Saudi Arabia uses Iranophobia to stop pro-democracy protests: Expert

Saudi Arabia is using anti-Iran propaganda as part of its policy to fuel sectarian tension in order to stop pro-democracy movements in the Kingdom, an analyst tells Press TV. In an exclusive interview with Press TV on Monday, London-based political commentator, Zayd al-Isa, said the rapidly spreading uprising which erupted in oil-rich Eastern Province in 2011 has prompted the “desperately worried” Saudi rulers to try and deepen the Sunni-Shia divide.

“[Riyadh wants to] demonstrate to its people that it is involved in confronting and combating the serious, perilous and extensile threat coming from the Shias and namely coming from the Islamic Republic of Iran,” the expert noted. This, Isa explained, aims to put anti-regime protesters in a corner and to “portray them as people who are standing against the regime which has tried its best to portray itself as the standard-bearer or the defender of Sunni Islam.”

The analyst said Saudis now see well through the maneuver, given the regime’s staunch support for Western-backed dictators in Egypt, Tunisia, and Yemen. Isa pointed to the continuation of demonstrations in Saudi Arabia despite the regime’s violent crackdown, arresting activists, and labeling protests as anti-Islamic by “the Wahhabi-Salafi establishment.” “All that has spectacularly failed to deter the people,” he concluded.