Crescent International
Announcement by the Western backed despotic Saudi regime to build a large cube-shaped structure as part of a re-development project in Riyadh, labeled synonymously with the Ka‘aba sparked a negative reaction online from some Muslims.
While the Saudis never explicitly linked the Mukaab project to the Ka‘aba, the regime is notorious for linking itself to Islam’s holiest sites in a politicized manner.
The negative reaction by some Muslims was, therefore, not surprising.
The Saudis’ latest veiled monetization of the sacred symbols of Islam is nothing new.
Muslim apathy towards far worse Saudi policies has contributed to enabling the Riyadh regime to continue to take advantage and misuse Islam for its corrupt agenda.
It is, therefore, important to open the broader and more substantive conversation about the Saudi regime once again.
Whether people like to admit it or not, on a subconscious level, many Muslims have for decades mistakenly linked up the sacredness of Makkah and Madinah to the Saudi regime itself.
Although today far more Muslims have seen through the Saudis’ “Islamic” charade than at any other time in recent history, there is still a significant number of Muslims who conflate the regime with the sanctity of Makkah and Madinah.
Ritualistic connectivity of many Muslims to Makkah and Madinah has enabled the Saudi regime, an anti-thesis of Islam, to continue to gaslight the Muslim Ummah for a long time.
While maintaining strategic relations with the US and Israel, the Bani Saud clan has managed to sell itself to a significant number of Muslims as the so-called champion of orthodox Sunni Islam.
The surprised reaction of some Muslims to the latest Saudi misuse of its geographic position says more about the lack of prudent socio-political awareness of Muslims than the repeated confirmation of the regime’s corrupt essence.
From external aggression to internal sabotage, the Saudi regime has played a key role in US-led aggressions in West Asia, sabotaged the electoral process in Egypt, destabilized Syria, Yemen and Bahrain.
These examples are in plain sight thus, the question arises: why do some Muslims continue to expect the Saudi regime to manifest any good for the Muslim world?
The response to this question lies partly in the fact that the world’s leading powers have invested heavily in propping up the Saudis as a model of Muslim governance.
This, however, is the external factor in the ability of the Saudis to continue creating mischief that has gone on for decades.
The internal aspect lies in the fact that many Muslim congregations worldwide are guided in their understanding of the fundamentals of deen (Islam) by Saudi-indoctrinated “scholars.”
Through the network of Saudi-trained “scholars”, the foreign-propped regime in Riyadh has managed to frame the Islamic discourse within its socio-political agenda and strip Islam of its intellectual, philosophical and spiritual essence.
This made the understanding of Islam vulnerable to the Saudis’ shallow manipulation.
From the regressive ideas that logic is haram (forbidden) in Islamic sciences to the anthropomorphic understanding of God, to the shallow perception of certain hadith books being almost flawless, combined with a wealthy Islamic proselytizing sponsorships worldwide, Saudi influence over Muslims is underestimated by their friends and foes alike.
The Saudi narrative of what Islam “is” has indoctrinated thousands of “teachers” whose influence will continue long after the Saudi regime has been consigned to the dustbin of history.
The only way to significantly reduce Saudi damage to Islam is to shun all their Islamic pretences, be it Saudi “Islamic” universities, news channels or humanitarian gestures designed to conceal their despotic nature.
