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The Middle East has recently become a battleground for competing Sunni Islamist projects, each placed in the context of a tight race among some Arab states for regional domination. Over 1400 years after the advent of Islam, this religion has become an essential part of the region’s identity, and no head of state can turn a blind eye to it, no matter their political orientation. In partiucular since the establishment of the third Saudi state in 1902, successive kings have attached great importance to Islam, and Saudi Arabia has projected itself as a custodian of Islam and a protector of the religion’s most important holy sites.
With Muhammad bin Salman (MbS) assuming power, the Crown Prince started to reshape the three pillars governing the Saudi social contract. The ruling family, whose members share distributed financial and administrative powers, constitute the first pillar. To subdue the ruling family, MbS won over loyal princes and removed potential opponents. The rentier economic sector, which has recently undergone shifts in policies felt by all Saudi citizens, constitutes the second pillar. Finally, MbS reaffirmed the State’s alliance with the religious authority founded by Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab, who allied with Saudi Arabia’s first state founder, King Muhammad ibn Saud.
This article discusses the shifts in the relationship between the Saudi regime and the Wahhabi movement under the leadership of Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman.
Wahhabism denied, its founder embraced
The burden Wahhabism has placed on Saudi Arabia is already becoming too costly to bear on three levels. The first is the mounting pressure among the youth, who speak against the powers of the religious police, namely the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice (CPVPV). Young people have preceded the rest of society by opening up to the world via official or semi-formal efforts. This is clear from the number of Saudi scholarship recipients sent to universities outside the Kingdom, which has reached 217,600 between 2005 – 2015, at a cost of about 59 billion riyals (nearly $16 billion). A decent number of these recipients spent their school years in liberal countries with democratic regimes, respecting personal and public freedoms. Even before that, the Saudi youth grew up through their late childhood and adolescence watching entertainment channels such MBC2, which have shaped their perception of and fed their imagination about the West.
The second level pertains to the heavy damage caused to the Kingdom’s legitimacy by the global jihadist movement. Despite the Saudi regime’s application of its interpretation of the Sharia and the Hudud, they still remained accused by extremist groups of ‘treason and subordination to the West’. Prompted partly by such accusations, a large number of Saudis have joined terrorist organisations. Statistics about their real numbers, however, remain conflicting. Saudi Arabia has been at the centre of extremist movements’ operations, which have resulted in scores of casualties, including the 1995 Riyadh Bombing. Meanwhile, the number of operations carried out by ISIS against Saudi Arabia has reached 22 in five years. In 2014, the cost of containing violence in Saudi Arabia exceeded $165 billion.
Despite the Saudi regime’s application of its interpretation of the Sharia and the Hudud, they still remained accused by extremist groups of ‘treason and subordination to the West’
The third level relates to widespread international criticism of Saudi Arabia because of extremism and its heavy toll on the entire world. Even cases against Saudi Arabia relating to September 11 are still being heard by the relevant courts in the US. These cases were filed by the 9/11 victims’ families under the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA). Saudi Arabia is also included on the European Union’s list of countries with “weak anti-money laundering and terrorist financing regimes.”
Limiting the religious authority’s power has never been an easy task, and CPVPV has come under criticism from various Saudi circles because of its violation of individual rights. As Crown Prince, MbS managed to reorganise the Committee and limit its executive powers only to reporting violations to the relevant authorities. Neither did the CPVPV object to the restricting of its powers nor did it make any criticisms about the holding of previously banned concerts.
Facing up to international criticism, MbS did not deny Saudi Arabia’s role in spreading Wahhabism, but said spreading the movement’s ideology was part of an anti-USSR campaign across Muslim countries during the Cold War, and upon the request of Saudi Arabia’s allies.
While officially the Saudi state refuses to acknowledge its connection to Wahhabism or Salafism, it nevertheless unequivocally holds onto the person and principles of Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab. Sheikh Abdullah Al-Manea, the adviser to the Royal Court, stated that the Saudis follow the teachings of Prophet Muhammad and his companions, stressing that Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab is a pious man and a ‘noble fighter’ who called for following the Prophet’s example, and was following the correct ‘Salafi’ approach that the Prophet had called for.
MbS did not deny Saudi Arabia’s role in spreading Wahhabism, but said spreading the movement’s ideology was part of an anti-USSR campaign across Muslim countries during the Cold War
Religion as a tool for opening
Despite MbS’s apparent desire to restrict the religious authority’s impact on society, there’s a set of potential challenges that should be addressed. The first challenge is Saudi Arabia’s awareness of its inability to antagonise religious movements loyal to the regime. Doing so will potentially create movements within Saudi Arabia that will excommunicate and justify violence against the ruling family, and this is not without precedents. In the 1970s the Muhtasibi ‘Salafi’ group (or al-Salafiyya al-Muhtasiba) denounced the Saudi regime’s rule, and eventually – under the leadership of Juhayman al-’Utaybi – occupied the Great Mecca Mosque.
The second challenge is the political influence and economic revenue enjoyed by Saudi Arabia’s custodianship of the two holy mosques. So apart from being the world’s largest energy producer and exporter, Saudi Arabia is the destination for Muslims wishing to perform Hajj and Umrah, an economic activity worth about $12 billion per annum. The performance of these two rites has been the focus of the country’s 2030 Vision, through the Hajj and Omrah Vision Realization Program. This programme aims to develop Hajj and Umrah services to increase the number of pilgrims, a goal the Kingdom might find hard to achieve if its image as a sponsor of Islam is further distorted.
The Saudi regime – under MbS’s leadership – needs a powerful religious movement able to grant it legitimacy when embarking on any social reform project. Many fatwas issued by Sheikhs loyal to the regime have warned against rebellions. Sheikh Abdulaziz al-Sheikh, Saudi Arabia’s Grand Mufti, has also stated that the 2030 Vision will be implemented under a special regulating decree that conforms to religious principles and social customs.
A reformer without a reform
Saudi Islam, as MbS calls it in an interview with The Atlantic magazine, is a pluralist Islam, one that accepts Shiite citizens in the various Saudi institutions on the basis of equal citizenship. It is an Islam that works to spread religion by word, not by ‘sword’. The religion’s teachings are applied in a country that’s in line with the values of modern states and the contemporary international order. This pluralist Islam is based on two pillars: faith and good actions.
In the same interview, MbS tries to explain the new ‘Islamic’ project by explaining who the enemies of this project are, and with whom he is in direct conflict: the axis of evil; namely, the Muslim Brotherhood, Sunni jihadist groups, and the Iranian regime. That is, MbS’s pluralist Islam is not an expansionary project but one that rejects the principle of the Islamic caliphate. This new Islam is also faced by extremism within the Saudi society. MbS’s Islam is more open-minded when it comes to women’s rights. Prohibitions on cultural activities are also relaxed so long as they do not contradict fundamental Islamic values and social norms.
Ironically, this perception of Islam has a lot in common with the vision introduced by Hasasn al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, in his “Peace in Islam” article, published in 1947. Nor is this perception that different from the one championed by the Saudi reformist movement, whose leadership is now thrown in jail.
Conclusion
It is not easy for Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to change the original agreement upon which the Kingdom was founded. Nor is it easy to end the clergy’s authority over society and culture. The Saudi system of government is full of religious symbolism, starting from its founding principles, which dictate that the Quran and Hadith represent the Kingdom’s Constitution. The state’s flag itself has the Shahada, declaration of the Islamic creed, inscripted on it, and not least the Kingdom enjoys the title of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques. The pledge of allegiance for the ruler is also another indication of the state’s religious identity, whose basic law dictates that protecting the Islamic faith and applying the Shariah are part of the state’s duties. More importantly, the government in Saudi Arabia derives its legitimacy in part through the conservative religious movement, the historical ally of Saudi kings.
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