File 756/1917 Pt 2-3 ‘ARAB BULLETIN Nos 66-114’ [‎63v] (135/834)

add stricter rules of consanguinity, veil their women even in the
house, are fatalists to a forbidden degree, and hold as first
principle the law of Jihad, at the call of the Imam and the Ulema.
1 fear always that to-morrow, when the stress comes, they will
reject the authority of the Koran (in the interpretation of which
they differ greatly from us), as they reject the Prophet to-day.
Their imam is Ibn Sand, but the title is not significant; yet they
regard him as the head of their tarika and submit themselves
wholly to his orders. He pays the salaries of all the preachers,
many hundreds of them ; but the moving spirit of the whole is
one of the Ulema of Riyadh. They appeal only to Bedu, and sow
discord between them and the hadhar. Riyadh (or the aalim
village near it) is the centre of the new doctrine. Eight out of
ten Nejd Bedu follow the Akhwan, and the Taif branch is rapidly
winning over the tribes of Northern Yemen. The Zobeir men
are influencing the Shamiyah Arabs ; one fourth of the Shammar
have allied themselves to it, and only the energy of Nuri has kept
it out of the Anazeh. The converts stir each other up to a pitch
of extreme fanaticism, but their subjection to the college at Riyadh
is absolute, and the college is the creation of Ibn Sand, who pays
and feeds the preachers. He insists on peace at present, and is
friendly to you. He suffers Ibn Rashid to exist till he has
converted the other Shammar. When his time comes he will
direct the force of the Bedu in turn against the settled peoples of
Arabia: taking piece-meal, first Qasim, then Hail, then the Hejaz,
then Iraq and Syria, he will impose everywhere the new doctrine,
and sway the peninsula.
Abdullah is making head against all this. The first step in
his ambition is to win the Shammar, and in this he is making-
steady progress. He has lost the Heteym, who have gone over
to the new faith ; but his hold upon the Ateibah is very strong
and he is daily confirming it. Without the Ateibah Ibn Saud can
never take the Hejaz. These measures are defensive, and so far
as his means go, Abdullah is extending them. He is also carrying
tie war into Ibn Sands camp, in Qasim, the weak point of the
Akhwan scheme. Aneizah, Bureidah and Rass are comfortable
towns. heir young men have enlisted in our, and the Turkish
Government s, ageyl, and there learnt tolerance and the use of
indTll ,1 ley T'f" ; lft u three or four years to their homes,
ami tel! the people ot the Hejnz government, where the savagery
humanitv oTV e ,’ Y ™ 1 "’f k" Saud - is ^ftened bv the
humanity ol the ruler to accord wijth the spirit of the time. In
consequence the eyes of Qasim turn longingly towards us and
U iv^ Sm n'A ,k S Hley Tb 1 , ' ebel *g“he Cm a-At
Akhwan ibn Saud usually keeps forces in their towns to
worif secretly "XT'* 8fl, t n, " s ll force > <md 80 Abdullah has to
rirCktudahTd ." 04 really want Qasim ’ i>ut h °
FatlnuThUTvccTb 1116 , Sett U P^P ' 68 of Arabia under my
rathe, s Hag, we can strangle the new faith in the desert, until