The bloody attacks on foreigners in Khobar, the center of Saudi Arabia's oil industry, were apparently carried out by four young men. The attackers were methodical, efficient and, up to a point, even polite. They asked potential victims their religion and, if satisfied that they were Muslims, asked where they could find Americans.

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Extraordinarily, three attackers escaped during an overnight siege. All must have expected to die and were clearly prepared to do so. Indeed, the ultimate security problem facing Saudi Arabia today may be finding a way to make life more attractive than death for young Saudi Arabian men. It will not be easy.

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For the great majority of young Saudi Arabian men, who are not rich, life is truly grim. Even speaking to young girls can, literally, produce a lashing, and they may not be able to afford a wife. They cannot enjoy a beer with friends in a pub or bar - there are none. They cannot go to a disco - there are none. They cannot go to a movie theater - there are none. They cannot go to a concert - there are none. Even the physical aspect of this country is grim. They are not surrounded by beauty. In addition, given Saudi Arabia's staggering birth rate and unemployment rate, they are unlikely to find a job - or, at least, one providing any interest or satisfaction.

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What can young Saudi Arabian men do? Essentially, two things. They can watch television, which, every day, shows them vivid and appalling images of "Zionists" and "crusaders" killing, brutalizing or otherwise humiliating Muslims (true images, unfortunately). And they can wholeheartedly embrace their country's mandatory and austere interpretation of Islam, which emphasizes that this life is inconsequential in comparison with the life to come - except in terms of assuring by one's acts the best possible place in the next life, in which places of honor, and the most attractive living conditions, are reserved for "martyrs."

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As psychologists know, arguments for suicide are more compelling to young people than to their elders, because the young still tend to think "magically" about the future.

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For frustrated young men facing thwarted lives without pleasure or hope, a spectacular death can seem a magical escape. Aspiring Muslims can believe that "martyrdom" will lead directly to a paradise whose sumptuous and erotic pleasures are the classic fantasies of adolescent dreams.

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Young people do not need to be Saudi Arabian, Muslim or even religious to be tempted by a magical suicidal solution to their problems. But the unusual social and religious environment of Saudi Arabia and the intensification of the long-running Israeli and Western practices of conquest, colonization, occupation and humiliation, of which Muslims are so visibly the victims, combine to make young Saudi Arabian men particularly prone to this tragic temptation.

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The preferred ways to seek martyrdom are currently to die fighting for the "liberation" of Palestine or Iraq. A respected, gray-bearded Saudi Arabian friend, who was born in Iraq, has been approached in mosques by children as young as 10 seeking his help to infiltrate them into Iraq so that they can die fighting the Americans. He tries to discourage them, but, as he freely admits, the young no longer pay attention to members of his generation, who are held in contempt - even by their own sons and daughters - for their perceived impotence against Israel and America.

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The borders of Saudi Arabia are closed, however. So the only alternative for most of those seeking martyrdom is to strike a blow against "evil" at home.

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Evil is, of course, a subjective concept, but those in the Middle East or in America who view the world in terms of good and evil have the utmost confidence that they know it when they see it, and that God is on their side. In Saudi Arabia, "evil" looks like me - or like the representatives of a Saudi regime widely perceived as more concerned about pleasing people like me than about pleasing its own people.

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What might make life more attractive than death for young Saudi Arabian men? The twin occupations of Palestine and Iraq - and the related humiliations of Muslims - might end through successful resistance, restoring a shared sense of dignity, self-respect and pride to Muslims. Or Saudi Arabian society might turn away from religion, with people increasingly focused on living this life decently - and even pleasantly - for its own sake. Neither seems likely in the near term.

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In these circumstances, there is every reason to expect that attacks like those in Khobar will increase in frequency, carried out by young men fired by rage, hate and a yearning for a better life in another world.

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John V. Whitbeck is an international lawyer based in Saudi Arabia.

http://iht.com/articles/523115.html