The 50 Worst Terrorist Attacks by Edward Mickolus, Susan L. Simmons Page B

and that at least 200 people were wounded. The Saudis announced that they had captured 170 rebels, most of whom were expected to be beheaded after questioning. Sheikh Mohammed Bin Sebil, a Grand Mosque imam, said a guard was killed and two were seriously injured in the takeover. The self-appointed Mahdi was killed in the final battle. He was identified as a 27-year-old dropout Islamic law student previously known to police as a religious agitator.
    In questioning the surviving terrorists, the Saudis learned that the attack was to be part of a general uprising against the Saudi regime. A simultaneous attack on a shrine in Medina was aborted when the raiders discovered that troops were coincidentally praying there. A large demonstration of foreign workers in the oil fields was also to take place. The raiders had hoped to take hostage King Khalid, who cancelled a planned appearance at the mosque due to illness. The intruders fanned out at the mosque, searching the faces of the faithful in hope of finding the king. One of the captured rebels was a National Guard colonel. Most were Saudi nationals,with the rest coming from Pakistan, North and South Yemen, Morocco, and Kuwait. Some prisoners admitted that they had been trained in South Yemen.
    The previously unknown Union of the Peoples of the Arabian Peninsula (UPAP) later claimed credit, saying the attack was part of a “national progressive Islamic Arab revolution.”
    In the early morning of January 9, 1980, 63 of the 170 militants arrested in the mosque were beheaded. The locations of the executions and nationalities of those executed were
Mecca: nine Saudis, two South Yemenis, one Egyptian, one Kuwaiti, one Sudanese, one Iraqi
Riyadh: seven Saudis, two Egyptians, one Kuwaiti
Medina: one South Yemeni, two Egyptians, four Saudis
Damman: three Saudis, one Kuwaiti, one Egyptian, one South Yemeni, one North Yemeni
Buraydah: five Saudis, one South Yemeni, one Egyptian
Tabuk: three Saudis, one South Yemeni, one Egyptian
    As the executions were held in the early morning, few Saudis witnessed the carrying out of the Koranic sentences, which were not televised. Juhaiman Bin Seif, the military commander of the group, was among those executed. The 107 other individuals, including 23 women and boys, were given various prison and reeducation center terms. Another 38 people were found not guilty and were released.
    The Saudis reported that 12 officers and 115 noncommissioned officers were killed in the mosque battle. Another 49 officers and 402 noncommissioned officers and soldiers were injured. Officials reported 75 terrorists were killed during the siege; another 27 later died from their injuries. Fifteen bodies were found when the mosque vaults were cleared. The final government tallies indicated that 270 people were killed and more than 550 wounded. At least 117 rebels and 26 pilgrims were among the dead.

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The 1980s
    The 1980s were the last hurrah of communist state sponsorship, and concomitantly, of the European Left, many of whom died, were detained, stayed in jail, stayed in hiding, or renounced terrorism and effectively retired. The end of communist control of Eastern Europe at the end of the decade led to the winnowing away of the European leftist terrorist movement as well. The breakup of the Soviet empire left The Left with few revolutionary regimes to serve as role models—few saw Cuba, Vietnam, North Korea, or China as saviors of the Marxist revolution, with China moving economically, if not declaratively, toward aggressive capitalism.
    The leftists were replaced in the next decade by al Qaeda, whose antecedents arrived in 1981 with the assassination of Egyptian president Anwar al-Sadat. The al-Gama’at al-Islamiyyah assassins later melded with al Qaeda at the behest of Gama’at leader Ayman al-Zawahiri. Zawahiri later became Osama bin Laden’s deputy and then his successor following his death.
    The key focus of Western government responses to