| Summary/Abstract |
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia does not have problems with other creeds or sects,” then Prince (now King) Salman claimed in a conversation with outgoing US Ambassador James C. Oberwetter in March 2007. Salman went on to stress: “Terrorism and fanaticism have done more harm to Islam than anything else.” This is the party line of the House of Saud—that, in the words of its last king, Abdullah, Saudi Arabia stands “in the face of those trying to hijack Islam and present it to the world as a religion of extremism, hatred, and terrorism.” Such statements are meant to reassure, but they ring hollow in the face of evidence that the roots and spread of violent Sunni jihad lead back to Saudi Arabia and its Wahhabi-centered clerical establishment.
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