Nimr execution to end in Al Saud collapse: Scholar

Press TV has interviewed Shabbir Hassanally, an activist and Islamic scholar from London, to discuss the Saudi Supreme Court’s approval of the death penalty handed down to prominent Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr Baqer al-Nimr.

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: When it comes to this case of Sheikh al-Nimr, are the Saudis essentially playing with fire at this point? 

Hassanally: Of course, they are definitely playing with fire. But I think the idea of expecting Mr. Cameron or Mr. Obama or any of these criminals to tell Salman or whoever is really in the power in that country… is wishful thinking. At the end of the day, Britain is the country that sponsored and supported Saudis’ application to be part of the United Nations Human Rights Council, which itself is farcical.

But the Saudi should be very careful. History has said that …there is a tipping point. There is the last straw that breaks the camel’s back, that changes the entire equation, and it would not be stretching it to say that the murder of Sheikh Nimr would be that last sraw that would result in the end of this cancerous, illiterate, criminal, Mafiosi family, called Saudi that have occupied, without any right, the land of Arabia.

Press TV: I imagine that the Saudis are trying to make an example out of Sheikh al-Nimr to scare off any other people who call for reforms within their country or within the other Persian Gulf dictatorships. Do you think that is bound to work?

Hassanally: Of course not. If anyone reads history, you turn around you have people who stand up and say, “Look, we want our rights!”

The irony of this entire situation is that Sheikh Nimr like Sheikh Ali Salman and other leaders from the [Persian] Gulf region that have been asking for rights and everything explicitly said ‘do it peacefully’ to the people, explicitly said ‘we do not want to use arms, we do not want to violence we will row with our tongue and our words.’

Now the Saudis in fact, by harming and killing Shiekh Nimr, what they will do is they will be telling the other activists that ‘actually guys we do not care how much you speak. You can speak whatever you want, we will just try to shut you up by killing you.’ So then the next phase of the entire of operation will begin. And I think it is number of commentators and politicians have said that. This will be a very, very bad move on the part of the Saudi family. They have made plenty of bad moves I mean what they do in Bahrain, what they do in Yemen, of course discussion is lengthy. But this would be, in my opinion and in many people’s opinion, a catastrophic move and one which would be last nail in the coffin of this illiterate family.  

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