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S. HRG. 109–836

SAUDI ARABIA: FRIEND OR FOE IN THE WAR

ON TERROR?

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

NOVEMBER 8, 2005

Serial No. J–109–49

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania, Chairman 

ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah 

CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa 

JON KYL, Arizona 

MIKE DEWINE, Ohio 

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama 

LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina 

JOHN CORNYN, Texas 

SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas 

TOM COBURN, Oklahoma 

PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont 

EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts 

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., Delaware 

HERBERT KOHL, Wisconsin 

DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California 

RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin 

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York 

RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois 

DAVID BROG, Staff Director 

MICHAEL O’NEILL, Chief Counsel 

BRUCE A. COHEN, Democratic Chief Counsel and Staff Director 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

STATEMENTS OF COMMITTEE MEMBERS 

Page

Feingold, Hon. Russell D., a U.S. Senator from the State of Wisconsin, prepared statement ................................................................................................... 106

Leahy, Hon. Patrick J., a U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont .................... 2

prepared statement .......................................................................................... 112

Specter, Hon. Arlen, a U.S. Senator from the State of Pennsylvania ................. 1

WITNESSES 

Bakali, Gulam, Secretary, Board of Trustees, Islamic Association of North 

Texas, Richardson, Texas .................................................................................... 21

Cordesman, Anthony H., Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy, Center for 

Strategic and International Studies, Washington, D.C. ................................... 15

Emerson, Steven, Executive Director, Investigative Project on Terrorism, 

Washington, D.C. ................................................................................................. 16

Glaser, Daniel L., Deputy Assistant Secretary, Office of Terrorist Financing 

and Financial Crimes, Department of The Treasury, Washington, D.C. ........ 4

Shea, Nina, Director, Center for Religious Freedom, Freedom House, Washington, D.C. ........................................................................................................... 19

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 

Responses of Daniel Glaser to questions submitted by Senator Specter ............ 36

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD 

Bakali, Gulam, Secretary, Board of Trustees, Islamic Association of North 

Texas, Richardson, Texas, statement and attachments .................................... 39

Cordesman, Anthony H., Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy, Center for 

Strategic and International Studies, Washington, D.C., statement ................ 45

Emerson, Steven, Executive Director, Investigative Project on Terrorism, 

Washington, D.C., statement .............................................................................. 73

Glaser, Daniel L., Deputy Assistant Secretary, Office of Terrorist Financing 

and Financial Crimes, Department of the Treasury, Washington, D.C., 

statement .............................................................................................................. 107

Mansour, Sheikh Ahmed Subhy, Muslim scholar and human rights activist, 

Alexandria, Virginia, statement .......................................................................... 115

Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), Yigal Carmon, President, 

Washington, D.C., statement .............................................................................. 143

New York Sun, Daniel Pipes, March 29, 2005, article ......................................... 151

Shea, Nina, Director, Center for Religious Freedom, Freedom House, Washington, D.C., prepared statement ....................................................................... 153

Woolsey, R. James, former Director of Central Intelligence, statement ............. 164

(1)

SAUDI ARABIA: FRIEND OR FOE IN THE WAR 

ON TERROR? 

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2005

U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, Washington, DC. 

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:32 a.m., in Room 

226, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Arlen Specter (chairman 

of the committee) presiding. 

Present: Senators Specter, Kyl, Brownback, Leahy, and Schumer. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. ARLEN SPECTER, A U.S. 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF PENNSYLVANIA 

Chairman SPECTER. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. It is 

9:30. The Judiciary Committee will now proceed with its hearing 

on the issue of Saudi Arabia and the efforts by Saudi Arabia, or 

to what extent Saudi Arabia is making efforts to combat terrorism 

with respect to the dissemination of information and propaganda to 

Saudis, school children, and people within the area of their influence. 

On July 25, Mr. Adel Al-Jubeir came to see me to discuss the 

Saudi Accountability Act, which I had introduced with some 12 cosponsors, calling on the Saudis to implement their efforts to fight 

terrorism and to take active stands to stop the dissemination of 

anti-American, anti-Semitic, anti-Christian literature, and as a result of that meeting and certain representations made by Mr. AlJubeir, the hearing was scheduled by this Committee for October 

25 and was postponed because of the imminence of hearings on Ms. 

Harriet Miers for the Supreme Court of the United States. Those 

hearings had been scheduled to start yesterday, and with a little 

time, collaboration with scheduling by the Ranking Member, we 

have put this item on our agenda. 

The seriousness of the issue of terrorism is one which need not 

be expounded upon at any time. Our relations with Saudi Arabia, 

the United States’ relations with Saudi Arabia, are obviously of 

great importance to both countries for many, many reasons, but it 

is critical that we confront squarely the issues of the fight against 

terrorism and confront squarely the problems created by the dissemination of anti-U.S., anti-Christian, anti-Semitic, anti-Western 

propaganda which is disseminated with the consent and apparent 

promotion of the Saudi government. 

My concerns go back to Khobar Towers and beyond. In the 104th 

Congress, I chaired the Intelligence Committee and made a trip to 

Saudi Arabia to witness what had happened at Khobar Towers, 

2

talked to the Crown Prince, now the King of Saudi Arabia, and expressed concern about the refusal of the Saudis at that time to permit FBI agents investigating the terrorism which led to the death 

of 19 Americans and the wounding of hundreds, and the Saudis declined to permit the United States to conduct that investigation. 

There have been recurrent issues, and the one which we are looking at today, we believe is to be one of really very great importance. 

With only 2 minutes left, I am going to yield at this point to my 

distinguished Ranking Member, Senator Leahy. 

STATEMENT OF HON. PATRICK LEAHY, A U.S. SENATOR FROM 

THE STATE OF VERMONT 

Senator LEAHY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I may not be quite 

as brief, but I do believe these are extremely important hearings. 

As a nation, we cannot defeat al Qaeda or Islamic extremists 

without the assistance of all our allies in the Middle East. We do 

recall, most of us do recall, that the Saudis were less than cooperative when the FBI sought to interview Saudi nationals as part of 

the Khobar Towers bombing which you referred to. The attacks of 

September 11, 2001, further strained our relationships with Saudi 

Arabia and they raised some very troubling questions about the 

Saudi government’s commitment to fighting terrorism. 

There has been some progress, but I believe there is still considerable room for improvement in the Saudi government’s current 

terrorism efforts. The 9/11 Commission noted in its final report 

that the problems in the U.S.-Saudi relationship must be confronted openly, but we have done little to openly confront the problems in that relationship. 

Critical information about the role of the government in Saudi 

Arabia before and after September 11 and its level of cooperation 

with U.S. law enforcement agencies before and after has been not 

revealed to the public. Democratic and Republican Senators have 

asked for it. The administration has denied the public its right to 

know these crucial facts. Even the former Ambassador from Saudi 

Arabia to the U.S. asked they be declassified. 

I must say, Mr. Glaser, I think the administration refuses to confront the Saudi government’s role in promoting Islamic extremism. 

Particularly troubling has been the Saudi government’s lavish 

funding of religious schools and madrasses throughout the region. 

They promulgate extreme forms of Islam and advocate hatred and 

violence. They are threatening the existence of more moderate beliefs and practices in the Muslim world. They foster anti-Western, 

anti-Semitic sentiments. 

More troubling is the strong link between madrasses and terrorist financing. It is widely known that the Saudi government has 

permitted and even encouraged fundraising by charitable Islamic 

groups and foundations that have been linked to known terrorist 

organizations. Even though they have announced restrictions to 

private charity organizations and relief groups sending funds overseas, the strict regulation of these restrictions remains to be seen. 

The President condemns many of the repressive policies of Arab 

nations. I agree with him, but he seems to have a blind spot when 

it comes to Saudi Arabia. Last month, he said, quote, ‘‘The United 

3

States makes no distinction between those who commit acts of terror and those who support and harbor them because they are 

equally guilty of murder.’’ Strong rhetoric. But then President Bush 

and Secretary Rumsfeld praised Saudi Arabia, a monarchy that 

has done more to promote Islamic extremism and discourage the 

emergence of moderate Muslim leaders than any other nation. 

The President defends Saudi Arabia’s record on civil liberties and 

religious freedoms, saying earlier this year that, quote, ‘‘The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia recognizes the principle of freedom upon 

which the United States was founded, including the freedoms enshrined under the First Amendment of the United States Constitution.’’ That is so outrageously off the mark that at first when I saw 

that, I thought somebody had rewritten something, one of the 

things we might see on a satirical website. After all, the State Department has designated Saudi Arabia as a country of particular 

concern for its violations of religious freedoms. To suggest they follow the principles that founded this country, especially our First 

Amendment, is not only laughable, it is discouraging that anybody—anybody in government, not the least of which the President, 

would say that. 

The 2004 Country Report on Human Rights Practices of the 

State Department wrote that in Saudi Arabia, citizens do not have 

the right to change their government. The government reportedly 

infringed on individuals’ privacy right. They may recognize the 

freedom enshrined in our First amendment, but they don’t allow 

their citizens to enjoy it. 

I might say, it is important to understand the extremist ideology 

promoted in the kind of publications we are going to talk about and 

broadcast does not reflect the teachings of Islam or the beliefs of 

the vast majority of Muslims. It forces a distortion of the teachings 

of Islam. 

It is also noteworthy to mention the broadcasts of extremist ideology is not limited to the Muslim faith or Saudi television. Several 

of America’s best-known Christian evangelists have made deplorable statements about Islam. These people are seen as speaking for 

the President and the Vice President. The Reverend Franklin 

Graham, who gave the invocation at George W. Bush’s inauguration, said to NBC News, ‘‘We are not attacking Islam, but Islam 

has attacked us. I believe Islam is a very evil and wicked religion.’’ 

Now, that is extremely offensive to those Muslims who practice 

their religion with the best tenets of it. 

The Reverend Jerry Falwell called the Prophet Muhammed a terrorist. The Reverend Pat Robertson has likened those who practice 

Islam, including a very large number of very loyal Americans, as 

our enemy. Just as the majority of Christians or Jews reject these 

statements, a majority of Muslims reject the publications and 

broadcasts that will be discussed here. 

So I commend the Chairman for his efforts to openly address the 

role of Saudi Arabia in our efforts to fight terrorism. I think this 

is an extremely important hearing, and I apologize for going almost 

a minute over. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Leahy appears as a submission for the record.] 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you very much, Senator Leahy. 

4

We had expected to have a witness from the State Department. 

When this hearing was scheduled originally for October 25, we had 

a State Department witness and we were notified late yesterday 

afternoon that the State Department would not be sending a witness. It is anticipated that the Secretary of State will be visiting 

Saudi Arabia soon and the indications are that the State Department thought from their point of view it was not advisable to have 

testimony presented at this Senate hearing. 

I regret that that decision was made. I believe that it is very important to shed light on these important subjects. The Syrian Accountability Act has become law, many features similar to the 

Saudi Accountability Act, and the Syrian Accountability Act grew 

cosponsors slowly but is an important piece of legislation. It is the 

Saudi Accountability Act which has attracted the attention and 

concern of the Saudi government and I think that is a very healthy 

thing and I think it is important to be very candid with our friends, 

the Saudis. If we are to maintain a good relationship, it ought to 

be in a context where we both speak frankly about what the facts 

are. 

The Committee does appreciate the Treasury Department sending Mr. Daniel Glaser here today. He is the Treasury Department’s 

Deputy Assistant Secretary for Terrorist Financing and Financial 

Crimes and is the primary Treasury official for the development 

and coordination of international anti-money laundering and 

counterterrorism financing policy. He has a Bachelor’s degree from 

Michigan, a law degree from Columbia, a very distinguished record 

in public service. 

Mr. Glaser, thank you for your appearance here today and we 

look forward to your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF DANIEL L. GLASER, DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY, OFFICE OF TERRORIST FINANCING AND FINANCIAL CRIMES, DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY, WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Mr. GLASER. Chairman Specter, Ranking Member Leahy, and 

other distinguished members of the Committee, thank you for inviting me to testify today before you on the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. This is an important topic that touches at the very heart of our 

efforts as a government to combat terrorism throughout the world. 

We have learned over the last year—the last 4 years that the 

war on terror requires the collective efforts of every country working to combat terrorism both within its own borders and in every 

corner of the globe. In this collective fight, we depend on the wisdom, vigilance, and support of both our allies and those whom we 

traditionally hold at arm’s length. 

Saudi Arabia is, by all measures, one of the countries most central to our global counterterrorism efforts. I would characterize the 

quality of this relationship as one of active partnership. The successes of global anti-money laundering and counterterrorist financing efforts relies in good measure on ensuring that this partnership 

is real, focused, and lasting. 

Today, Saudi Arabia is actively countering the threat of terrorism. This is a key success, unfortunately catalyzed in the May 

2003 terrorist attacks in Riyadh, which alerted the Kingdom that 

5

terrorism is not a theoretical global problem, but very much a local 

one. Having now suffered multiple attacks on the Kingdom itself, 

Saudi Arabia has come to understand the clear and present danger 

that terrorism and its vast support structures pose to its citizens 

and the very fabric of everyday life. The United States experienced 

the same shock on September 11, 2001, and the difficult months 

and years that have followed. 

The time has now come for Saudi Arabia to take an active leadership role in all aspects of the war on terrorism. Saudi Arabia is 

aggressively tackling the scourge of extremism and terrorism it 

faces within its Kingdom, but those efforts must now translate into 

action against a broader range of terrorist support activities wherever they are found. 

In some respects, Saudi Arabia has gone further than many 

countries in its region to build serious systems aimed at combatting 

illicit finance. For example, recently, Saudi Arabia has taken measures, such as enhancing measures to target cash couriers, establishing its stringent financial regulatory regime regarding charities, developing a financial intelligence unit. Anecdotal information 

suggests that these measures have made it more difficult for sponsors of terrorism to fund their causes. We also must acknowledge 

the extraordinary effort of Saudi Arabia’s internal security forces, 

which have been waging an ongoing battle on the ground with al 

Qaeda and have themselves sustained casualties. Any assessment 

of Saudi Arabia’s efforts should be understood against that backdrop. 

While we support and welcome these efforts, resolute leadership 

against all aspects of terrorist financing is absolutely crucial and 

Saudi Arabia needs to take its efforts in this area to the next level. 

For example, abuse of certain charities and NGO’s has been an ongoing concern. Saudi Arabia has taken impressive steps with respect to the oversight of its charitable sector as a whole, but it is 

not clear to us, though, that these restrictions are having true effect on the global operations of certain Saudi-based international 

NGO’s, such as the International Islamic Relief Organization, the 

World Assembly of Muslim Youth, and the Muslim World League. 

Saudi officials must concern themselves beyond the limits of restrictions within the Kingdom. They must recognize that organizations so closely associated with Saudi Arabia anywhere in the 

world are de facto Saudi responsibility. These organizations must 

become an integral part of Saudi focus and policy. I am not suggesting that Saudi Arabia go it alone. This type of comprehensive 

strategy will require the coordination of many regional and global 

counterparts. But Saudi Arabia itself must be actively engaged in 

ensuring that these organizations are responsive to Saudi oversight. The Saudis must care not only what happens in IIRO-Riyadh, but must also be concerned with what transpires in every 

other IIRO office around the world. 

Moreover, formal NGO’s are not the only mechanism for raising 

and transmitting funds to terrorists. Beyond charities, we are concerned about the pocketbooks of private donors who are not currently scrutinized by these stringent regulations. We have raised 

this issue on numerous occasions with our Saudi counterparts. Especially as charities and NGO’s are held under closer scrutiny, it 

6

will become increasingly important to focus on the ways in which 

private giving has and is being abused. 

Finally, the fight against terrorist financing cannot be limited to 

al Qaeda funding alone. Just as Saudi Arabia is working to ensure 

that Saudi funds do not support al Qaeda, it must work equally 

diligently to thwart the funding of Palestinian terrorist groups that 

undermine peace and stability in the Middle East. 

Leadership requires a comprehensive, proactive, and zero-tolerant approach to terrorism that includes widespread vigilance over 

global charities and wealthy private donors as well as total intolerance for support to all terrorist organizations. We hope that Saudi 

Arabia accepts this challenge of leadership and the greater responsibilities that come along with it. As Saudi Arabia does so, we will 

be able to say that we have entered into a new stage of our partnership in the war against terrorism. Thank you. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you very much, Mr. Glaser. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Glaser appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman SPECTER. We have been joined by Senator Kyl. Senator Kyl, would you care to make an opening statement? 

Senator KYL. Mr. Chairman, no, I think it is more important for 

us to hear from the witnesses. Thank you for holding this hearing. 

It is just critical and it does followup on some hearings we have 

had in the Terrorism Subcommittee which early on pointed out the 

fact that the great bulk of funding for terrorism was coming out of 

Saudi Arabia. In fact, David Aufhauser, then the General Counsel 

of Department of Treasury, testified in this room before our Subcommittee that Saudi Arabia was the epicenter of funding for terrorism, and I don’t believe that that circumstance has been significantly altered. So it is important that you hold this hearing and 

I thank you. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you, Senator Kyl. You have been a 

leader in this field for a long time. My recollection is that we 

served on the Intelligence Committee together back in the 104th 

Congress and have been engaged in these issues. You Chaired the 

Subcommittee for the Judiciary Committee and have done excellent 

leadership work. 

Mr. Glaser, we are going to show a video which reflects the monitoring by the Middle East Media Research Institute on Saudi television channels and it will depict leading Saudi religious leaders, 

professors, government leaders, and intellectuals this year and last 

year where they call for the annihilation of Christians and Jews, 

rampant anti-American and anti-Semitism, support for jihad, incitement against U.S. troops in Iraq, and the coming Islamic conquest of the United States, very, very graphic evidence as to a very 

intense problem. 

On May 23 of this year, just a few months ago, the Under Secretary of the Department of the Treasury, Stuart Levey, made this 

statement, quote, ‘‘In addition to the export of terrorist funds, we 

are extremely concerned about the export of terror ideologies. 

These teachings are as indispensable to terrorists as money and 

possibly even more dangerous. We must do all we can to ensure 

that extremists’ violent ideologies are not disseminated under the 

cover of religious organizations, charities, or schools.’’

7

The September 2005 GAO report says that Treasury, quote, 

‘‘does not identify, monitor, or counter the support and funding of 

the global propagation of Islamic extremism as it relates to ideology.’’

My question is, in light of the explicit Treasury Department policy as articulated by the Under Secretary, how do you account for 

the fact that the GAO reports that the Treasury Department has 

done nothing to formalize a program to counter this propaganda? 

Mr. GLASER. Thank you, Senator. I think that the reference in 

the GAO report that you are referring to is a legalistic point that 

it is making, saying that the specific authorities that we have at 

the Treasury Department to target terrorism, in particular, are Executive Orders, Executive Order 13224, which gives us the authority to impose targeted financial sanctions on supporters of terrorism, focuses on the activities of individuals. It doesn’t focus on 

the ideology of an individual. And I think that is the point that the 

GAO is trying to make in that. 

Of course, we can use this authority, though, to undermine the 

underlying support networks that do promote the propagation of 

extremist ideology and we have done so. The GAO report mentions 

our targeting of Al-Haramain Foundation. We have targeted with 

our authorities Al-Faqih last year. We designated him. The 

websites that he and his organization were running were propagating extremist ideology. 

So I think it is important to understand that that quote in the 

GAO report is speaking to the legal foundation upon which we operate, not to the overall policies that we have at the Treasury Department. Certainly at the Treasury Department, we are very concerned about the propagation of extremist ideology and use the authorities that we have to undermine that as best we can. 

Chairman SPECTER. Mr. Glaser, in September of last year, the 

Bush administration designated the Saudi Al-Haramain charity as 

a group suspected of supporting terrorism through its main location in Ashland, Oregon, and a mosque in Springfield, Missouri. 

Assets of both have been frozen since February of 2004. How can 

it be explained why the Saudis have not shut down all worldwide 

branches of Al-Haramain as they said they would, according to the 

State Department? In May of this year, a Treasury official told 

GAO that it was unclear whether the Saudi government had made 

any efforts to shut down other branches. 

What has the Department of the Treasury done to insist on compliance by the Saudis with their commitments? What can the 

Treasury Department do, or what will the Treasury Department 

do? I asked you three questions because my time just expired. 

Mr. GLASER. OK. I will try to answer all of them, Senator. 

With respect to Al-Haramain Foundation, obviously, it has been 

a long concern of the Treasury Department and of the entire U.S. 

Government, and frankly, of the Saudi government, as well. I believe in 2002, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia jointly designated two 

branches of Al-Haramain Foundation, in Bosnia and in Somalia. 

Subsequent to that, we jointly designated an additional four or five, 

and then after that, designated more after that, all in conjunction 

with Saudi Arabia. In addition to that, the Treasury Department 

designated the leader of Al-Haramain Foundation. 

8

I think at this point, it is safe to say that Al-Haramain Foundation as we have known it is not functioning in the world. The network—the Al-Haramain Foundation that we were concerned about 

in 2002, 2003, 2004 is no longer in existence. 

Now, with that said, there is always concerns with respect to any 

designation, be it Al-Haramain Foundation or any designation that 

we do, that the individuals who run these networks find other 

means of moving their money throughout the world. That is why 

this has to be a constant, vigilant attack. We need to make sure 

that the individuals who were involved in Al-Haramain Foundation 

are not finding alternate means of moving their money. They certainly haven’t changed their views of the United States or of Israel 

or of Western civilization as a whole. 

And I think this gets to the point I was trying to make in my 

testimony, both in my written and oral testimony, is that this is 

precisely the sort of issue that Saudi Arabia does need to be concerned about and is to make sure that organizations which have 

been so closely associated with Saudi Arabia in the past are—that 

it is absolutely clear where Saudi Arabia stands with respect to 

those organizations, that it is absolutely clear that those organizations can find no comfort with the government of Saudi Arabia. 

I think in the case of Al-Haramain, Saudi Arabia has made that 

clear, but we need to constantly be vigilant. We need to constantly 

be monitoring. We need to be constantly looking around the world 

to make sure that any entity we designate doesn’t reconstitute 

itself through other mechanisms, and that is something that the 

U.S. Government is quite aware of and is always trying to followup 

on. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you, Mr. Glaser. 

Senator Leahy? 

Senator LEAHY. Mr. Glaser, if the Saudi government or its proxies, which sometimes can be just as important, were to provide direct funding to terrorist activities, we could, of course, prosecute 

those actions. Funding in these schools, as you suggest, is a lot 

more complicated. In some cases, they may simply provide education to people who wouldn’t have had it otherwise. Others, we 

know they are doing a lot more than that. 

What steps, if any, are available to the Department of Treasury 

to address the Saudi’s lavish fundings of madrasses when those 

schools directly advocate extremist interpretations of Islam, including hatred and violence? Or do we have any steps? 

Mr. GLASER. Thank you, Senator. I think that is an important 

question. The Treasury Department, I think, has a range of authorities that we could deploy against extremist ideology, against 

terrorist ideology worldwide. The first and most obvious tool is the 

one that Senator Specter and I were discussing, and that is designations, especially under Executive Order 13224, and we have 

and do aggressively use our authority in that area to try to undermine the networks that support global jihad, that support global 

extremism, and we do that whenever we feel appropriate. 

You have designated—you mentioned madrasses and charities. 

We have designated 41 charities under Executive Order 13224. I 

fully agree with you. Simply because a charity is engaged in beneficial social programs doesn’t give it the right to also engage in terVerDate 0ct 09 2002 14:44 Apr 04, 2007 Jkt 034114 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\GPO\HEARINGS\34114.TXT SJUD1 PsN: CMORC
9

rorism, and if it is 99 percent social programs and 1 percent terrorism, that is 1 percent too much and we have to take very aggressive action. 

Senator LEAHY. The 1 percent would—you would move under 

these various laws if there was even that 1 percent? 

Mr. GLASER. Absolutely. If we think a charity is involved in terrorism, we will take whatever steps we can to shut the charity 

down. 

Senator LEAHY. Now, Account 98 has been described as a Saudi 

government account that funds Palestinian terrorist groups. The 

Saudis say that Account 98 no longer exists. Is Treasury convinced 

it no longer exists? How would you verify such a statement? 

Mr. GLASER. Account 98 has been an issue that we have raised 

with the Saudis many times over the years. I have personally 

raised it with the Saudis many times over the years. The Treasury 

Department has raised it with the Saudis many times over the 

years, as recently as just last month. Every time we raise Account 

98 with the Saudis, we are assured that Account 98 no longer exists. 

Senator LEAHY. Does it exist? 

Mr. GLASER. We have been assured that Account 98 doesn’t exist. 

Now, I understand—

Senator LEAHY. Are you convinced that it doesn’t, then? 

Mr. GLASER. Well—

Senator LEAHY. I mean, if you keep raising it, obviously, these 

assurances from the Saudis are not convincing the Treasury Department. How do you feel? Is it there or isn’t it? 

Mr. GLASER. As the Senator pointed out, there was a recent 

broadcast that was broadcast through Saudi Arabia which made 

reference to Account 98. It is very troubling. As I said, we have 

raised that with the Saudis—

Senator LEAHY. Mr. Glaser, you are troubled, I am troubled, a lot 

of people watching this are troubled. Are the Saudis telling the 

truth? Does Account 98 exist, in your opinion? 

Mr. GLASER. Well, my opinion is that we need to look into this 

and verify that Account 98 does not exist and we are doing so. 

Senator LEAHY. OK. So you are not prepared to say—is it fair to 

say, in your opinion, it does exist and it hasn’t been proven not to 

exist? 

Mr. GLASER. It has not been proven not to exist. It is something 

that—

Senator LEAHY. Let us move away from the double negatives. 

Does it exist? 

Mr. GLASER. Senator Leahy, I am not trying to evade your question. I am sorry if I appear to be. We are concerned with respect 

to the existence of Account 98. We are looking into the existence 

of Account 98. We have asked the Saudis to look into it, as well. 

We have been assured that it doesn’t, but we need to look into it. 

Senator LEAHY. Is it fair to say you have not been satisfied by 

the statements of the Saudis that Account 98 does not exist? 

Mr. GLASER. We think the Saudis and the United States need to 

look into this to ensure that it does not exist. 

Senator LEAHY. In your testimony, you discuss the problem of 

international NGO’s based in Saudi Arabia. The Saudis say these 

10

charities are de facto prohibited from sending funds abroad. Do you 

have confidence in that de facto prohibition, or is there a role for 

Treasury to play? Like the Chairman, I made sure I ended that 

just as the clock ran out. 

Mr. GLASER. Let me just quickly back up for 1 second and explain how the Saudi regulations work with respect to charities and 

where the loopholes are in that regulatory structure. The Saudis do 

have a very, very aggressive, comprehensive regulatory structure 

with respect to the financial activities of charities, and I go into 

that in some detail in my testimony and it is quite strict. 

Senator LEAHY. That is why I asked the question. 

Mr. GLASER. There is an exception within that regulatory structure for certain charities that the Saudis regard as international or 

multilateral organizations. Those are the charities that I named, 

IIRO, WAMY, and Muslim World League. The Saudis have assured 

us that, nevertheless, those charities are being treated as if they 

were under the regulations, and I can say that, again, this is something else that the U.S. and the Saudi government need to look 

into more, to ensure that these organizations are not, in fact, continuing to fund activities worldwide. 

In addition, and this is, I think, is a crucial point and a point 

that I tried to make in my oral statement, is it is not just about 

these organizations’ operations in Riyadh or their operations in 

Saudi Arabia. Equally of concern is their operations worldwide, 

which Saudi Arabia has asserted it has very little control over. 

That is, I think, one of the key issues that we need to continue to 

engage with the Saudis on, to emphasize to them that, in our view, 

these institutions, these entities are so closely associated with the 

Saudi government that they need to accept ownership of them and 

they need to do everything they can to exert influence in every way 

that they can, and that is the type of leadership internationally 

that I think Saudi Arabia is capable of doing and that I certainly 

hope and expect it will do in the future. 

Senator LEAHY. That is what I was driving at. Thank you. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you, Senator Leahy. 

Senator Kyl? 

Senator KYL. Thank you. What was their response when you 

pointed out that the television advertising as late as late August, 

August 29 of this year, specifically referred to Account 98? 

Mr. GLASER. They were as puzzled as we were. They asserted 

again that Account 98 does not exist. 

Senator KYL. One of the purposes of this hearing, I think, is to 

send a message of how disappointed we are in the Saudis. They are 

not going to change what is a very difficult situation to change, I 

am sure, until they appreciate fully that most of the policymakers 

in the U.S. Government are very, very disappointed in their lack 

of complete cooperation here. Your testimony verifies that we remain disappointed and we remain committed to working with them 

to close a lot of these so-called loopholes, but obviously, something 

stronger is going to be needed. 

I think perhaps since this is above your pay grade, and I 

wouldn’t hold you accountable to telling us what those policies 

should be, we can at least suggest that if changes are not more 

forthcoming than they have been, that they can fully expect policies 

11

to come from the U.S. Congress and then the administration will 

have to determine how to deal with those policies. If the President 

signs legislation, it will be up to people like you to implement it. 

But we can’t continue with this sort of cat-and-mouse game that 

has characterized the relationship. 

It is also, I think, important to note that even if there were an 

absolute commitment by the Saudi government and a sincere desire on the part of the Saudi government to cooperate fully, it 

would still be a very difficult proposition because of the ingrained 

traditions in Saudi Arabia and the contributions of a lot of very 

wealthy individuals through a variety of means that find their way 

to support terrorism around the world and to support the propagation of the virulent Wahhabi version of Islam. 

So I don’t discount the difficulty of dealing with this, but when 

you don’t see the commitment of the government itself that is 100 

percent and you know that even with that, it would be very, very 

difficult, it is disappointing and I think we have to be pretty clear 

about our intention to act in a stronger way. 

Given the fact that, as I said, this is above your pay grade, although I would, frankly, like to see a little stronger—I would expect it out of the State Department more than Treasury. Treasury, 

I think, could be a little tougher in this regard, but you are not the 

person to pick on here. We should deal directly with the people who 

can express the views on behalf of the United States of America directly to the Saudis. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you very much, Senator Kyl. 

Thank you, Mr. Glaser. As you hear from the panel, it is an issue 

of great concern and we really think more has to be done. We appreciate the interest which the Treasury Department has undertaken. We appreciate your efforts, but would encourage you and 

your colleagues in Treasury to do much, much more. 

We are now going to have a brief video presentation on monitoring which was done by the Middle East Media Research Institute’s TV Monitor Program on Saudi government controlled-television channels, TV1, TV2, as well as the Saudi satellite channel 

Iqraa. They are continually monitored and we have a short excerpt. 

[A videotape was shown.] 

Chairman SPECTER. Mr. Glaser, would you care to comment 

about the advocacy in favor of the jihad and the comments on retaliation against the Christians and the Jews? 

Mr. GLASER. Senator, I think that I probably have the same reaction that you have and that everybody in this room has. It is horrifying to see that sort of thing broadcast. It is what I and my colleagues throughout the U.S. Government spend our entire days 

and our careers trying to fight against. It is very troubling to see 

that type of hateful speech broadcast anywhere, and it is certainly 

troubling to see it broadcast in a place like Saudi Arabia. It is 

something that we need to all work very closely together to put an 

end to. It is absolutely unacceptable. 

Chairman SPECTER. What is the response of the Saudi government when confronted with this unassailable evidence? They can’t 

deny these words. They can’t deny the means of disseminating this 

12

virulent, hateful propaganda, and they can’t deny that they have 

the power to stop it. So what do they say? 

Mr. GLASER. And this is the great challenge for the Saudi government. I truly believe this is the great challenge for them. I 

think they have come to understand that this type of speech, that 

this type of ideology is poisonous. It is poisonous in Saudi Arabia. 

It is poisonous in that region, and it is poisonous throughout the 

world. They are taking steps, as I pointed out in my testimony, to 

try to turn some of this around. 

Now, as has been pointed out already, this is a very difficult 

challenge for them and it is something that goes to the very heart 

of their role in the Arab world and in the Islamic world and in the 

international community. We are calling upon Saudi Arabia to take 

the steps that it needs to take to put this to an end. 

When we at the Treasury Department see opportunities to undermine the financial networks that support this type of activity, 

we take advantage of that, and we do that and we have done so 

in the past and we will continue to do so. 

Chairman SPECTER. One of the items that I discussed specifically 

with Mr. Al-Jubeir when he came to see me was the issue of what 

is in the schoolbooks. There have been representations by the 

Saudis, and this is a recurrent problem throughout the entire MidEast, that they are taking care, at least for the next generation, to 

eliminate that kind of insidious propaganda. We are going to be 

having a witness later in the hearing today who will be testifying 

that that kind of propaganda is continuing. Have you heard any explanation or effort by the Saudi government to explain away that 

kind of insidious propaganda directed to children? 

Mr. GLASER. I think—I apologize. I am not trying to duck any 

questions, Senator, but I do think that is a question better put to 

the State Department. At the Treasury Department, we are trying 

to work to undermine the financial networks that support these 

types of activities. As I said before, we have raised these activities 

with the Saudis in the context of some of the broadcasts which 

have referenced Account 98 and we, of course, are continuing to 

push the Saudis to take as aggressive of action as possible. 

Chairman SPECTER. When the State Department—excuse me for 

interrupting you, but the time is close to expiring, less than a 

minute now. When the State Department has confronted the 

Saudis, and I am sorry the State Department representative is not 

here to answer this question directly, but you are the best we have, 

Mr. Glaser, so I am going to ask you. When the State Department 

has confronted the Saudis, what have the Saudis said? 

Mr. GLASER. I haven’t been present for the discussions at our 

embassy and that State Department officials have had with the 

Saudis. I do think the Saudis are beginning to understand the 

threat that this type of ideology poses not just to the Kingdom, but 

to the world at large, and I think they are beginning to take steps 

to counter it. They are not—

Chairman SPECTER. They are beginning to take steps? 

Mr. GLASER. Yes, I think they are beginning to take steps. 

Chairman SPECTER. When you say ‘‘beginning,’’ why just now beginning? 

Mr. GLASER. Well—

13

Chairman SPECTER. When did they begin? And two questions—

time is almost up—when did they begin and what steps are they 

taking? 

Mr. GLASER. I think that the attacks in Riyadh in May 2003 

were a wake-up call for Saudi Arabia that terrorism and an extremist ideology that supports terrorism is a local problem for 

Saudi Arabia, that it is not just a theoretical, global problem, but 

that it is a local problem for Saudi Arabia, and I think that we saw 

a significant change in the cooperation that we received from the 

Saudi government from May 2003 on. 

Now, I think the important thing for—what I would like to see 

more of is not simply focusing on Islamic extremism as it implicates the Kingdom itself, but the exportation of Islamic extremism. 

That is some of the very same points that you made yourself, Senator. 

With respect to some of these NGO’s, some of these non-governmental organizations that I mentioned in my testimony, that you 

yourself have mentioned, it is important that Saudi Arabia take 

ownership of the problem of the ideology that is put forth by those 

organizations and take every action it can to make sure that those 

organizations, which were purportedly set up for charitable purposes, are not being abused and put to hateful and to terrorist 

ends. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you, Mr. Glaser. 

I am advised that these clips are available for viewing in the 

United States via satellite TV. 

Senator Leahy, further questions? 

Senator LEAHY. No. I just share your concern that the State Department would not send somebody up here. Mr. Glaser has done 

a great job. It is unfortunate he has to be the one to answer these, 

because ultimately, the State Department has to take strong steps. 

One of the things I would have asked Secretary Rice or her representative, is she willing to speak out strongly when she goes to 

Saudi Arabia? 

It is not speaking out strongly to have the top official of our 

country say that the Saudis have the same or similar commitment 

to democracy that we saw in our Constitution. I would point out 

that we have the First Amendment, which guarantees the right to 

practice any religion you want or none if you want and guarantees 

your freedom of speech. There are no guarantees in Saudi Arabia 

or anything like that. 

I must admit to a concern, I have never had adequate answers 

about why we flew a planeload of Saudis out of this country right 

after 9/11, even though most of the hijackers were Saudis. When 

the FBI testified here, they said, well, we had FBI agents go in and 

talk to them before they took off. I asked if any FBI agents spoke 

Arabic. Of course, none did. We are far too cozy with the country 

that has provided the terrorists who have hit us here. 

When Under Secretary Levey, according to your testimony, said 

that wealthy Saudi individuals were still funding violent extremists around the world, is there anything specifically we can do to 

stop that funding, I mean, other than say we hope that they will 

stay true to their commitments to democracy, which is carefully 

hidden? 

14

Mr. GLASER. Thank you, Senator Leahy. To address one of the 

previous points you make, and then I will certainly give you a direct answer to your question, I do think that we have spoken out 

forcefully with respect to Saudi Arabia. I think it is important that 

we be balanced in what we say, but I was in Saudi Arabia earlier 

this year with Homeland Security Advisor Fran Townsend and I 

can tell you that she was quite unambiguous in the U.S. commitment to support democracy in the region and support democracy 

within Saudi Arabia. So I think that we have spoken out quite 

clearly and directly to the Saudis on that issue. 

With respect to what we can do with respect to donors, private 

donors within Saudi Arabia, as we locate these donors, there are 

a number of tools that we have at our disposal. We do have designations at the Treasury, designations under Executive Order 

13224, and we have used those. We have used those against 

wealthy Saudi donors in Saudi Arabia, Batterji, Jalaluddin. These 

are examples of wealthy Saudi donors that we have designated. 

Now, there are other options that we have. We have a joint task 

force on the ground with the IRS Criminal Investigative Division 

and the FBI working very closely with Saudi police to pursue law 

enforcement in those types of actions with respect to these donors 

as we come up with them. But what is vital is that we have the 

information that we need to pursue these. This is not something, 

obviously, that we could do at the Treasury Department. As we get 

the information, we act upon it. 

But we do—at the end of the day, if an individual is in a particular country, we need to work very closely with that country in 

order to have success with respect to responding to that individual, 

and that is why the relationship with Saudi Arabia is so important, 

because there are wealthy donors in Saudi Arabia, as Under Secretary Levey said, and we need as much cooperation as we can get 

to make sure that we crack down on them. 

Senator LEAHY. I couldn’t agree with you more. I couldn’t agree 

with you more. Thank you, Mr. Glaser. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you, Senator Leahy. 

Senator Kyl will be rejoining us, but does not have any further 

questions, so we thank you for coming in, Mr. Glaser. Thank you 

very much. 

Mr. GLASER. Thank you, Senator. 

Chairman SPECTER. I now call our second panel, Mr. Anthony 

Cordesman, Mr. Steve Emerson, Ms. Nina Shea, and Mr. Gulam 

Bakali. 

We had requested or invited the Saudi government to send a representative to these hearings in our policy of being balanced and 

asking people on all sides to testify. The Saudi government declined, but did recommend Mr. Anthony Cordesman as a prospective witness and he will lead our second panel. 

Professor Cordesman holds the Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy, Co-Director of the Middle East Program at the Center for 

Strategic and International Studies. He is a military analyst for 

ABC, served in senior positions in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, State, Energy, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects. 

He has written extensively on security developments in North Africa and Arab-Israeli States. 

15

Thank you for agreeing to come in, Mr. Cordesman. Our practice 

is to have 5-minute statements and then 5-minute rounds of questioning by members of the panel. The floor, Professor Cordesman, 

is yours. 

STATEMENT OF ANTHONY H. CORDESMAN, ARLEIGH A. BURKE 

CHAIR IN STRATEGY, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES, WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Mr. CORDESMAN. Thank you very much, Senator. This is an extraordinarily complex set of issues and I do have a formal statement for the record, which I request—that it will be made a part 

of the record in full. 

Chairman SPECTER. Your formal statement will be made a part 

of the record in full, as will all other statements which have been 

submitted to the Committee. 

Mr. CORDESMAN. Let me just make a few quick points of introduction. The first point is, if you pick the worst, you get the worst, 

and there are organizations which make almost a full-time effort 

to find the worst possible rhetoric in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, other 

Arab states, and Islamic countries, just, as unfortunately, as there 

are other organizations which are equally indiscriminate in finding 

the worst rhetoric from nations like Israel. 

Much of what has been said is very real, and Saudi Arabia is 

going to take time, at best, to make the changes that it should 

make. 

What bothers me about the approach that you are taking is, 

frankly, that I do not believe singling out Saudi Arabia or 

‘‘Wahhabi’’ practices focuses on the real problem. I think extremist 

neo-Salafi movements are not derived from Saudi practices. They 

have their origin in ideologies coming from Egypt, which indeed is 

where bin Laden and Zarqawi derived their ideology. 

There are some very good analyses of what the broader issues 

are in Islamic extremism by the Crisis Group, which I think would 

be described as one of the most balanced looks by any organization 

at the problems and tensions in this region, and I would commend 

that to the Committee. There is one called ‘‘Understanding 

Islamism,’’ which is a report they issued in March of this year. 

I think the great problem we face here is also understanding just 

how serious anger is against us in the Islamic and Arab world and 

the reasons for which that anger occurs. It is, unfortunately, our 

alliance with Israel. It is our presence in Iraq. These are not policies that I in any way oppose, but they do have a very powerful 

cost, and if you look at polls of popular reactions in Jordan, Morocco, Turkey, other Islamic countries, or countries with strong Islamic movements, you find broad-based support for extremism, violence, and sometimes bin Laden. These countries do not have 

strong Wahhabi presence, practices and beliefs. ‘‘Wahhabism’’ in 

itself is not the problem. 

The second point I would make is that I do see real progress in 

Saudi Arabia. I don’t think you are going to get instant progress. 

I have never seen instant progress in any aspect of that country 

and I have been pushing for reforms in the kingdom for several 

decades, long before 9/11. But they have cooperated with us in 

Iraq, in spite of the fact they did not support the Iraq war. They 

16

have had an increasing cooperation in counterterrorism, and in my 

visits there, I find the U.S. embassy and people in the U.S. security 

community praising the enhanced cooperation. Is it complete? No. 

But in areas like education, in areas like religion, I think you do 

see movements toward reform. 

I do have to say that, frankly, I think some of the discussion here 

this morning on the financing of terrorism is ridiculous. I would 

love to see somebody stop talking in generic terms and tell me 

what the financing streams are by terrorist organization, because 

I don’t believe that Saudi Arabia is the cause. I think most of these 

organizations have ample sources of other funding. And if it had 

not been for 9/11, I think we would be focusing on the fact that 

Qatar, Egypt, and many other countries have a powerful flow of 

private money. And given the fact that there is nearly, at this 

point, a trillion dollars worth of private capital in private facilities 

in Europe, your chances of controlling this are about as good as 

your chances of winning the war on drugs. 

Quoting or having excerpts from a satellite program that isn’t 

based in Saudi Arabia doesn’t really tell you very much about 

Saudi television coverage or culture. Picking out the worst of what 

is said in Saudi Arabia doesn’t tell you much about the overall 

thinking in Saudi Arabia, or the attitudes of the Saudi government. 

I think we need to be very careful this morning and in the future 

to focus on Saudi Arabia’s very real problems and the pace of reform that can occur and not to ignore the nature of what is happening in the Middle East as a whole. 

I do believe that we have many tools, and I will be happy to discuss them with the Committee, if you are interested. We could do 

a much better job as a government, not only in dealing with Saudi 

Arabia, but with dealing with all of the countries in this region. 

The fact that 9/11 had 15 Saudis is not the issue here. They could 

as easily have come from Egypt or Morocco or many of the other 

countries where these movements occur. They are not Wahhabi and 

that is not their source of origin. They are extreme neo-Salafists 

movments and not derived from Saudi religious practices. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you very much, Professor Cordesman. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Cordesman appears as a submission for the record.] 

Chairman SPECTER. Our next witness is Mr. Steven Emerson, 

Executive Director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism, one of 

the world’s largest data and intelligence centers on Islamic and 

Mid-East terrorist groups. He is an internationally recognized expert who frequently testifies before Congressional Committees on 

the operational networks of al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic 

Jihad, and the other terrorist organizations. 

We appreciate your being here, Mr. Emerson, and look forward 

to your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF STEVEN EMERSON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

INVESTIGATIVE PROJECT ON TERRORISM, WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Mr. EMERSON. Thank you, Senator Specter, and thank you, Senator Leahy, for having this hearing, which I believe resulted in the 

State Department yesterday releasing its report on violations of religious freedoms—

17

Senator LEAHY. You don’t think that was a coincidence? 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. EMERSON. The State Department acts in strange and mysterious ways. 

Chairman SPECTER. Let me interrupt you for just a minute on 

that, Mr. Emerson, and we will start your clock back at 5 minutes, 

but I think it is informative and significant. Why do you think this 

hearing motivated the release of the report? 

Mr. EMERSON. I think the fact that the hearing was supposed to 

be held 2 weeks ago and that it was delayed and that it was held 

now without the participation of the State Department meant that 

they were seen as almost obstructing the hearing or impeding it—

Chairman SPECTER. Almost obstructing? 

Mr. EMERSON. All right, obstructing. I will take out the qualification. I think—

Chairman SPECTER [continuing]. Instant modification. 

Mr. EMERSON [continuing]. And I think the opportunity for them 

to basically try to deflect some of the culpability for obstructing the 

hearing was manifested in the presentation of that report, which 

I think is a good report. It should have been presented last month 

pursuant to the Act that was passed by Congress. 

Chairman SPECTER. Your 5 minutes begins now. 

Mr. EMERSON. All right. Thank you. 

Twenty years ago, I wrote a book called The American House of 

Saud: The Secret Petrodollar Connection. It was written in 1985 

and it talked about the political strings attached to Saudi Arabian 

investments and donations and funding to academic centers in the 

United States and how it essentially acquired legitimacy by purchasing it through registered agents and donations. I find myself 

now 20 years later returning over and over to the same problem. 

In the years prior to 9/11, the U.S. Government and most everybody else paid little attention to the flow of money and propaganda 

coming from Saudi Arabia, promoting the Wahhabist agenda, and 

there is no doubt, as my co-panelist, Dr. Cordesman, has stated, 

that Saudi Arabia is not the only exporter or shouldn’t be targeted 

as the exclusive exporter of militant Islam, because the Muslim 

Brotherhood has done that for years. But Saudi Arabia’s 

petrodollars have been absolute vehicles and their legitimacy as the 

custodian of Islam, as they have represented themselves, have 

given them the ability to project their views of Islam, which I do 

not believe represent mainstream Islam, but it unfortunately has 

had a domino chain reaction in influencing the views of organizations and madrassats and other institutions around the world. Because of its vast petrodollar riches, it has been able to pursue its 

puritanical interpretation, described in shorthand as Wahhabism, 

in indoctrinating young Muslims, controlling the direction of major 

Islamic religious institutions, and extending the Wahhabist doctrine around the four corners of the globe. 

The question now we face in 2005 is whether, in fact, Saudi Arabia has changed or the representations that they need post-9/11, 

that they are actually redirecting the activities of the NGO’s, that 

they are exercising controls over the organizations, that they are 

trying to stop the export of extremism. How true is this? Have they 

actually changed the textbooks? Have they actually reigned in 

18

those NGO’s? Those are the metrics that we need to be specifically 

focusing on. 

I can’t pretend that I have all the answers, but I can tell you 

that pursuing an investigation as I have for the last 10 years, and 

over the course of the last year in particular, looking at Saudi Arabia websites, publications, broadcasts, textbooks, and the institutional recipients here in the United States, I can say that there are 

certain conclusions that I would come to. 

One, Saudi organizations and leaders operating with the permission or acquiescence of the Saudi regime continue to promote a virulent anti-Western propaganda and raise serious questions of 

whether the regime itself is trying to comprehensively crack down 

on the sources and support for Islamic terrorism. While there have 

been efforts to sanitize Saudi websites and publications, the fact of 

the matter is, there are still significant websites, including those 

officially attached to the Saudi government, that call for jihad and 

that disseminate anti-Christian or anti-Jewish theology. 

There have been some constraints imposed by the Saudi government on NGOs, but, in fact, the primary perpetrators and disseminators of radical Islamic theology, the Muslim World League, the 

World Assembly of Muslim Youth, have not been reigned in under 

the official governance and package announced by the Saudi government. 

Saudi funding of Hamas continues. There was a courier arrested 

in Israel in September and apparently he was a courier transferring funds between Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian territories. 

Saudi government officials, in response to questions about 

whether, in fact, they are involved in stopping the flow of extremism, have vehemently claimed that they are, but they have made 

outrageous anti-Semitic allegations and claiming somehow that the 

al Qaeda attacks in Saudi Arabia that have occurred since 2003 are 

part of a Zionist conspiracy. 

Saudi religious figures continue to call for jihad against the 

United States. Saudi officials in the United States and American 

recipients of Saudi funds here continue to detract attention from 

the extremists by alleging there is a campaign against Saudi extremism that is racist. In fact, it is the Saudi campaign that is racist. 

Senior Islamic terrorists, Yasin Al-Kadi and others designated by 

the United States as al Qaeda supporters, have never been sanctioned. 

So in the end, the question is what are the metrics? How are we 

going to verify their representations to us? I believe the record 

shows that the campaign of quiet diplomacy, of trying to nudge 

them along and push them without publicly criticizing them, has 

not paid the dividends that we need to see, and therefore, I believe 

your act that you have supported is something that would be vitally important in putting them on record and demanding a set of 

metrics and standards that they have to adhere to. Thank you. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you very much, Mr. Emerson. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Emerson appears as a submission for the record.] 

Chairman SPECTER. Our next witness is Ms. Nina Shea, Director 

of the Center for Religious Freedom. She serves on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom and represented the 

19

United States as a public delegate to the U.N. Commission on 

Human Rights in 1993 and again in 2001. Her organization recently published the report, ‘‘Saudi Publications on Hate Ideology 

Invade American Mosques’’ in January of this year. 

We appreciate your coming in, Ms. Shea, and we look forward to 

your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF NINA SHEA, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR 

RELIGIOUS FREEDOM, FREEDOM HOUSE, WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Ms. SHEA. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, members of the 

Committee. 

Two years ago, a Muslim American friend and colleague of mine 

handed me this little pamphlet and told me to read it. It was in 

Arabic, and so we had it translated, and it says—it gives detailed 

instructions on how to build a wall of resentment between the Muslim and the infidel. Never greet the Christian or Jew first. Never 

congratulate the infidel on his holiday. Never befriend an infidel 

unless it is to convert him. Never imitate the infidel. Never work 

for the infidel. Do not wear a graduation gown, because this imitates the infidel, and so on. The cover of this book giving this particular instruction states, ‘‘Greetings from the Cultural Attache, 

Washington, D.C.,’’ this from the Embassy of Saudi Arabia here in 

Washington. 

So Freedom House’s Center for Religious Freedom decided to go 

forward and take on a study addressing the question, is Saudi Arabia, our purported ally in the war on terror, responsible for having 

planted extremist propaganda within our borders? In order to document the Saudi influence, the material for this report was gathered 

from a selection of more than a dozen prominent sites in large 

American cities, and these materials cover—have publication dates 

spanning four decades, including dates after 9/11. 

The study did not attempt any general survey of American 

mosques or American Muslims. In fact, we believe American Muslims overwhelmingly reject these directives. 

The various Saudi publications gathered for the study state that 

it is a religious obligation for Muslims to hate Christians and Jews 

and warn against imitating or helping them in any way. They instill contempt for America because the U.S. is ruled by legislated 

civil law rather than by totalitarian Wahhabi-style Islamic law. 

Some of the publications direct Muslims not to take American citizenship as long as the country is ruled by infidels. 

The textbooks and documents our researchers, who themselves 

were Muslim, collected preach a Nazi-like hatred for Jews and 

treat the Protocols of the Elders of Zion as historical fact, and Mr. 

Chairman, as you know, this was a document—this protocols was 

a document used by Hitler to indoctrinate Nazi use, now being exported by Saudi Arabia, by the government of Saudi Arabia to the 

United States. These documents show a particular vicious hatred 

toward other Muslims, especially those who advocate tolerance. 

These Muslims are condemned as infidels. 

The opening fatwa in one embassy-distributed booklet responds 

to a question by a Muslim preacher in Europe who taught that it 

is not right to condemn Christians and Jews and infidels, and the 

Saudi state cleric’s reply rebukes the Muslim cleric. ‘‘He who casts 

20

doubt upon their infidelity leaves no doubt about his,’’ and that is 

basically a death threat, because in Saudi Arabia it is a crime, a 

capital offense to be an apostate. 

Sufian Shiite Muslims are also viciously condemned in these documents. Others in our collection declare that Muslims who engage 

in interfaith dialog are also unbelievers. Regarding those who fail 

to uphold Wahhabi sexual mores through homosexual activity or 

heterosexual activity outside of marriage, the edicts found here advise, quote, ‘‘it would be lawful for Muslims to spill his blood and 

take his money.’’ Regarding those who convert out of Islam, it is 

explicitly asserted in some of these documents, they should be 

killed. 

They show an ideology that embraces a dualistic world view in 

which there exists two antagonistic realms that can never be reconciled, and that when Muslims are in the land of the infidel, they 

must behave as if on a mission behind enemy lines. So this is an 

ideology whose message is that Muslims should live in ghettoized 

enclaves with enmity and hostility against others. 

An insidious aspect of this propaganda is its attempt to replace 

traditional and moderate interpretations of Islam with Wahhabi 

extremism. These replies in the fatwa collections distributed by the 

embassy and by other agencies of the government, whether it is the 

Education Ministry or Cultural Ministry, are given an authoritative pronouncements that the introduction should be official 

guides for preachers, mosque imams, and students living far from 

the Kingdom. So this is a hate-filled ideology, not just speech, and 

it is educational and authoritative. 

Mr. Chairman, my time is out. I just want to say, we have not 

attempted to measure, again, the impact of this here. We know 

that King Fahd states the cost for spreading the stuff has been astronomical on the King Fahd website, which is still up even though 

he is gone. 

We haven’t measured the effect. I know that most Muslims here 

are law-abiding citizens. Mr. Aliami, who is here today, saw firsthand in Saudi Arabia—he is a Saudi dissident living here now—

he doesn’t want to see this stuff here. His son served honorably in 

Iraq with the American military as an officer, so this is not a comment on American Muslims. It is a comment on Saudi Arabian government responsibility. 

Thank you very much. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you, Ms. Shea. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Shea appears as a submission for 

the record.] 

Chairman SPECTER. Our next witness is Mr. Gulam Bakali, who 

serves on the Board of Trustees of the Islamic Association of North 

Texas. He was formerly its Chairman. Mr. Bakali’s mosque was 

one of the mosques surveyed in the Freedom House report. He is 

Project Manager for Lockwood Green, a major global engineering 

construction firm. 

Thank you very much for coming to Washington today, Mr. 

Bakali, and we are very much interested in your testimony. You 

may proceed. 

21

STATEMENT OF GULAM BAKALI, SECRETARY, BOARD OF 

TRUSTEES, ISLAMIC ASSOCIATION OF NORTH TEXAS, RICHARDSON, TEXAS 

Mr. BAKALI. Good morning and thank you, Senator Specter and 

the rest of the members of the Committee. I appreciate the opportunity to come and talk about this report. 

Our basic focus is to talk about who we are, as referenced in the 

report, organizations referenced in the literature that was picked 

up, and it is incumbent upon me this morning, on behalf of my 

community, to help explain what we are rather than being extrapolated otherwise. 

At the very beginning, our mosque has neither been filled nor invaded by the literature alluded to in the report. The majority of the 

congregation do not understand Arabic as a language to even read, 

absorb, and propagate the line of thinking alleged to be advanced 

by such documents. Furthermore, the total number of books and 

literature, we have thousands. IANT, being the largest organization in the area, provides the library as a service to not only Muslims, but all faith-based groups for research and special projects. 

Our records indicate that the books referenced in the Freedom 

House report as collected from the Richardson mosque were not 

found in the library, were not ordered or purchased by IANT, were 

not distributed to the congregation, were not read from to the 

IANT congregation, were not promoted for purchase to the congregation, and were definitely not used to develop or author any 

position paper to promote a point of view. In fact, the majority of 

members do not access the library unless there is a dire need for 

academic research or something similar. The library operations 

amount to a small portion of what we currently do. 

We certainly feel that we have been wronged by this report that 

initially was published this year. We certainly have no knowledge 

of such documents being present, nor have we ever endorsed these 

materials. 

We invite you and the Committee to visit our facility and see our 

community firsthand. We have submitted for the record all our activities, and I urge you to indulge in those. You may join us at any 

of our Friday prayers, any classes, and any interfaith events. In the 

past several years, hundreds of government officials and candidates 

have observed our Friday prayers. Our U.S. Senators, along with 

several U.S. Congress Representatives, have been to our community gatherings. city of Richardson officials, FBI officials both past 

and present know many of our leaders personally and have been 

to many interfaith and community gatherings. 

We would love to host any of you who seek to understand us further and ask questions. Only by asking and listening to each other 

can we initiate and establish a better understanding about who we 

are as Americans. 

I have been with this organization 25 years continuously and can 

say with conviction some of the defining attributes as to who we 

are. A place of worship for Muslims, yes. A place for advanced Islamic studies, those who want to do more soul-searching. A private 

school teaching Islamic and public school curriculum 6 days a week 

throughout the year, very rigorous, more so than any private 

school. A free medical clinic for the underprivileged. A place where 

22

other faith-based organizations can collaborate. Home for the youth 

to learn leadership skills, Scouts, and Habitat for Humanity. All 

this data has been submitted to you. A place where women can do 

their own programs. A welcoming center for new arrivals on the 

American shores. We have a refugee center. An adult retraining 

center for those who have been affected by the economy, computer 

classes and what not. A banquet hall, gymnasium for parties, 

events, basketball games. A humanity and civics group indulging 

in soup kitchen, Adopt-a-Highway, Katrina relief, and so on. And 

most recently, the last 5 years or so, we have been a very prominent member for the State Department’s International Visitor 

Leadership Program and have hosted visitors from at least 12 to 

15 countries. 

This certainly does not paint a picture of an indoctrinated community, reclused to themselves and full of hate for America. We are 

very proud of our 30-year heritage in the North Texas region as a 

place of worship, and more importantly, a center for sharing information about Islam in America, in particular. We plan to continue 

our open-door policy wherein every segment, group, race, or faithbased organization of our society is welcome to join us, understand 

who we are, and share the concerns and beliefs to help and reach 

our society. 

Our partners and patrons are many and they can further attest 

about our organization and what we stand for. Not to single a few 

out, but Thanksgiving Square, city of Richardson, Habitat for Humanity, Carter Blood Center, Arapaho United Methodist Church, 

North Texas Food Bank, and the list goes on. 

Thank you very much for this opportunity, Senator. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you very much, Mr. Bakali, for your 

testimony. We acknowledge at the outset that the Muslim community in the United States has contributed a great deal to our country and to our culture and we welcome the Muslim community as 

a nation welcomes the very diverse representations which we have 

in our country. 

When we express concern about what some extremists do, it does 

not reflect in any way upon the Muslims in America. We regard 

you as first-class American citizens, and I think it is important to 

keep that in perspective and the experience you have had on the 

Board of Trustees and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the 

Islamic Association of North Texas is very important to bring before the Committee, so we thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Bakali appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman SPECTER. Ms. Shea, you have quoted from some of the 

documents from the Saudi embassy. Is there anything specific in 

those documents which relates to the information given to children 

in textbooks? 

Ms. SHEA. Well, we have collected from various sites textbooks, 

as well. For example, this one has the Saudi seal on it and it is 

published by—these are published by the Education Ministry or 

the Girls’ Teaching. Some of these textbooks are—

Chairman SPECTER. What do the textbooks contain relevant to 

the issue of how Christians are characterized, how Americans are 

characterized, how Jews are characterized? 

23

Ms. SHEA. Absolutely. A third-year high school textbook, for example, talks about don’t help or imitate the infidel Christians or 

Jews in any way. An 11th grade textbook in our collection is very 

anti-Semitic, saying Jews lured women to go to work, that kind of 

thing. 

Chairman SPECTER. Well, never mind that kind of thing. Let us 

hear it. Can you read it? 

While you are taking a look at it, Mr. Emerson, you refer to textbooks in the course of your testimony. Do you have anything specific to put into the record as to what the textbooks contain with 

respect to how Americans are characterized or Christians are characterized or Jews are characterized? 

Mr. EMERSON. A few years ago, we collected a series of textbooks 

that were published by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and disseminated by the embassy here in Washington. Now, I can’t represent 

that they are still being circulated today, those particular textbooks, but I did speak to several people in the Middle East in the 

last 2 weeks as we were preparing for this testimony in terms of 

having them try to acquire current textbooks. We spoke to several 

people actually in Saudi Arabia who are involved right now in securing some of the current textbooks. 

But I can tell you that textbooks that continue to be in circulation in the U.S. as well as in Europe, published by the Kingdom, 

have called specifically—

Chairman SPECTER. Can you give us a date when they were published by the Kingdom? 

Mr. EMERSON. Yes, we can give you—

Chairman SPECTER. What is the date? 

Mr. EMERSON. The dates that we have of some of those publications go back to the 1990’s and early 2000 period. 

Chairman SPECTER. And do you have any evidence that they are 

currently in use? 

Mr. EMERSON. We have evidence that some of them are still in 

use in the United States and some of them are still being used in 

Europe. I can’t represent that at this date, November, that those 

books are still being used in Saudi Arabia, and to a certain extent, 

they can’t necessarily be blamed if books that they have now 

stopped publishing, and if they disavowed, which would be great, 

are being used by others. 

Chairman SPECTER. Have they been disavowed? 

Mr. EMERSON. Not as far as I know. They claim that they have 

sanitized some of the textbooks. They have claimed that, and this 

has been a big issue—

Chairman SPECTER. Have you asked them for evidence on that? 

Mr. EMERSON. I have not asked them directly for evidence. We 

have tried to acquire the textbooks directly from Saudi educational 

institutions and we are in the process of acquiring them now. 

Chairman SPECTER. Professor Cordesman, you testified that 

there have been improvements, as you characterized it, reform in 

education and religion. Could you be more specific? As a sub-part 

of the question, do you know, firsthand knowledge, whether there 

has been a change in the Saudi textbooks testified to by Ms. Shea 

and Mr. Emerson? 

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Mr. CORDESMAN. There has been a change in the textbooks. The 

problem is that nobody knows how quickly they are being disseminated. You are talking about a relatively large country—

Chairman SPECTER. But you have seen specific changes in the 

textbooks? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. Yes. I have seen copies of the changes. I don’t 

sit around and collect the textbooks, Senator, and I have to have 

them translated, as others do. Changing the textbooks is part of a 

3-year program, and it is not going to be quick or instant. It is a 

political struggle for the Saudi government against not only a conservative Saudi public, but unfortunately, a significant number of 

Jordanian, Egyptian, and very conservative teachers. It is not, however, something that is going to be quick or easy. 

The textbooks are being changed, and I would ask the Committee 

to ask the Saudis to provide the demonstrations, because for anybody on the outside, you are asking us to count the impossible. 

On the side of the clergy, I have seen more obvious signs because 

there are protests when I visit Saudi Arabia and some of the 

imams have been disciplined. Now, part of the problem is, Since 

there are no madrassas in the Kingdom, every imam in Saudi Arabia is a government employee. You have a long legacy of people 

who, at the extremes, were allowed to preach and say almost anything as long as it didn’t have internal political impact. It is not 

going to be easy to change that clergy, but the fact that they are 

complaining about the government’s interference is at least a reassuring sign. 

Chairman SPECTER. My time expired in the middle of your answer, but I will make just one comment with respect to what you 

have requested the Committee to do. We have asked the Saudi government for the texts and have not received them. The textbooks 

are said to be in the process of being translated. This follows a recurrent pattern of seeking information and being delayed and not 

getting it, but it is something the Committee is pursuing. 

Senator Kyl? 

Senator KYL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Let me just begin, Tony, with you. You say we can’t demand instant change, and nobody is suggesting that things have to change 

instantly, but we are looking for demonstrated efforts in the right 

direction. There are simply a lot of folks who, while acknowledging 

efforts that have been made, don’t see them as enough. 

Second, you know that others are radical, too, and they promote 

it, noting people from Egypt and so on, and that is true. But the 

big bucks have come from Saudi Arabia. 

Let me ask you this question. I alluded to it before. The former 

General Counsel of the Department of Treasury testified before my 

Subcommittee that Saudi Arabia was the epicenter for terrorist financing around the world, and that was just a couple of years ago. 

You note that Saudi Arabia began to try to control funding in the 

1990’s and that governmental efforts to control terrorist financing 

have sharp limits and have probably reached the point of diminishing returns. 

Do you disagree with the Treasury Department’s earlier statement, or are you saying that the situation has been corrected since 

then? 

25

Mr. CORDESMAN. I disagree with it. I have seen this approach 

used in many other cases by government officials and by the intelligence community. If you want to know where the financing is, you 

look at the individual movements and you try to figure out whether 

you have real evidence. You do not go with generalizations. 

If I say that there are Mennonite terrorists in Pennsylvania and they get $13 billion a year from Germany and I repeat it often 

enough, somebody may actually believe it. When I want to know 

where in bin Laden’s organization the money actually is going, I 

don’t ask about generic money. I want to know where that financing is coming from. The same is true for Zarqawi inside Iraq. 

It would be true in other cases that the financing probably was 

Saudi. Certainly, it was in the Pakistani madrasses that this Committee has focused on. But one needs to be careful about the content of those madrasses because it was President Zia of Pakistan 

who was encouraging those madrasses as a counterbalance to the 

secular movements inside Pakistan and that was perfectly all right 

for us as long as it was part of getting the Soviets out of Afghanistan. 

Senator KYL. Tony, could I—we are getting kind of far afield, and 

I don’t agree with that policy any more than I gather you do. I am 

primarily interested just in your view about this terrorist financing. The people from the Treasury Department have gotten very 

specific about specific bank accounts and specific countries and specific charities and so on and—

Mr. CORDESMAN. Senator, there is a vast amount of Saudi money 

out there that shouldn’t have gone where it has gone. The recipients of this money and their ties to terrorists, however, are what 

matter. The idea that somehow Saudi Arabia is the source of the 

money on which these groups depend, is not true. As I think you 

know, there is a member of the Qatari royal family who contributes 

significant amounts of money to these groups. I could go down case 

after case. 

Senator KYL. There are others, but would you disagree with the 

statement that of all of the places where funding for terrorist-related activity has come from, that the largest single country from 

which it comes is Saudi Arabia? Would you disagree with that 

statement? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think if you talk about moving money out of 

the country to extremist organizations, it would be Saudi Arabia. 

If you talked about what dominates terrorist financing, which is 

what you began with, it would not be Saudi Arabia. 

Senator KYL. Steve Emerson, let me ask you, since your original 

testimony was cut short a little bit, to comment on this exchange 

right now, please. 

Mr. EMERSON. Well, I think I would make several points. One is 

I don’t think we can make this clear distinction between, quote, 

‘‘terrorist financing’’—you can make a clear distinction legally between terrorist financing versus financing of extremism, but I 

think it should be very clear that the massive billions of dollars the 

Saudi Arabian government has pumped into radical Islam and the 

Wahhabist views of Islam, in terms of their publications or 

websites, NGO’s that are quasi-official representatives of the government have promoted a view of the world in which it is legitiVerDate 0ct 09 2002 14:44 Apr 04, 2007 Jkt 034114 PO 00000 Frm 00029 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\GPO\HEARINGS\34114.TXT SJUD1 PsN: CMORC
26

mate to attack infidels or Jews or Christians and you can carry out 

9/11-style attacks. So the extremist funding coming from Saudi 

Arabia has created the environment and the virus in which terrorism occurs. 

Now, the issue is trying to get a handle on this. I believe that 

the Saudi abilities have—the Saudi willingness to curtail the financing of Islamic extremist movements, they have not been willing to publicly declare and followup—emphasis on the followup—

in terms of restricting the flow of money. 

WAMY, MWL, those are two NGO’s that are fundamentally antiSemitic and anti-Christian. Let me just read you one quote here. 

It was from a New York Times story in 2004. I read you the quote. 

Quote, ‘‘’Saying that the Jews and the Christians are infidels is 

part of our religious dogma,’ said Saleh S. al-Wohaibi, the American-educated Secretary General of the World Assembly of Muslim 

Youth. ‘Any changes in the way it is taught should be decided by 

the Saudis,’ he said, adding, ‘it doesn’t mean we try to incite hatred 

against others, but my religion has its own principles that should 

not be violated or changed.’’’

In other words, his dogma is hatred of Jews and Christians, and 

unfortunately, you can see that represented today even on official 

Saudi government websites. Look, they could take down these 

sites. Al-islam.com, which is part of the Saudi Arabian Ministry of 

Islamic Affairs Endowments and Guidance, continues to call for 

killing Jews. MWL’s website in Canada calls Jews a racist religion. 

I could list over and over in specifics. 

I know Dr. Cordesman said, we want specifics. I don’t deal in 

generalities. I deal in specifics. And the specifics are that the regime itself is wrapped up and continues to promote an ideological 

virus that, unfortunately, ends up legitimizing terrorist attacks, because in the end, terrorism can only flow from the decision by 

someone who says it is acceptable to kill somebody else who is not 

my religion. 

Senator KYL. And I would note, Mr. Chairman, that we have focused not just on the funding of cells of terrorists conducting violent operations, but also on the whole question of the winning of 

the hearts and minds, the incitement to terror which precedes the 

action itself. So I think both of the points are legitimate. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you very much, Senator Kyl. 

Senator Schumer? 

Senator SCHUMER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the 

hearing and the efforts of all of our witnesses here. 

You know, I would say this to Mr. Cordesman. You can point out 

other bad examples, but what has gone on in Saudi Arabia is as 

plain as the nose on your face, on any of our faces, and that is that 

there has been a link to Wahhabism all along. I don’t know if it 

is called the official Saudi religion, but it is, and Wahhabism believes in many, many extreme things such as Mr. Emerson outlined. 

Here is what I think happened. Well, I want to ask you, I mean, 

do you disagree with any of the specifics that he cited? Are any of 

them wrong? Is it true that an official Saudi website—how would 

we react in America, or anywhere else, if it said that it is OK to 

kill Jews? Why don’t they take that down? And don’t you think 

27

that their precarious political balance with the royal family needs 

Wahhabism to protect itself and make itself OK to the people is 

sort of a deal, almost a deal with—I don’t want to use the word, 

but a deal with someone very bad? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. No, Senator, I don’t agree with you. 

Senator SCHUMER. Well, explain to me—

Mr. CORDESMAN. Are there any examples in Wahhabi teaching 

which I completely disagree with? Yes. Do I watch, as Senator 

Leahy pointed out, similar examples of extremism and poor rhetoric on the parts of Christians and does that lead me to generalize 

about Christian teaching in the U.S.? 

Senator SCHUMER. No one is generalizing, sir, about Muslim 

teaching or Islam. 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I am talking about—

Senator SCHUMER. I am asking you about Wahhabism. 

Mr. CORDESMAN. And that is specifically what I am answering. 

I have been going in and out of that country for more than 30 

years. 

Senator SCHUMER. And you think Wahhabism, the main thrust 

of Wahhabism is not what these two folks have been talking about, 

that hatred, that inferiority of non-Muslims and non-Wahhabi Muslims isn’t part of the warp and woof of Wahhabism? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think it is part of the margin. I think it is 

part of the extreme views in Saudi Arabia. 

Senator SCHUMER. When anyone writes to the Saudi government 

and says, take this off your website, I would like to know—I mean, 

your main testimony, as I watched it, has been they are not doing 

as many bad things as they used to. I would like to know affirmative things they do to stop all of this. I believe in affirmative action 

here in America, OK, even though—I believe it because we have 

had a long, tawdry history about race and we ought to make up 

for it until there is equality. 

Well, the Saudis have had a long, tawdry history—Wahhabism 

has a long, tawdry history in terms of this hatred. I mean, as you 

know, it was OK. Terrorism against Jews in Israel was perfectly 

OK, women, children. There are countless statements where Saudi 

leaders have said that is OK, and only after 9/11, when it started 

being directed at other people, did they officially sort of change 

their view. I think it was a short step from one to the other. 

Shouldn’t they be, if they have changed, shouldn’t there be some 

affirmative signs? Shouldn’t they take a website like this down? 

Saying we are doing less of bad things isn’t good enough. Can you 

point to some affirmative things that they are doing to undo the 

decades of hatred leading to terrorism that has been spewed from 

large parts, in my judgment, of Saudi society and of Wahhabism? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. First, Senator, to just correct the record, Saudi 

Arabia officials from King Fahd’s time on were very clear about not 

supporting violence against Israel and supporting a peace plan—

Senator SCHUMER. Weren’t there leaders in the Saudi government that did support it, interior ministers and others—

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think—

Senator SCHUMER [continuing]. Appointed by King Fahd? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. There was certainly Prince Naif who criticized 

Israel. He did not support, to my knowledge, any attacks on Jews 

28

or men and women or terrorism. And indeed, in the case which Mr. 

Emerson quoted, he went on from attacking Zionist causes to 

promptly attack the Muslim Brotherhood. So it is probably useful 

to keep things in context. 

But to go to your specific question—

Senator SCHUMER. But Wahhabism attacks many branches of 

Muslim, too. 

Mr. CORDESMAN. It is an extraordinarily puritanical belief, and 

having encountered a few puritanical Jews and Christians, I don’t 

like the level of inherent discrimination on any of them. 

But you asked about specific measures, and in my written testimony, I point out there has been a really significant advertising 

campaign. It has been mixed with efforts to have television shows 

and to deal with the overall educational reforms. This is a matter 

of public record. You can just look at the part of the campaign that 

took place very openly in Saudi Arabia. It started in February of 

this year. So that is something that the Committee can easily confirm. 

The efforts to actually reeducate or discipline imams, which are 

not going to be something which you see advertised in every Saudi 

newspaper, have been real. The efforts which began after 9/11 by 

the Ministry of Education, and particularly with Prince Salman’s 

leadership, but which have now taken on a considerable momentum, have begun to change the textbooks. 

Do I like the rate at which this progress has occurred? No, I 

don’t. Do I believe that this progress is occurring in many of the 

countries which have similar kinds of anger and hatred at the level 

I would like to see? No, I don’t. But is there progress? Yes, and I 

have given you three tangible cases. 

Senator SCHUMER. Without specifics. I mean, I guess they are in 

your testimony. I did not read it. Do you have specifics—

Mr. CORDESMAN. I have given you—

Senator SCHUMER [continuing]. Because you asked for specifics. 

You wanted specifics in reference to Senator Kyl’s question. Give 

me the most specific positive thing. What do these advertising campaigns say? Do they say it was a mistake that many people advocated killing of Jews? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. The problem you have, Senator, is you began 

with the thesis that many people are going around advocating the 

killing of Jews. I have been in Saudi Arabia on many occasions. I 

haven’t heard that. And I have been there with colleagues of mine 

that are Jewish. 

Senator SCHUMER. In Israel? In Israel? You haven’t heard that 

in Saudi Arabia? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I have heard people attack me in Saudi Arabia 

for being Jewish and for being a supporter of Israel. I have heard 

them use rhetoric which was about as personally vicious as you can 

get. Did they represent any significant number of the Saudis that 

I deal with and have dealt with over the years? No. 

Senator SCHUMER. Could I ask Mr. Emerson to respond—

Chairman SPECTER. You are only two-and-a-half minutes over 

time, so the answer is yes. 

[Laughter.] 

29

Senator SCHUMER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You are always 

fair. 

Mr. EMERSON. Thank you. I think the bottom line here is that, 

one, the institutional leadership of the regime, the family, the 

NGO’s that were set up, the Saudi industrials who operate at the 

sufferance of the regime itself—this is not a totally capital, free 

market country—have all been involved in promoting a severe puritanical version of Islam, but which has called Jews and Christians 

infidels for years. The question is—I am amazed that this would 

be compared to the current situation with Judaism and Christianity because the bottom line is we in the West have largely 

excised much of our religious fundamentalism. Yes, there are fundamentalists in every religion and there are terrorists in every religion, but the radical Islamic theology as promoted by Saudi Arabia 

is the centerpiece and has been. 

Now, the question is, have they changed, and the mark for that 

is the metrics. The other mark is whether they will own up, as you 

appropriately asked, whether they will own up to the fact that they 

did promote this, and I can give you several examples that, unfortunately, show an effort to basically lie, fabricate stuff. 

This year, in April, NBC obtained a tape of a prominent Saudi 

sheikh, the Chief Justice of Saudi Arabia’s Supreme Judicial Council, exhorting young Muslims to go to Iraq to participate in the 

jihad against American forces. NBC asked Saudi officials here in 

the United States for their reaction. Do you know what their response was? The tape was fabricated, that this was digitally created, enhanced. They warned them that this was a total made-up 

tape. So NBC contacted the sheikh directly in Saudi Arabia, who 

admitted on the phone that he actually made the tape himself. 

So the reality is, you can see this over and over again where the 

Saudi officials deny any support for extremism, any anti-Semitism, 

anti-Christian dogma. This year, there have been dozens of Christians arrested, dozens of them arrested for practicing Christianity. 

If you asked the Saudi government, are you persecuting Christians, 

they say, no, there is total freedom. These are lies. 

And the fact is, unless we are willing to call them on the carpet, 

then we can pretend that there is no disagreement. We will all get 

along. I call it the ‘‘kumbaya’’ culture. Everyone will have a nice 

day and we will go along with our business, but then business will 

continue as usual. That is the problem. 

Senator SCHUMER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you, Senator Schumer. 

Senator Brownback? 

Senator BROWNBACK. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate my colleague, Senator Schumer. I worked with him on this 

issue of Saudi Arabia for some period of time and he has been a 

very effective advocate and good advocate. 

I have got a pointed question. I wondered how the Saudis recently reacted officially when the Iranian President called for the 

State of Israel to be wiped off the face of the Earth, or of the map. 

What was the official Saudi response? Did they condemn this statement by the President of Iran? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I don’t believe they condemned it directly. I believe what they did was to call for a peace settlement between the 

30

Arabs and Israel. I don’t think you are going to see direct confrontation in the Gulf region, Senator, if people can avoid it. It was 

a problem in terms of their contact with the Iranians. 

Senator BROWNBACK. Didn’t the Egyptians, though? Didn’t the 

Egyptians condemn that statement? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. They are safely, shall we say, distant. 

Senator BROWNBACK. I doubt the Egyptians would agree with 

that assessment. It seems like this is a tangible one that you could 

have—this is a pretty easy call, pretty direct call. You could have 

said, well, this is an inappropriate statement for any leader, to call 

for another country to be wiped off the map. No official statement 

out of the Saudis? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. Frankly, Senator, I don’t know what their official statements have been on this. I do know that they reacted, and 

it was not in a positive way. But I think you have to understand 

just how tense things in the Gulf are right now. This is a matter 

of countries having to deal with an extraordinarily unstable neighbor, undergoing major political change, where at this point in time, 

they don’t even know what nature of regime they are dealing with. 

Senator BROWNBACK. Ms. Shea? 

Ms. SHEA. Senator, in our publications and textbooks, we have 

seen that kind of sentiment expressed over and over again. In, for 

example, a fourth grade Saudi state textbook, and again, this is not 

a cleric or a sect somewhere, this is the government, its own publications, they talk about Israel as being a thorn in the back of the 

Muslim nations and a window through which colonialism can 

sneak up among the ranks of the Muslims to work on dividing 

them and light the fire of hatred between them. The Muslims will 

not rest until they cutoff this disease and purify the land of Palestine from the plague of Zionism and its rightful owners reclaim 

it, and so on and so on. 

Senator BROWNBACK. That is a fourth grade text? 

Ms. SHEA. That is a fourth grade textbook that we found in New 

Jersey from Saudi Arabia, and we have a number of other examples, as well, so it is the same kind of sentiment. These are still 

in circulation. The government claims—

Senator BROWNBACK. Ms. Shea, do you know if those statements 

have been repudiated by the Saudi government at any point in 

time in recent history? 

Ms. SHEA. I don’t know that. 

Senator BROWNBACK. So, actually, it would be a consistent statement of what the President of Iran stated for what has been in the 

textbooks sponsored by the Saudi government? 

Ms. SHEA. That is correct. They say that they are going to, or 

that they already have changed the textbooks. I met with the textbook reeducation reformers in Saudi Arabia—they came here last 

year, last December—and they said that, actually, reform wasn’t 

even necessary. It was all a misunderstanding. 

After our report came out, our study, the government—the crown 

prince at that time appointed a new Minister of Education. The 

only problem is, he appointed Mr. Obeid, who had been the Secretary General of the Muslim World League, which the Treasury 

Department says is an agency of grave concern for its links to extremism. 

31

The Gulf Institute, which is an NGO based here in Washington, 

started by Saudi dissidents, have the new curriculum that is being 

used inside Saudi Arabia for 2005–06, K through 12, and they say 

it is really just as bad. They are going to be coming out with a new 

report soon, as soon as they get it all translated. 

Senator BROWNBACK. I will stay within my time. It seems to me, 

basically, your best appraisal of a group or entity or even an individual is fruit, what it produces, what comes out of that. It seems 

like we have seen a lot of bad fruit here, and then when you get 

this particular type of statement that was made by the President 

of Iran, that I think most of the world gasped when he said something like this, and then you look at a regime that doesn’t repudiate it, and not only that, apparently its textbooks actually teaches it to its children, this is not a good fruit situation. 

I appreciate, Mr. Cordesman, what you are representing. I have 

worked with the Saudis over the years. I have chaired that Subcommittee in the Foreign Relations Committee. I have traveled the 

region. I have also traveled and seen their product in the region, 

in that region and particularly in Central Asia, was an area I noted 

the most. It was an area of change and foment. I traveled it in the 

mid- and late–1990’s. There were two countries that were funding 

the most disruptive type of behavior in the Stands region and they 

were Iran and Saudi Arabia. Virtually everyplace you would go, 

there would be some funded group by the Saudis or the Iranians 

that were pushing very troubling, difficult messages in a region 

that was fomenting. 

It just seems like what we have taken place lately is some movement away from that, or maybe some movement toward more subtlety, but I haven’t detected yet that the central message has 

changed at all. It may be more subtle, but it hasn’t changed the 

message. 

Mr. Chairman, thank you. 

Chairman SPECTER. Thank you, Senator Brownback. 

I am going to ask unanimous consent to make a part of the 

record an article written by Mr. Daniel Pipes and published in the 

New York Sun on March 29 of this year which contains a number 

of statements which bear on what we are looking at, and we are 

going to verify the accuracy of them. 

It is represented that the Council on American-Islamic Relations 

published—the Freedom House published information on the Council on American-Islamic Relations which contained repeated references to anti-Semitism and neo-Nazi philosophy and that the 

head of the Canadian Islamic Congress, Mohamed Elmasry, publicly endorsed the murder of all Israelis over the age of 18, and 

that in New York City, an investigation by the New York Daily 

News in 2003 found that books used in the city’s Muslim schools 

were, quote, ‘‘rife with inaccuracies and sweeping condemnations of 

Jews and Christians, and triumphant declarations of Islam’s supremacy,’’ and that in Los Angeles, the Omar Ibn Khattab Foundation donated 300 Korans entitled The Meaning of the Holy Koran 

to the city school districts in 2001 that had to be pulled from the 

libraries because of anti-Semitic condemnations. 

We have had the representations by Mr. Al-Jubeir that the textbooks have been modified and it is a question which we are going 

32

to continue to pursue, Professor Cordesman, to see what the current status is. 

The legislation on the Saudi Accountability Act calls for Saudi 

Arabia to vastly improve cooperation with the United States in the 

investigation of terrorist networks and closing all organizations 

which fund, train, and incite terror; block all funding from private 

Saudi citizens and entities to Saudi-based offshore terrorist organizations; and to deal with the issue of the propaganda in the school 

books. So we are going to be pursuing that subject. 

Mr. Emerson, I am advised that you have some information as 

to what King Abdullah had to say about those who were behind the 

2003 attacks on Riyadh in Saudi Arabia? 

Mr. EMERSON. Yes, Senator. I will refer to it in a second here. 

I just wanted parenthetically to make a comment to let you know 

that sitting behind me is a very prominent and courageous Muslim 

religious leader, Sheikh Ahmed Subhy Mansour, who has prepared 

testimony that I would like to ask to be submitted for the record, 

and who has been a graduate of Al Azhar University. He is now 

living in the United States, having been granted political asylum 

here. But he is very familiar with and an expert on Wahhabist ideological views as well as the consistency of the Saudi government 

in continuing to promote it in publications and online. I urge him 

to be used as a resource by this Committee. 

Chairman SPECTER. We would be pleased to receive that testimony and it will be made a part of our record. 

Mr. EMERSON. In response, in 2004, after there was an attack in 

the city of Yanbu, Crown Prince Abdullah asserted that, quote, ‘‘Zionist elements,’’ quote, ‘‘it has become clear now that Zionism is behind the terrorism actions in the Kingdom. I can say that I am 95 

percent sure of that.’’ And then followed up by that was Saudi Foreign Minister Saud Al-Faisal, who said that the al Qaeda attacks 

were financed by Israel. 

That was followed up on a CNN interview when Adel Al-Jubeir 

was interviewed by CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer, who asked him about 

the allegations that there was a secret Zionist plot behind supporting al Qaeda attacks against the regime. I have included the 

entire transcript of the exchange between the CNN anchor as well 

as Mr. Al-Jubeir because it is exceptionally instructive, because AlJubeir consistently tries to equate Israel with al Qaeda. He is given 

an opportunity finally at the very end to recant and disavow those 

comments and never once takes the opportunity to do so. 

Chairman SPECTER. Professor Cordesman, would you care to 

comment on that? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. All I can say, Senator, is that in working with 

people in Saudi Arabia, in the Ministry of Defense, in the Ministry 

of Interior, in the Foreign Ministry, I never once had anybody suggest for a moment that there was any Zionist support for al Qaeda. 

I never heard that talking to Prince Turki in conversations that go 

back 7 years. I never heard it in talking to the Assistant Minister 

of Defense in Saudi Arabia or to the son of the Minister of the Interior. 

They have focused on what I think they recognize as not only an 

internal problem, but as one which surrounds them in the region. 

Whatever has been said here is not something that has been raised 

33

with me nor is it typical of any of the people that I have been dealing with who are involved in counterterrorism operations in the 

Kingdom. 

Chairman SPECTER. Professor Cordesman, I can easily understand why it wouldn’t be raised with you. On the conversations 

that I have had with the Saudi officials, when I talked to King 

Abdullah about Khobar Towers, no bellicose or inflammatory statements were made. In talking to the Saudi Ambassador to the 

United States recently, he called me and wanted to be available to 

answer any questions, and we do have a substantial number of 

questions for him, no statements like that are made. 

But when you have the repetition of comments by ranking Saudi 

officials, including King Abdullah, about the Zionists being behind 

al Qaeda, it is antagonistic, inciting propaganda at the highest levels. It can’t be denied. 

Mr. CORDESMAN. Senator, may I make a brief response? 

Chairman SPECTER. Sure. 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I think what bothers me a little about this is 

that this is the same King Abdullah which, as Crown Prince, took 

with considerable courage the initiative creating a new peace initiative, and not simply cosmetically, but pushed it through the 

Arab League. It is the same Saudi Arabia which has put together 

what will be a conference in December of this year in Mecca of the 

OIC, a summit meeting which will be trying to deal with these 

issues of extremism and terrorism. 

I can’t say that there are not within Saudi Arabia many things 

that I don’t like. That is something that I have lived with in all 

my visits to the Kingdom. But I do see, perhaps, a lack of balance 

that, is not necessarily going to help us in persuading the Saudis 

to change. 

Chairman SPECTER. Well, Professor Cordesman, shouldn’t we, 

while trying to maintain a positive relationship with Saudi Arabia, 

identify to them in a very direct way the things you characterize 

you do not like? Shouldn’t we confront the King with the statement 

which I think is on the record and not denied about his being 95 

percent sure that Zionists were behind the al Qaeda attacks? 

Should we ignore those matters, or should we deal with them in 

a very direct way? 

Mr. CORDESMAN. I don’t think we should ignore them at all, Senator. I have great reservations about legislation. I have no reservations about the Congress putting constant pressure on the administration and the Saudis to respond. My fear with legislation is that 

often what happens is that it is seen as counterproductive inside 

the Kingdom, where the threat of legislation is not. 

I think you have tools that you also could use. One of them is 

to expand the role of the Human Rights Report and require that 

it deals with reporting in these areas. It is to expand the State Department Report on Terrorism. The advantage of these kinds of forums is they cover all countries, and I do not believe that Saudi 

Arabia should be exempted from any of this kind of review. 

Second, I think that there is a very real reason to have much 

stronger embassy teams and to have the Congress put much more 

pressure to get people into embassies like Saudi Arabia who actuVerDate 0ct 09 2002 14:44 Apr 04, 2007 Jkt 034114 PO 00000 Frm 00037 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\GPO\HEARINGS\34114.TXT SJUD1 PsN: CMORC
34

ally work in the field to deal with the countries involved, and I 

could give you a list of others measures, as I have in the testimony. 

So in no sense am I saying that you should not put pressure 

here. I think it is vital here and it is vital in all of the countries 

where terrorism and extremism are a problem. 

Chairman SPECTER. I am pleased to hear you say that it is an 

appropriate area for Congress to apply pressure and that you think 

the introduction of the legislation is appropriate pressure. You just 

stop a little short of enacting the legislation. 

When the Syrian Accountability Act was started, it was a pressure point, but as evidence mounted as to what Syria was doing 

and the evidence has continued to mount, that legislation was finally enacted, and the administration took the position you do. 

Don’t legislate. Don’t tie the hands of the administration. But finally, at the very end, the Bush administration agreed with the 

Syrian Accountability Act. 

These are not easy matters. There is great concern that if Bashir 

Asad falls, that there will be a replacement causing more problems 

for the United States. I think we have to continue to work with the 

Syrian government, notwithstanding all of the problems that they 

have presented, especially on being transit ports for insurgents 

going into Iraq. But while we continue to work with them, let us 

not be bashful about confronting them. I don’t think we are too far 

apart on that point. 

We are going to have very substantial additional questions for 

the Saudi government. I will take up the Saudi Foreign Minister 

on his invitation to respond to questions. We will have more questions for him than we had for the entire panel. 

Ms. Shea, did you have something more you wanted to say? You 

were looking for some responses to my question earlier. If you want 

to add something, we would be pleased to hear it now. 

Ms. SHEA. OK. We have one of the books. The anti-Semitic passage in one of the books we found here issued by the Saudi government, Ministry of Education, Riyadh: ‘‘The Jews lured women to go 

to work in the factories. When the number of working women increased, they lured them into wearing makeup and revealing 

clothes to corrupt their morals and to corrupt young men with 

them.’’

So that is the tenor of this stuff. It is not against the policies of 

Israel. It is not on a political level. It is just truly anti-Semitic and 

awful. 

Mr. Chairman, also, I would like to point out that the GAO 

issued a very important study at the request of some of the members of the Senate, and they released it in September. In it, they 

found as of July 2005, agency officials, meaning across interagency 

officials, whether it is State or Treasury, did not know if the government of Saudi Arabia had taken steps to ensure that Saudifunded curricula or religious activities in other countries do not 

propagate extremism. I think that is a very important point, and 

I share Mr. Cordesman’s view that this should be reported on in 

the religion reports and the human rights reports and the U.S. 

Government should press Saudi Arabia for an accounting. I think 

that you should include it in your Act, as well. Thank you. 

35

Chairman SPECTER. Mr. Bakali, would you care to add anything 

at this point? 

Mr. BAKALI. No, Senator. We just wanted to differentiate the fact 

that the indoctrination by Saudi would be one thing. We are not 

here to comment on it. But the fact that the assumption and extrapolation offered or implying that that could be invaded or filled, 

that is the point we were trying to make, that the indoctrination 

by Saudi of these few books or whatever is not necessarily a true 

picture of the American Muslim, to which you have alluded already. 

Chairman SPECTER. We want to be emphatic that there is no 

condemnation or criticism of the Muslim community in the United 

States. We welcome your participation in our country, as we welcome men and women of all faiths or those who choose to abstain. 

Thank you all very much for coming. This is, I think, a constructive hearing and one which will be ongoing and one which we will 

pursue. 

That concludes our hearing. 

[Whereupon, at 11:37 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.] 

[Questions and answers and submissions for the record follow.] 

[Additional material is being retained in the Committee files.]

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