Home > The Magazine > Features

Saturday 22 November 2008

Dare to dream and make your ultimate trip a reality

The latest culture as recommended by our staff

Michael Henderson

Michael Henderson suggests

Email registration

Free weekly email update

Great products and special offers for Spectator readers

Click here for great value events

Click here for exclusive articles, offers, tasting notes and discussion

Cover Story

Ground Zero and the Saudi connection

Stephen Schwartz

Saturday, 22nd September 2001

Stephen Schwartz on the extreme Islamic sect that inspires Osama bin Laden as well as all Muslim suicide bombers - and is subsidised by Saudi Arabia

It is stripped-down Islam, calling for simple, short prayers, undecorated mosques, and the uprooting of gravestones (since decorated mosques and graveyards lend themselves to veneration, which is idolatry in the Wahhabi mind). Wahhabis do not even permit the name of the Prophet Mohammed to be inscribed in mosques, nor do they allow his birthday to be celebrated. Above all, they hate ostentatious spirituality, much as Protestants detest the veneration of miracles and saints in the Roman Church.

Ibn Abdul Wahhab (1703-92), the founder of this totalitarian Islamism, was born in Uyaynah, in the part of Arabia known as Nejd, where Riyadh is today, and which the Prophet himself notably warned would be a source of corruption and confusion. (Anti-Wahhabi Muslims refer to Wahhabism as fitna an Najdiyyah or 'the trouble out of Nejd'.) From the beginning of Wahhab's dispensation, in the late 18th century, his cult was associated with the mass murder of all who opposed it. For example, the Wahhabis fell upon the city of Qarbala in 1801 and killed 2,000 ordinary citizens in the streets and markets.

In the 19th century, Wahhabism took the form of Arab nationalism v. the Turks. The founder of the Saudi kingdom, Ibn Saud, established Wahhabism as its official creed. Much has been made of the role of the US in 'creating' Osama bin Laden through subsidies to the Afghan mujahedin, but as much or more could be said in reproach of Britain which, three generations before, supported the Wahhabi Arabs in their revolt against the Ottomans. Arab hatred of the Turks fused with Wahhabi ranting against the 'decadence' of Ottoman Islam. The truth is that the Ottoman khalifa reigned over a multinational Islamic umma in which vast differences in local culture and tradition were tolerated. No such tolerance exists in Wahhabism, which is why the concept of US troops on Saudi soil so inflames bin Laden.

Previous page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 Next page

More articles from: Stephen Schwartz | this section

Print this article | Email to a friend | Permalink | Comment

Post this entry to: del.icio.us | Digg | Newsvine | NowPublic | Reddit

Thank goodness we can have a run on the pound when we need one

Martin Vander Weyer

Martin Vander Weyer looks ahead to next week’s Pre-Budget Report and reflects on George Osborne’s contentious remarks about the devaluation of sterling. It looks like Gordon Brown is getting away with his borrowing binge — leaving the Tories isolated

I loved Oliver Stone’s Bush film — and I know why the critics hated it

Rod Liddle

The movie W. did not provide the crude anti-Bush agitprop that the reviewers craved, says Rod Liddle. This was precisely its strength: we need to get inside the minds even of those we most deplore

The great Tory tax and spend battle: seconds out...

Fraser Nelson and Daniel Finkelstein

In the wake of Cameron’s decision to drop his pledge to match Labour spending, Fraser Nelson and Daniel Fin kelstein of the Times trade rhetorical blows over the issue that is gripping and troubling the Conservative party as it adjusts to the transformed economic context

Where is our inspiration when we most need it?

Bryan Forbes

Bryan Forbes remembers listening to Churchill as a 14-year-old evacuee and now looks with envy at Obama’s capacity to galvanise hope. Where are his UK counterparts?

For a bit of perspective, try thinking Jurassic

Christopher Lloyd

The first takeaways originated about 150 million years ago, says Christopher Lloyd; global travel is pretty ancient, too. And as for democracy...

The Republicans are where the Tories were in 1997

James Forsyth

This is bad news for the Conservatives, who have always feasted on US right-of-centre ideas, says James Forsyth. But the GOP can learn from the Cameroons

Obama’s America will be more equal but less mighty

Reihan Salam

Reihan Salam says that the President-elect is no socialist and it was desperate of McCain to claim as much. Obama’s policies more closely resemble European social democracy — with the attendant risk of economic sclerosis in the face of Asian competition

Obama has changed the world just by being elected

James Forsyth

James Forsyth looks back on an extraordinary contest and the victory of a man who, even before his inauguration, has had a transformative effect upon American politics

Russia’s aggression in Georgia is a portent of perils to come

Philip Bobbitt

Philip Bobbitt says that the crisis reflects Russia’s determination to remain an old-fashioned nation state, dominating its region. Intellectual imagination will be needed to thwart that ambition: a recognition that the post-Cold War world needs new global institutions

Don’t mention the Afghan–Pakistan war

Fraser Nelson

Both Britain and America are reluctant to admit it but, says Fraser Nelson, our most pressing foreign policy problem is what to do about Pakistan, a nuclear-armed state in which terrorists have taken sanctuary