1930s, the Al-Saud dynasty, under the leadership of Abdul Aziz, carried out extensive conquests in the Arabian peninsula. It is better to be admitted that the Wahabi school of thought has prevailed over the alliance more than what the military might of the Al-Saud line has been able to influence. It is this predominance of the Wahabi thought which has shaped the world view of the line of Ibn Saud as the latter derives its legitimacy from the former.

It is a bit confusing why MBS, the Crown Prince, initially gave an impression that he would reform the Saudi society. He did give Saudi women the right to drive cars in public. But he does not want to disturb the ‘male guardianship’ system of the country which means that women in Saudi Arabia must always remain under the tutelage of a male member of her family – father, husband, brother, or any other male relation. Several Saudi women activists have been arrested for opposing this system and on charges of maintaining contacts with foreign diplomats, journalists and international human rights activists.

There is no doubt that conditions in Saudi Arabia are big with many possibilities. Weakening of the Al-Saud dynasty in any immediate future will mean a topsy-turvy situation in the United States’ and the West European countries’ strategic plans in the oil-rich Middle East and West Asia. This is why they are leaving no stones unturned to prop up Crown Prince MBS in spite of the fact that Jamal Khashoggi was a columnist of The Washington Post. Twenty-eight journalists in Saudi Arabia are now behind bars. Saleh al Shehi, a journalist, was sent to gaol for five years after he lambasted the royal family for tolerating corruption and nepotism in a television interview. Even the royal household’s economic policies cannot be criticized. An economist named Essam al Zamel did it. He paid the price by facing trials.

The US stability in Saudi Arabia has now become a necessity for two principal purposes – containing Iran’s growing influence in the Middle East and checkmating Tehran’s proxies like the Hezbollah in Lebanon, Houthis in Yemen and the Hamas in Palestine. But Washington has reasons to feel perturbed as conditions in Saudi Arabia are not what they look like outwardly. The kingdom is always under strain. It started with the tribal Ikhwan rebellion of 1929 and culminated with the seizure of the great mosque in Mecca by Juhaiman-al-Utaibi in 1979.

That the house of Al-Saud is not in total control of the clergy becomes apparent from the fact that in recent times, more than 1,710 religious leaders have either been fired or suspended. Whatever kind of crackdown the Sheikhdom might have inflicted internally, opposition to it is growing in some other countries of Europe being organized by some Saudi fugitives.