Sacrilege in Mecca

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A similar attack was attempted that morning at the Prophet's Mosque in Medina, 200 miles to the north, but that assault failed because authorities learned of it in advance.

When word of the invasion reached Riyadh, Saudi Arabia's King Khalid ordered the cutting of all telephone and telex lines to the outside world until he could establish whether the gunmen were connected with any outside group. Then, as required by Islamic law, his government sought the permission of the 'ulama, the religious leadership, to make a counterattack. Reason: the Shari'a (Islamic canon law) prohibits the shedding of blood in holy places, but the rule can be suspended if the clergymen agree that there is sufficient justification. After several hours of deliberation, the 'ulama gave the King unprecedented powers to stage a battle within the Sacred Mosque.

Government helicopters by then had begun dropping tear gas on the besieged holy place. In the great courtyard, the attackers were haranguing their hostages to proclaim Mohammed Abdullah al-'Utaibah the promised messiah. But they fled in panic to the upper floors of the mosque and its seven minarets when National Guard troops suddenly burst through the gates of the mosque and armored vehicles with artillery and machine guns quickly encircled the Ka'ba. To minimize damage to the mosque, the government had ordered its troops to move in with knives and to use them in hand-to-hand combat, with the backing of snipers and expert marksmen.

During the three days of the siege, the identity of the attackers remained unknown. The first rumor that spread through the Arab world was that the invaders were Iranian Shi'ites who had been influenced by Khomeini's recent calls for a general uprising by Muslim fundamentalists. Others speculated that the terrorists were members of an extreme Mahdist sect aligned with the Shi'ites. Still others said they were not Shi'ites at all but fanatical Sunni purists known as Wahhabis. At week's end, with the Riyadh regime saying nothing publicly, the best guess of Western intelligence experts was that the attackers were members of the 'Utaibah tribe, a migratory Sunni group that still wanders with its herds of goats and sheep between Mecca and Riyadh. The group apparently is small in number and represents no serious political threat to the House of Saud.

Events in Mecca were being followed closely and with great concern in Tunisia, where 20 Arab heads of state, plus Palestine Liberation Organization Chief Yasser Arafat, had gathered for their annual meeting. An honor guard wearing plumed gold helmets presented arms with drawn swords as the leaders trooped into Tunis' Palais de Congrès for a summit that one Kuwaiti delegate predicted would be a "love feast." He meant that there would be no public arguments about divisive subjects and that the leaders would merely reaffirm their opposition to Egyptian President Anwar Sadat for signing the Camp David accords with Israel.