Loading ...Islamic State sets sights on Saudi Arabia
In a 17-minute audio message, purportedly from its elusive leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the group sets its sights firmly on Saudi Arabia, birthplace of Islam and the world’s largest oil producer and exporter.
The speaker does not refer to it as Saudi Arabia, since this is a name derived from the ruling tribe, the al-Saud, whose authority IS does not accept.
Instead he calls it “the land of Haramayn”, the land of the two holy places, meaning Mecca and Medina.
Reaching out to IS’s growing number of Saudi followers, he sets out a target list for attack, starting with the Shia who make up a minority of Saudi nationals, living mostly in the oil-rich Eastern Province, and whom hardline Salafi radicals view as heretics.
So deep are the sectarian divisions opened up in the Middle East by the insurgency in Iraq that many Saudis view IS not as a marauding band of terrorists but as brave defenders of Sunni Islam against the encroaching forces of Iran and its Shia allies.
Saudi officials have long been warning that their country is the primary target of IS.
Having declared itself a caliphate this summer, it was inevitable that sooner or later the group would turn its attention to the largest and most important country in the region.
Saudi Arabia’s supreme religious authority, the grand mufti, has branded IS as the “greatest enemy of Islam”.
A recent op-ed written in the New York Times by Saudis close to the government said: “Saudi Arabia is the only authority in the region with the power and legitimacy to bring IS down.”