Better late than never: Saudi authority says the jihadis are tools and commodities in the hands of the intelligence agencies

The Saudi Arabian religious hierarchy has in the past issued statements denouncing the enlistment of young Saudis in the cause of "so-called jihad" in foreign countries, but the statement issued yesterday by the top person in that hierarchy sharpened that criticism to include an additional important point. What was new in this statement, and the reason why Al-Quds al-Arabi made this its top story this morning, is that the the mufti went a step further and said: These young men are not only being themselves misled: They are allowing themselves and their misguided passion to be used as "commodities that are being bought and sold among parties of the East and the West, in the interests of aims and objectives, the full extent of whose harm is known only to god almighty".

The AlQuds account begins:

Sheikh Abdulaziz al-Sheikh, general mufti of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, criticized sharply Saudi islamists who leave the country in the cause of jihad, because their actions damage Islam, and they are changed into people who carry out dirty operations.

In a statement published by the Saudi news agency, the mufti said "It has been evident for years that our sons have been leaving the country in pursuit of jihad in the path of the lord, but they lack the understanding to distinguish between what is true and what is completely baseless. And this is the reason" he continued, "why they have been seduced and used by notorious (or "dubious") parties. They have been tools in the hands of foreign agencies (using a word often used as shorthand for Mukhabarat agencies) who manipulate them in the name of jihad, and who use them for the attainment of their dishonorable aims, and realize their purposes via them, with dirty operations that are as far removed as can be from any religion, so that now our youth have been made into commodities that are bought and sold among the parties of East and West, for the attainment of their ends, and just how far the damage that has been done by this extends, is something known only to god almighty".

The mufti said: "The rebellion of these youths against their custodians and their authorities, and their going abroad in what they call jihad--this has led to atrocious scandals, including rebellion against their lord and tyrannizing over him, and this is one of the great sins. Among the other atrocities", according to the mufti, "is the fact these Saudis have become convenient knights for whoever wants to foster corruption in the land, and for whoever wants to exploit their zeal, even up to the point of turning them into walking bombs who kill themselves in the interests of the political or military aims of these dubious parties".

Kind of hard to miss the point.

By way of background the Al-Quds reporter offers an abbreviated history of Saudi regime's domestic problems with the jihadis, but the focus is on recent regional embarrassments including the participation of a number of Saudis in Fatah al-Islam in Lebanon, and a July statement by Iraqi national security adviser Mowaffaq al-Rubiae to the effect his government is getting ready to prosecute 160 Saudi individuals involved in "rebellion" adding there are thousands more in awaiting referral to the courts.

There can be a lot of speculation on the question why the Saudi establishment has chosen this exact timing for an attack on the region-wide role of AlQaeda and its look-alikes. Probably an omniscient narrator would be able to tell us something about the degree of control the Saudi regime used to have, or thought it had, over this network and how this control has been wrested away by others, no doubt including the CIA in pursuance of whatever are the latest US aims in Iraq.

But the clear and indisputable point is this: The Saudi mufti, who knows a thing or two about the network, says it is a tool in the hands of foreign intelligence agencies. Think about it. If there was even a grain of truth in this, how much of the history of atrocities and civil war in Iraq would have to be rewritten.

But the point won't be taken up in the Western media. And the reason is because it would call in question the narrative of a nation's descent into the chaos of warring factions, and eventual dismemberment.