Background

Thousands of Saudis have had experience fighting abroad, mostly in Afghanistan, but also in Chechnya, Somalia, and Bosnia. Most of those in Afghanistan returned to Saudi Arabia following the overthrow of the Taliban government in October 2001. In the wake of the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, veteran fighters and a new generation of young radicalized Saudis, mobilized in part by television coverage of the fighting in Iraq, began to make plans to fight in Iraq against those whom they considered infidels—Iraq’s foreign invaders, but also Shi`a Iraqis.

By 2003 Saudi Arabia also faced a growing number of militants prepared to act violently against domestic targets. Militants kidnapped and killed foreigners living in Saudi Arabia, exploded bombs among foreign and Saudi civilians, and targeted Saudi government officials and institutions. In 2003 and 2004 Saudi Arabia witnessed a series of bombings that killed 74 security officers and injured 657, in addition to 90 civilians killed and 439 injured, according to an article by the news website Alarabiya.net of October 21, 2008, quoting a Saudi “security source.”[1] In February 2006, militants failed in an attempt to bomb a large petroleum refinery. Saudi officials in June 2008 announced the arrest of over 700 persons in the preceding six months alone on suspicion of planning to assassinate religious leaders and government officials and attack pilgrimage sites, and of being involved in fighting in Iraq. Around 180 suspects were later released, the Ministry of Interior spokesperson Mansour al-Turki said in June 2008.[2]

Those whom authorities have now indicted are believed to include clerics who, in the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, reportedly either publicly questioned the religious legitimacy of the Saudi government or endorsed violent actions. . These include Nasir al-Fahd, Ali al-Khudair, Faris al-Zahrani, and Ahmad al-Khalidi. It remains unclear whether they have been charged with inciting violence or participating in it through recruitment, fundraising, or other logistical support. Okaz Saudi daily newspaper on October 28 reported that confessions of persons “belonging to cells active in propagating deviant thoughts,” had been authenticated for use in trials.[3] On October 25 the newspaper reported that “it is believed that the three shaikhs of takfir [the practice of declaring others unbelievers] al-Khudair, al-Fahd, and al-Khalidi are among those referred to court.”[4]