Two decades after Saudi Arabia’s militants carried out the September 11 attacks, the desert kingdom is striving for change in a reform campaign aimed at updating its ultra-Orthodox image.
Women can drive and cinemas have reopened in “new” Saudi Arabia under Crown Prince and de facto ruler Mohammed bin Salman, one of the many modern reforms some believe it should have done after 9/11. May be linked to trauma.
Yasmin Farooq of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace told AFP the initiative was “one of the long-term consequences” of the worst terrorist attack on American soil.
Fifteen Saudis were among 19 hijackers in plane attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, which killed nearly 3,000 people and were planned by Saudi-born al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
The state, a longtime US ally, denied any involvement, but faced harsh American rhetoric on its social and education systems, which critics called extremism.
Further pressure could mount in the coming months after US President Joe Biden ordered the disclosure of secret documents from the US investigation into the attacks.
Biden was responding to pressure from the families of some of those killed on 9/11, who have long argued that classified documents may contain evidence that the Saudi government had links to the hijackers.
In a statement issued Wednesday by its Washington embassy, Saudi Arabia said it “welcomes” Biden’s move.
It said it could reiterate “its longstanding support for complete declassification” of any documents only with the hope that they would “once and for all put an end to the baseless allegations against the state”.
Rise of MBS
Saudi Arabia’s resolute image was rooted in a strict Wahhabi interpretation of Islam, a puritanical doctrine that was accused of exporting the world.
The country, which houses Islam’s holiest sites and is the world’s biggest oil exporter, has previously resisted pressure for reforms.
But the rise of Prince Mohammed, or “MBS”, who was named Crown Prince in 2017, and the need to diversify as oil demand plummets, has brought about a series of economic, social and religious changes.
Prince Mohammed has sought to position himself as a champion of “moderate” Islam, even as his international reputation was hit by the 2018 murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul .
The state’s heavily criticized ban on women’s driving was lifted in 2018, mixed-gender concerts are now allowed and businesses can remain open during the five daily prayers.
Saudi Arabia has also neutralized its once frightened religious police, which chased people out of malls to pray and harassed anyone who resembled them with the opposite sex.
The Gulf country, a destination for millions of Muslim pilgrims every year, has also opened its doors to non-religious tourism.
“The kingdom is a different and better place,” Saudi government adviser Ali Shihabi told AFP. “(Reforms) have dismantled the structures and networks of radical Islam within the country.
“Terrorists planning an outrage similar to 9/11 will have to go fishing for recruits somewhere other than the kingdom, as the pool of Saudi youth involved in reactionary Islam is rapidly shrinking.”
But some Saudis have warned that rapid and sweeping reforms risk a backlash, when it is hard to gauge popular sentiment when officials crack down on any opposition or activists.
‘heavy work’
In 2019, a Yemeni resident was stabbed during a live concert in Riyadh and in another incident that year, a Saudi man shot and killed three people at a Florida naval base.
Farooq said it was in many ways a “new Saudi Arabia”, but warned that the reforms were “not enough” to eliminate extremism.
“They do not include a dialogue with society that would address extremist arguments,” she said. “A dialogue is very important to reach objectives, not just impose change on people.”
Kristin Dewan of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington said reform should focus on an educational system that has long been associated with Wahhabism.
“Improving the entire education system – curriculum, instructors, institutions – is a huge task, akin to rebuilding society,” he told AFP.
The state is currently reviewing textbooks that refer to non-Muslims as “kafars” or non-believers, while the education ministry has announced that it is working on a new curriculum that will “thought and Promotes the values of freedom of tolerance”.
In 2018, Prince Mohammed told CBS television that he aimed to remove all “extremist” elements from the education system, in which radical Islamists were widely employed.
“There is no question that there is intention, but effective execution will take time,” Dewan said.
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