First: Praise be to God for the safety of Prince Muhammad Bin Nayef Bin Abdul Aziz, the responsible security chief who was able, with his fellow security officers, to bring the burrow-dwellers out of their burrows, thwart their plans and intentions, and send their deception back into their gullets, after they sought evil for the country and the people. Second: Doubtless the attempt to assassinate the Deputy Interior Minister sends a dangerous message from terrorist groups to the Saudi state, as a government and as a people, one signifying that they will not surrender and that they will maintain their ideology and their methods, as they assert yet again that they are able to target officials and that they will, just as they murder innocent civilians. This reveals the wicked intentions of such groups, as well as their desire to bring back bloodlust, destabilize society and undermine the country's security and stability. Third: Al-Qaeda was in past phases planning to target high-ranking officials, writers, journalists, intellectuals and thinkers. Information about this had been revealed in 2003, but these attempts were thwarted. Prince Muhammad is a high-ranking security official whose country is waging a war on terror. As such, Al-Qaeda places him at the top of its list of targets, and if it had – God forbid – achieved its goal, it would have achieved a victory that would have raised the morale of its members. Fourth: Why target Muhammad Bin Nayef, who had received those wanted by the law, helped them, visited them, and played the role of mediator in forgiving them for their criminal acts?! Certainly it is because he has succeeded in implementing foolproof security programs, and made sure, with his security staff, to keep the country safe and sound. It is also because he has succeeded in suppressing the leaders of strife, evil and terrorism, and because he is a man who works and achieves his purpose silently, so as to defeat these groups in confrontations and to hunt down their members, until the world recognized his ability and that of his team to strike at the joints of terrorists and in their bastions, to capture their cells, to devastate their morale, to cut off their claws and to expose their terrorist plots. Fifth: Whoever thinks that terrorism in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has weakened or disappeared is wrong, as the ideology of terrorism has members, followers and supporters who are still present. Nevertheless, it appears then lies in wait; its cells sleep then awaken, according to security circumstances, waiting for the opportunity to attack and return yet again to sucking blood, and to restore the cycle of violence. Sixth: There are circles that still feed these terrorist groups, among them are sympathizers, inciters, funders, loyalists and those who hide their identity. These people wear many faces, and in them lies the real danger facing the country and the people. Seventh: The attempted assassination of Muhammad Bin Nayef reveals the extent of the effective need to know who is facilitating and who is justifying the actions of those terrorists, whether through mobilization or unseen recruitment, or who is working to draw the hearts and minds of young people and inflame them in the name of religion. Eighth: After this incident and the terrorist incidents that preceded it, we were demanding the necessary activation of the roles of the mosque, the home and the school, that they should be established on bases of reconciliation and forgiveness, and under responsible supervision in terms of correcting false ideas among the youth, in order to build a healthy society that would reject one-sidedness, exclusivism and the hatred of those who hold different opinions. Ninth: The security officers made a mistake when they failed to search one wanted by the law and designated as a “terrorist”, based merely on his claims that he would turn himself in to Prince Muhammad, and that he had come to his senses. Indeed, how many of those like him have relapsed and returned to the cycle of violence after having announced that they had renounced it? In fact, some of them have fled abroad, to accuse society of heresy and threaten the country from behind mountains and from within caves, after the state had helped them and provided them with housing and a salary to start a new life. Indeed, that person should have been searched thoroughly, even if the official had been overcome with emotion, chivalry and the desire to earn his trust. I think the solution to confront these terrorists, their sympathizers and those loyal to them is to take national action the strength and impact of which would exceed that of discussion and advice – that is to carefully search for the motives and the grounds that turn ordinary young men into zombies that accuse others of heresy and blow themselves up. Furthermore, our discourse must be renewed towards forgiveness with ourselves and reconciliation with others, or else terrorism will remain standing among us, its climates and its keys in the best of shape.
