Page 231 - Arabia the Gulf and the West

228 Arabia, the Gulf and the West

but lightly. To the northward a new power was arising in Arabian politics in the
shape of the Rashidi dynasty of Hail in Jabal Shammar. Abdullah ibn Faisal
held on in Najd for ten uncertain years, until in October 1885 he was over­
thrown and imprisoned in Riyad by the sons of his late brother, Saud. He was
saved from probable death by the intervention of Muhammad ibn Rashid, the
head of the house of Rashid, who drove Saud’s sons from Riyad, bore Abdullah
off to Hail to recover from his ordeal, and appointed his own governor to rule
the Wahhabi capital. It was the beginning of the eclipse of Saudi power in
Arabia. Abdullah ibn Faisal was only permitted to return to Riyad in the
autumn of 1889 so that he might die (as he did within weeks of his return) in the
house of his fathers. Although his younger brother, Abdur Rahman, declared
himself imam in his place, he remained at Riyad only on the sufferance of
Muhammad ibn Rashid. Fifteen months later, in 1891, the Rashidi ruler
foreclosed on Abdur Rahman’s precarious mortgage. Riyad and the whole of
Najd were added to the Rashidi domains, and Abdur Rahman and his family
were driven into exile. The former imam appealed for succour to the Turks,
who gave him a monthly stipend for his support and allowed him to settle with
his family in Kuwait.
The downfall of the house of Saud now seemed complete. From being at the
start of the century masters of half of Arabia they no longer held even their
family domains, but survived only on the charity of their former enemies. The
religious movement which had initiated their rise to power and sustained it
thereafter still endured, however; for the Al Rashid followed the Wahhabi
creed and identified themselves with the aspirations of the Wahhabi com­
munity, even to the point of assuming the imamate. The recovery in the
fortunes of the Al Saud began a decade after Abdur Rahman ibn Faisal’s flight
to Kuwait, when, in January 1902, Riyad was captured and the Rashidi
garrison expelled by a raiding party led by his son, Abdul Aziz, at that time
twenty-one years of age. In the next three years Abdul Aziz restored Saudi rule
over Najd and drove the forces of Ibn Rashid from the Qasim, to the north­
west. The recovery of Hasa was a more daunting task, especially as his relations
with the Turks had been compromised by his father’s acknowledgement of
Ottoman suzerainty and his investiture by the Porte with the title of qaim-
maqam of Najd. After endeavouring unsuccessfully to secure help from the
British authorities in the Gulf in ejecting the Turkish garrison from Hasa,
Abdul Aziz accomplished the task by himself in the summer of 1913. Wisely he
did not attempt to provoke the Turks further but agreed, in an engagement
concluded in May 1914, to acknowledge Ottoman suzerainty in return for
recognition as vali of Najd, with the rank of pasha, and the guaranteed
succession of his sons and grandsons after him. Six months later war broke out
between the British and Ottoman empires, opening up to Abdul Aziz bright
new opportunities for political and financial advancement.
The first was that of casting off his lightly worn allegiance to the Turks and