Nasir al-Fahd

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Nasir al-Fahd (Arabic: ناصر الفهد‎‎, also known as Nasir bin Hamad al-Fahd, is a Saudi Arabian Salafist Islamic scholar who supports jihad.^[1] He was arrested in 2003 by the Saudi Arabian government.

After three years of undergraduate work in engineering, he shifted to study Shari’a (Islamic law) at the Imam Muhammad Ibn Saud Islamic University. After completing the program, he was appointed as a dean at Umm al-Qura University. He later became associated with jihadists and strongly opposed the Saudi government, accusing it of collaboration with the United States against Muslims.

Biography

Nasir al-Fahd was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in 1968 to a religious Saudi family. After finishing high school, he began to study engineering at Al-Malik Saud University. In his third year, he changed direction and left to study shari’a (Islamic law) at the Imam Muhammad Ibn Saud Islamic University. There he met several prominent sheikhs.^[2] He studied at Imam University’s College of Shari’a in Riyadh.

In 1992, al-Fahd was appointed as a dean at Umm al-Qura University.^[3] He was arrested in 1994 after writing a poem deriding the “loose morals” of the wife of Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud. Following his release in 1997, al-Fahd became closely linked to the Buraydah-based “al-Shu’aybi school,” a group of clerics named after the cleric Hamoud al-Aqla al-Shuebi.^[3]

Al-Fahd and other clerics associated with this school, such as Ali al-Khudair and Sulaiman Al-Alwan, became influential among jihadists. They condemned the actions of the Saudi state and provided backing from the Quran for their positions. Al-Fahd wrote in support of the Taliban's destruction of the ancient Buddhas of Bamiyan in Afghanistan.^[4] He declared that any Muslim who aided the United States war effort in any manner in Afghanistan or Iraq was an infidel.^[3] In a 2003 fatwa, al-Fahd approved of the possession of Weapons of Mass Destruction by Muslim nations to protect Muslims from harm that could be caused by other countries possessing such weapons.^[5]

Al-Fahd was arrested in May 2003 by the Saudi Arabian government. He believes that the Saudi state is an apostate regime because it has supported the United States in some of their actions. He defines this as a war against Islam that is focused on killing Muslims.^[6]

On 16 November 2012, a fatwa was posted online that was attributed to al-Fahd. It said that the Jews were the greatest enemies of Islam and that jihad against them anywhere in the world is an important duty of Muslims.^[7]

On 25 August 2015, PJ Media reported that al-Fahd had pledged his allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, leader of the Islamic State (ISIS or ISIL). He encouraged other Muslims to join the Islamic State and also pledge allegiance.^[8]

See also

• Sulaiman Al-Alwan
• Ali al-Khudair

References