Report: Qaeda Vows Saudi Attacks if Clerics Dead

Reuters ^ | 05-29-03

[Brian S]

Thu May 29, 2003 09:19 AM ET

DUBAI (Reuters) - A purported al Qaeda e-mail has vowed revenge attacks on the Saudi royal family over reports that Saudi police killed two Muslim clerics during a manhunt after the Riyadh blasts, an Arabic newspaper said Thursday. Saudi Arabia has denied the reports and said the outspoken clerics, who have issued religious edicts against close Saudi-Western ties, were among suspects held after the May 12 suicide bombings that killed 34, including eight Americans.

The London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi reported that the e-mail, sent by unnamed persons close to Osama bin Laden, said the al Qaeda leader promised reprisals if the two were indeed dead.

"Sheikh Osama and the leaders of al Qaeda in Afghanistan are closely following reports of the deaths of Sheikh Ali al-Khodeir and Ahmed ak-Khaledi," the daily quoted the e-mail as saying.

The London-based Saudi opposition Movement for Islamic Reform in Arabia has said that the two may have been killed by police Monday during raids in the holy Muslim city of Medina.

"If it was especially confirmed that Sheikh Ali al-Khodeir was martyred then our response against the al-Saud family ... will be as great as the Sheikh is to us," the e-mail added.

The clerics, who are popular among young Saudi Islamists, have urged Saudis not to cooperate with the manhunt for 19 people on a wanted list issued days before the Riyadh blasts.

Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef said Wednesday that the two clerics and a third one, Nasser Ahmed al-Fuhaid, were alive and were among suspects detained in connection with the Riyadh attacks. He did not specify charges against the three.

Saudi-born bin Laden and al Qaeda are blamed for the September 11, 2001 attacks on U.S. cities and the Riyadh blasts.

"I want to clarify none of them (clerics) have been killed. They are all alive," Arab News quoted Prince Nayef as saying.

Al-Quds Al-Arabi said Khodeir and Khaledi had gone into hiding in the kingdom, the birthplace of Islam, shortly before the U.S.-led war on Iraq and issued edicts against the Saudi leaders for helping U.S. and British military activities.

Khodeir was a student of a radical Saudi cleric sympathetic to the ideology of militant groups like al Qaeda.

[theDentist]

Suddenly the Saudis start to notice the elephant in their room.

[Coop]

Oh darnitall! Now they've done it! Al Qaeda wasn't bothering anybody until this happened. [wringing hands nervously]

[justshutupandtakeit]

We can't lose in this fight.

[Alberta's Child]

Report: Qaeda Vows Saudi Attacks if Clerics Dead

I nominate this as the dumbest threat of the year. Al-Qaeda was "vowing Saudi attacks" long before these guys were dead.

[Coop]

We can't lose in this fight.

I don't agree. This tumultuous environment could severely impact the world's falafel market.

[Billthedrill]

Al-Qaeda is currently feeling the heat of not having formal state sanctuary in Afghanistan and informal state sanctuary in either Iraq or Syria. The Saudis will never give it to them because they represent too much of a destabilizing influence in an already unstable political environment - al Qaeda could all too easily become the Wahhabis' military wing and literal king-makers. But al-Q isn't going down quietly. The recent shakeup in the ranks of the senior clerics in Saudi Arabia is most likely a part of this - one thing the Saudis do have better than anyone else is information on who is really doing what. It is now becoming necessary for them to act on that information. And they'd better if they want to continue to run that little gold mine of a country.

[sheik yerbouty]

They are chasing their own tail.

[steve-b]

Sheikh Osama and the leaders of al Qaeda in Afghanistan are closely following reports

You can get news reports in hell?

[Uncle Miltie]

Al-Qaeda was "vowing Saudi attacks" long before these guys were dead.

All they ever do is VOW, never actually attack, the House of Saud. Attacking the source of your funds, ideology, personnel, and schooling would not be wise.

[swarthyguy]

Contrary to conventional wisdom, this was an attack on expats; Americans and other westerners.

If they wanted to attack the House of Saud, they could have gone after Saudi Govt buildings. Instead, they attacked an expat compound, and sent a few unknowing muslims to heaven; collateral damage of the jihad.

The Saudi TV appearances and platitudes of support are the same as they always were; pure propaganda.