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IN Saudi Arabia, the punishment of crucifixion results in the victim’s decapitation, and the public display of his body. This is what the teenaged Ali Mohammed Al-Nimr has been condemned to.
His crime? He was arrested in 2012 at a pro-democracy demonstration, but under torture, young Ali was made to confess to being part of a plot to overthrow the government. Another young pro-democracy Saudi, Raif Badawi, is in prison for 10 years; his sentence includes 1,000 lashes, of which he has received 50.
And this is the country that has been elected to chair a committee of the United Nations Human Rights Council. No wonder so many states question the credibility of the UN’s human rights body. Israel openly rejects its reports because it can say, with some justification, that the Saudis have no right to lecture others on human rights.
As for international law, we have the appalling bombing campaign against Yemen being carried out by the kingdom and its Gulf allies over months. Thousands of unarmed civilians have been killed, including 130 members of a wedding party a few days ago. Schools, hospitals and market places have been indiscriminately targeted by incompetent pilots. And the ongoing blockade of the impoverished nation has put millions at risk of starvation. A shortage of lifesaving medicines is also causing untold misery.
The Saudis should accept the blame for the Haj tragedy.
Had a coalition of Western forces inflicted so much death and destruction in a Muslim country, believers from Indonesia to Tunisia would have been rioting and attacking the embassies of the ‘infidels’. And yet when the custodians of the holy sites slaughter fellow Muslims, there’s not a squeak from the ummah.
This is entirely in keeping with our tradition of maintaining a discreet silence over Muslim-on-Muslim killings, while accusing the West of targeting the Islamic world, and of Islamophobia in its treatment of Muslim migrants. And yet it is the West that has taken in hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing the Syrian conflict. The Saudis have offered to build mosques (hallelujah!), but have not taken any refugees. Ditto the Gulf states.
Against this backdrop, the callous attitude displayed by Saudi officials and princelings about the hundreds of deaths at the recent Haj is easy to understand. One blamed the pilgrims for ‘indiscipline’, while another made racist comments about African hajis.
Considering the kingdom benefits to the extent of 7pc of its GDP from Haj and umrah, one would have expected a little sympathy, if not a better-managed pilgrimage. The truth is that when it comes to such needless deaths, the Saudis (and most other Muslims) tend to shrug their shoulders, look skywards and mumble: “It was the will of Allah.”
However, incompetence and stupidity can hardly be laid at the Maker’s door. After all, He gave us brains to think with, so surely Saudi Arabia should accept the blame for its mistakes that cause so many deaths over Haj. The toll this year has been worse than usual, but is hardly abnormal.
But slowly, the chickens are coming home to roost. As oil prices refuse to rise above $50 per barrel, the House of Saud is feeling the pinch. Given the vast subsidies the ruling family hands out to keep the population quiet, as well as the mounting cost of the Yemen misadventure, oil needs to be around $107 per barrel for the kingdom to balance its books.
With thousands of royal relatives, the squeeze is getting real. Already, the Saudis are drawing down on some of their vast overseas holdings. How much longer they can live with low oil prices remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, dissent is simmering in the ranks. Quoting a letter circulated by an unnamed prince, the Guardian reports that there is talk of regime change, with important members of the royal family wanting King Salman and his son Mohammed bin Salman to be ousted.
But while such rumbling indicates dissatisfaction with the aggressive policies being followed by the present king and his son, these royals only call for the replacement of one Saud by another. There is no hint here of any democratic transformation of a backward, autocratic society.
More and more, though, the world sees through the pious mask worn by the ruling aristocracy. Its recourse to an extreme ideology to appease its clergy, and its export of a violent version of Islam, has destabilised much of the Muslim world. The sectarian violence we see in Iraq and Syria is largely due to the takfiri philosophy used by extremists to justify their mindless cruelty.
Thus far, Saudi Arabia has relied on its vast oil reserves to buy Western support. However, as the nuclear deal with Iran showed us, the Saudis are no longer indispensable. Cheap oil and gas have eroded Saudi clout. Surely the day of reckoning is coming. For me, it couldn’t be soon enough.
Published in Dawn October 3rd, 2015
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