** FATHER FRANK’S RANTS Rant Number 661 5 January 2016 WHO IS THE ENEMY?

THE CONCEPT OF THE ENEMY IS CENTRAL TO POLITICS. IS THE HOUSE OF SAUD THE ENEMY TODAY?
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The opposition between friend and enemy is the key category of politics, wrote right-wing jurist Carl Schmitt. In his ‘On Praise of Love’, far-left philosopher Alain Badiou concurs: ‘The enemy belongs to the essence of politics’.

So, who is the Enemy today? There is no doubt. The great, the mega-enemy, the Beast from the Abyss is the House of Saud.
The repulsive judicial murder of non-violent Saudi dissident, Shia’ Sheikh Nimr by Saudi Arabia’s despotic rulers unmasks them as the enemy  par excellence. That is, the enemy from the perspective of a righteous, ethical and revolutionary politics. The only politics worthy of its name.

Martyr Nimr, not a violent terrorist but found ‘guilty’ of defending the rights of the Shia minority in Arabia, was beheaded alongside 43 Jihadis charged with real terrorism. A macabre irony because the Saudis are said to fund and arm, directly and indirectly, the blood-curdling Caliphate fighters in Syria and Iraq. And the 9/11 criminals were almost all Saudis, if you recall. And so was defunct Bin Laden. Back then American voices called for ‘draining the swamp’ of terrorism there. Clearly, the drainage has not quite succeeded.

‘It is the age-old rivalry between Sunni and Shia Islam’, Western commentators are busy blabbing. Untrue. Because the Saudi regime represents not entire Sunnism but only a sect. The Wahhabis. An extreme tendency that arose late in Islam. Taught by rigid preacher Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab. Thanks to that unpleasant man’s alliance with the leader of the al-Saud tribe, Wahhabism became the official ideology of ‘Saudi’ Arabia - the country named after its ruling dynasty. But not all Sunnis are Wahhabis, as the liberal media would have you believe. The latter are actually a minority in Sunni Islam. A former, wonderful President of India, Abdul Kalam, for instance was a Sunni. As different from ibn al-Wahhab as the sky is from the earth. And the Shia’ too consist of many sects.

A bizarre conspiracy theory has it that al-Wahhab was taught and controlled by a mysterious British agent and spy, Mr Hempher. (If true, it would serve the Brits right because the Wahhabis later spread to India where they fought hard infidel British rule.) Poppycock, methinks. Funny though how Britain has been in close alliance with the House of Saud since early last century. If Mr Hempher was real, he was far-sighted…

It is nobody’s secret that Saudi oil reserves are the second largest in the world. That partly explains why US and UK politicians fawn so cravenly on the House of Saud. The spectacle of Obama and Cameron bowing deeply as if to kiss the hand (the arse?) of the Bedouin chieftains known as ‘kings’ is comical but self-interest is the name of the game. That is why Prince Charles was dispatched to play, kitted out as Lawrence of Arabia, the jolly Saudi ‘sword dance’. Good job he was not asked to help in lopping off a few heads.

Unholy oil apart, the Saudis, along with other Gulf tribes disguised as ‘monarchies’, are essential regional allies of the Washington and London regimes. Seen as a bulwark against Iranian ambitions – and the long-term radical effects of the Iranian revolution. (Also as basically accepting of the State of Israel and the oppression of Palestinians.) They are vital parts in the shabby system of props that shores up the capitalist and imperialist interests in the Middle East. That is why it is morally imperative that the enemy, a.k.a. the House of Saud, should be consigned to history’s dustbin.

The Riyadh rulers had one close shave in 1979. A violent uprising took place in Mecca, led by a charismatic agitator called Juhaiman al-Utaibi. Although himself a Wahhabi, Juhaiman focussed on the idea of the Mahdi, a redeemer right-guided by God, expected to appear at the end of time to usher in an age of Islamic justice. According to Juhaiman, the Mahdi was no less than his brother in law, Muhammad al-Qahtani. On the appointed day, the militant Mahdists, calling themselves ‘the Brothers’, seized the Great Mosque in Mecca. Juhaiman uttered an impressive speech in which he accused the House of Saud of lacking in genuine religious credentials. There are no kings or princes in pure Islam, he said. Nor should the sacred land of the Prophet be in any way in league with unbelievers, Christians or Jews.

King Khaled, then in charge, was not pleased. After fierce fighting, with the help of French paratroopers and other ‘infidel’ soldiers the Brothers were flushed out, the Mahdi killed and Juhaiman and his remaining followers captured. In due course they were all beheaded. As the concept of the Mahdi entails that necessarily he must be victorious over his enemies, it is crystal clear that Muhammad al-Qahtani was not, alas, the real McCoy.

Ordinary Saudi people of course are not the enemy. I have met some delightful Saudi students who were certainly not fanatics or intolerant – well, at least not with me. The quarrel is with their rulers. With that weird House of Saud which is closely in cahoots with Western liberal-democratic, capitalist parliamentarism – another terrifying, ferocious foe of spirituality and transcendence. Last week the priest was doing his little bit, demonstrating outside the Saudi Embassy in Mayfair. God willing, you too can do your bit – non-violently, as holy martyr Nimr righteously showed - to fight this crucial good fight.

Revd Frank Julian Gelli

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