In the mid-1990s, the environment for Islamist activism in Saudi Arabia changed considerably. The government came to view the Sahwa as a political threat and jihad veterans as a security threat. By the late 1990s, most forms of Islamist activism, including classical jihadism, represented clandestine and relatively perilous endeavours. How, then, was Usama bin Ladin able to recruit so many Saudis to his Afghan camps in the late 1990s? A crucial part of the answer lies in the evolution of the political opportunity structure for global jihadism in the kingdom between 1996 and 2001. Of particular importance were developments in three areas: policing, international conflicts involving Muslims, and the Saudi Islamist arena. However, before we examine these developments more closely, it is useful to recall the events between 1994 and 1996 which forever changed the relationship between the state and the Islamist community.

From the Burayda intifada to the 1995 Riyadh bombing

The rise of the reformist opposition in the early 1990s represented the most serious challenge to the Saudi state's legitimacy in the kingdom's modern history. While it never turned violent, the Sahwa articulated a more explicit and biting critique of the Saudi system than the regime was willing to tolerate. Tensions escalated throughout 1992, arrests began in May 1993 and by the autumn of 1994 the time had come for a final showdown.