Saudis and Wahhabis: A Marriage between Politics and Piety
By Siamak Nooraei
8 February 2015
Much speculation has surrounded the new Saudi Arabian king Salman’s policies with respect to the powerful religious establishment: the Wahhabi clerics. Are Saudi-Wahhabi relations a problem worth worrying about?
Time and again throughout history, we see humans relying upon celestial bodies to legitimize their earthly dominion over others. Politics is rarly completely shorn of religious underpinnings—not even in ostensibly secular counties. This is especially true of the Middle East, a region in which the blurring of Islam and politics has led to armed conflicts and human rights abuses. Nowhere is an examination of the role religion plays in politics more requisite than in Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Arabia is the focal point of Islamic politics. Home to Islam’s two holiest cities, Mecca and Medina, it is de facto leader of the Sunni world. From a geostrategic perspective, it is particularly important, due to its immense oil reservoirs, its alliance with the west, its political influence over other Arab states, its tacit recognition of Israel, and its position as counterweight to regional powers such as Iran.
Saudi monarchs have historically supported and promoted a form of Islamic practice—Wahhabism—considered by many as one of the most extremist strains of Sunni Islam. In Saudi Arabia, despite all appearances—the skyscrapers and glittery shopping malls, and other ostensible symbols of modernity—Wahhabis are explicitly anti-modern.
Calling for a return to the practices of Prophet Mohammad and his early disciples, they shun anything that in their view contradicts the Prophet’s teachings. That includes gender equality, liberal dress, drinking, music, dance, and religious pluralism.
Although not always politically radical, their views have been interpreted to justify violence against non-Wahhabi Muslims and non-Muslims. Their worldview has played a key role in the radicalization of men and women the world over. A notable example is the late, infamous Osama Bin Laden. The Islamic State, as well, owes its ideological basis to Wahhabism. It is thus important to understand the group’s history, role in Saudi society and politics, and the existential threat it poses to the region and the world.
On January 23, 2015, Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah died at age 90, and was succeeded by his half-brother Salman. Some analysts believe that Salman, given his close personal tries with Wahhabis, will at once try to forge a stronger relationship with the Wahhabi establishment, in contrast to his predecessor, who alienated many clerics with his lukewarm reforms. By giving them more control over social matters, Salman will in return demand their backing for his foreign and domestic military policies.
For over two and a half centuries, the House of Saud and Wahhabi Islam have welded together power and piety. During the eighteenth century, with the decline of imperial powers, revivalist movements sprang up throughout the near East. Perhaps the most prominent of these currents was Wahhabism.
Named after founder Mohammad Abd Al-Wahhab, it advocated establishing a society modeled after the “earliest teachings” of Islam. Al-Wahhab opposed many practices and advocated a literalist reading of Islam. He also reintroduced the idea of takfir—labeling other Muslims as non-believers—which would thereafter be used periodically by rulers, Jihadists, and clerics to justify their own political positions.
In 1744, Mohammad bin Saud, founder of the modern Saudi dynasty, cooptedAl-Wahhab into legitimizing his campaign to unify various warring tribes. During the First World War, Saudi chieftain Abd al-Aziz again evoked Wahhabism to carve a kingdom out of Ottoman territory. He used his devoutly Wahhabi Bedouin army—the Ikhwan, the ‘Brotherhood’—to defeat rival tribes, until he decided to temper his political ambitions in exchange for nation-state recognition in the League of Nations.
Some members of the Ikhwan viewed his actions as ‘selling-out’, both Islam and the Arabs, and staged an insurrection. Even though Abd al-Aziz eventually defeated the Ikhwan, the ideas of Wahhabis became deeply ingrained, both as a way of life and as a method of resistance.
In the 1970s, the Saudi Kingdom used its oil revenues to export its own ‘official’ Wahhabism, to solidify its position as a Sunni leader and to counter Shia movements and a newly minted Shia theocracy in Iran. The kingdomfunded Wahhabi schools, Saudi-style mosques, and exported Wahhabi preachers to indoctrinate mostly impoverished Muslims the world over. Thus, simultaneously, Saudis gave tacit support to radical Wahhabi clerics to pacify its own Shia minority, and abroad, money to radical Sunni movements.
Today, within Saudi Arabia, the Wahhabi clerical establishment’s main political function is providing the monarchy and its policies with religious legitimacy. For instance, many observers are of the view that with the deteriorating situation on the kingdom’s borders and the threat of domestic extremism on the horizon, Salman may build closer relations with the Saudi religious establishment. In exchange, the Wahhabis usually get to exercise broad authority over Saudi society in education, family law, gender segregation, stoning dissidents, and stoning adulterers.
Why are Wahhabis a problem? First, Wahhabism condones sectarianism.Takfir is entrenched in the Wahhabi ethos. Within Saudi Arabia, clerics are known to antagonize Shia Muslims, who constitute roughly 12 percent of the country’s population. For example, renowned cleric Nasser al-Omar has called the Shia “rejectionists” and “enemies of religion and the nation.” Anti-Shia sentiment within the country has grown since Hezbollah, backed by Bashar al-Assad and Iran, was deployed in Syria to put down what many observers see as a Sunni uprising.
Also, with minor Shia unrest in Bahrain, Houthi uprising in Yemen, and Iran’s continual support for Shia movements within Saudi Arabia and its neighbors, many Wahhabis have become vehemently sectarian. Many Saudis have even welcomed the Islamic State’s destruction of Shia shrines and Christian churches in Syria and Iraq.
Second, even though the Saudi regime has officially condemned Jihadist groups, organizations like Islamic State and al-Qaeda enjoy support amongst many Saudis. As stated before, historically, many groups—like Ikhwan—have used Wahhabism in order to achieve their political objectives. Osama bin Laden, in a sense, “was precisely the representative of a late flowering of this Ikhwani approach.” Today, groups such as the Islamic State and al-Nusra Front espouse the same puritanical beliefs held by the early Wahhabi Bedouins centuries before.
Over the past decade, al-Qaeda and groups with similar views have carried outseveral acts of terrorism, such as suicide bombings, within the country. But according to some accounts, “the March of Isis has not been entirely unwelcome in some sections of Saudi society.”
Third, in Saudi Arabia Sharia governs every aspect of life. Wahhabi clerics reserve strict punishments for crimes: stoning for adultery, cutting hands for theft, beheadings for murder and drug trafficking, among other barbaric practices. Gender mixing is prohibited, freedom of expression curtailed, and mandatory prayers enforced five times a day. The Wahhabis also patrol public spaces to ensure men and women dress appropriately and perform their prayers five times a day. Their intrusive and at times barbaric practices contradict practically every human rights principle.
Fourth, Saudi Arabia, as a major player in Middle Eastern and Islamic politics, is very important to almost every other country. Western countries, particularly the United States, have economic and military interests in Saudi Arabia. America has military bases and investments in oil within Saudi Arabia. Furthermore, Saudi Arabia, as the largest oil producer, has enormous influence, especially within the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. It can distort prices in order to weaken its regional rivals and exert pressure on other energy markets.
Moreover, many countries rely on Saudi Arabia to counter ‘rogue’ states such as Iran, Russia, and Syria. The “Wahhabist impulse,” however, threatens the fragile alliance between Saudis and the west. Were Islamic State and other groups with Wahhabi ideology to challenge the royal family’s handle on the domestic situation, western interests within the region could be severely threatened.
The aftermath of Abdullah’s demise, and the succession of his half-brother Salman to the throne, may very likely result in a realignment of relations with the Wahhabi establishment. On the one hand, Saudis must quell fanatical elements within the Wahhabi establishment to secure their own royal dominion. On the other hand, they need the Wahhabis to legitimize their policies at home and abroad.
This will in practice mean exerting more pressure on Wahhabi clerics who command followings with Jihadist sympathies. In exchange, the Saudis will grant Wahhabis more sway over social matters that are not directly linked to security. This will result in a lamentable worsening of the human rights situation in Saudi Arabia.
To depict himself as a leader in the fight against terrorism and justify his role in the coalition, Salman must retreat from the limited social and political reforms of his predecessor in order to secure the support of the religious establishment. This does not bode well for those concerned with the protection of women, religious minorities, and freedom of expression.
Source: https://www.opendemocracy.net/arab-awakening/siamak-nooraei/saudis-and-wahhabis-marriage-between-politics-and-piety
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