Who and what is implicated in the execution of Ayatollah Nimr?

Nimr Baqr al-Nimr also called as Sheikh Nimr was a Shia Sheikh in al-Awamiyah, Eastern Province, Saudi Arabia was executed by the Saudi regime on the 2nd of January, 2016. Nimr was arrested in the aftermath of the protests that hit the Arab world and were termed as the ‘Arab Spring’.  He was popular among youth and critical of the Saudi Arabian government. Ayatollah Nimrs’s family has stated that the Saudi regime had found him guilty of seeking ‘foreign meddling’ in the Kingdom.

His death sentence was confirmed in October 2014, with his family saying he had been found guilty among other charges of seeking “foreign meddling” in the kingdom.

He was popular among youth and critical of the Saudi Arabian government.He called for elections in Saudi Arabia.

In 2009, he criticised Saudi authorities and suggested secession of the Eastern Province if Saudi Shias’ rights were not better respected. A warrant for his arrest was issued and 35 people were arrested. During the 2011–2012 Saudi Arabian protests, al-Nimr called for protestors to resist police bullets using “the roar of the word” rather than violence,predicted the overthrow of the government if repression continued.

According to the BBC, “Here was a prominent, outspoken cleric who articulated the feelings of those in the country’s Shia minority who feel marginalised and discriminated against. This was a figure active on the sensitive Sunni-Shia sectarian fault line that creates tension in the Kingdom and far beyond.

Sheikh Nimr’s supporters say he advocated only peaceful demonstrations and eschewed all violent opposition to the government.

Nimr’s execution is abominable; it does not stand scrutiny both from a legal as well as moral standpoint. A shia scholar of repute has been executed for articulating angst and protesting against the marginalization of minorities in Saudi Arabia. How does this qualify him to be executed? This is insofar as the killing is concerned and what meets the eye. But the issue appears to be wider and deeper.  The Middle East is in the midst of deep existential, political and social crises. The deep authoritarian post colonial Arab state challenged by the Arab Spring. The prelude of the Arab Spring was the pre-emptive war launched by the United States whose ostensible rationale and premise was to ‘democratize the Middle East’. (It is curious that the United States chose to ignore it’s ally, Saudi Arabia’s democratic credentials in its allegedly ‘democratization agenda’). The fizzling out of the Arab Spring and America’s war in the Middle East bred a militant force called the Islamic State (IS). The Middle East’s post colonial order or condition is now widely challenged by a diverse set of actors and forces. Overlaying this anarchical condition is the millennial and age old conflict and fault line – the Shia-Sunni conflict- that dates back to the formative years of Islam which is now out in the open.

Historically and contemporarily, the Middle East has been defined by a clash of hegemonies- with both revolutionary Iran and Wahhabi Saudi Arabia claiming the mantle of leadership of the Muslim world. In this quest for leadership of the Muslim world and security reasons, the region has over time become militarized. Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons and the Saudi Arabia’s alliance with the United States falls under this dynamic. The point of elaborating the conditions and the dynamic that defines the Middle East is that Ayatollah Nimr appears to have fallen victim to these. Nimr was a shia scholar who followed the Twelver Shiism philosophy. According to this philosophy and its followers, the Twelver Shia’s  await the return of the Mahdi (the Twelveth Imam) who is believed to be in occultation. Twelver Shi’ism was a quietist philosophy which eschewed political activism and to extent interference in worldly affairs till Ayatollah Khomeini revolutionized this by introducing the concept and idea of Velayat a Faqih or rule by the scholar jurisprudent. Instantly, shi doctrine became state doctrine in Iran and the premise for its rule, foreign policy and other domains. One immediate consequence of Ayatollah Khomeini’s stroke of genius was the ouster and fall of the Shah’s regime in Iran. This is insofar Iran is concerned.

The genesis and formation of the Saudi state is owed to the marriage between Wahabism – an austere and literalist interpretation of Islam (where Shia’s are looked down upon)- and the House of Al Saud( a tribal clique). This marriage forms the essential premise of the Saudi state- the Al Saud family rules and the Wahhabi scholars and community is allowed its interpretation of Islam to be followed in the state. 

While Saudi state may present the country as being homogenous but diverse peoples form its firmament. This includes the shia’s. But given the nature of the regime, Shia’s claim unequal treatment by the Saudi’s. This is what Ayatollah Nimr was protesting. He was duly arrested and then finally executed on flimsy grounds. The regime’s post execution justification is that Nimr sought ‘foreign meddling’ – a hint at Iran.

The intriguing question is that why now? Why was Ayatollah Nimr executed now?

Nimr’s execution also comes at a time when the nuclear deal between Iran and the West is going awry and of course the anarchic conditions that obtain in the Middle East. Unless , the execution is inspired by foolishness and folly, it could be that  Nimr’s execution is a provocation aimed to disrupt further the Middle East by intensifying the Shia-Sunni conflict. An anarchic Middle East would make foreign powers  wary of a stable and a powerful Iran and also intensify the ill will and feelings between major antagonists in the region. These are speculations but plausible ones.

Can the situation be salvaged?

Unlikely. The fallout is likely to be more bitterness and estrangement between Iran and Saudi Arabia with attendant spillover effects. But there is a lesson to be learnt and gleaned: minority rights across the Middle East must be respected. And minorities should be given due respect, voice, opportunities and legal redress. This is also what our religion states and enjoins upon us to follow and this is the gravamen and thrust of democratic theory and practice. In the least, if the philosophical differences between Islam and democracy are too deep, there is scope for the two to meet in terms of procedure. Here there is no fundamental incompatibility between the two. Respect difference, minorities and give them substantive rights. This should be the motto of all states in the Middle East. Ayatollah Nimr’s execution points out to the absence of these rights in the region-especially in Saudi Arabia- and if left unattended can be portentous of more conflict and strife in the region- a condition that only a synthesis of faith and reason can pre-empt.

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