BEYOND SYRIA IRAQ

IDEOLOGY
reality. This is the near opposite of the strategy followed by al-Qaeda in its
failed uprising in Saudi Arabia between 2003 and 2006, which focused on
Western targets.
The Islamic State’s campaign has adhered to Baghdadi’s strategy, with
the Shiites and Saudi security forces suffering the brunt of its attacks. Since
November 2014, five major attacks have been carried out on Shiite mosques
in the Eastern Province, in the form of either suicide bombings or shootings,
and one suicide bombing has taken place against an Ismaili Shiite mosque in
the southern region of Najran.
As for the government, one very deadly suicide bombing was carried out
against a security forces mosque in the Asir region, in August 2015, as well
as numerous drive-by shootings against police stations and security patrols
and several targeted assassinations of security forces personnel. Many of the
targeted assassinations have been carried out by family members of the victims—usually
cousins killing cousins. One such murder took place in September
2015 outside the northern city of Ha’il, where two militants filmed
themselves killing their cousin. Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, the official
spokesperson of the Islamic State, celebrated this murder in a public statement
delivered the following month, describing the act as “more dear to us
than tens of car bombings.” 1
Thus far, Baghdadi’s strategy has yielded mixed results. The attacks have
been persistent but limited in effect. As of June 2016, the overall pace of
attacks has not slowed. In April 2016, the Islamic State released its first official
video from Saudi Arabia, in the name of the province of Nejd, which depicted
the targeted assassination of a military official in al-Dawadimi, near Riyadh.
In May 2016, the semiofficial Saudi press reported that over the past year the
kingdom had suffered an average of one Islamic State attack every twelve days.
Meanwhile, a security crackdown has undermined the Islamic State’s capabilities
in the country and put its networks in Saudi Arabia on the defensive.
Despite the frequency of attacks, the press has also reported promising news:
many of the Islamic State’s networks in the country have been disrupted, and
many attacks have been thwarted. Back in May, for example, police raided
two Islamic State safe houses near Taif, and the leader of the al-Dawadimi
attack was arrested. The Saudis hailed the arrest as particularly significant, as
the captive is considered to have been the main go-between with the Islamic
State leadership in Syria and Iraq. But just how significant this arrest truly is
has yet to be seen. For the time being, the Islamic State threat to the Saudi
regime remains persistent, but it is by no means existential.
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