After the launch of the U.S.-led ‘war on terrorism’, and particularly the invasion of Afghanistan as a response to ‘9/11’ in 2001, al-Qaʿida's ability to move and strike was severely hampered. This loss of territorial and operational freedom was compensated for, however, by new groups that were founded or reorganised under the label of al-Qaʿida across the Arab world. One of those was al-Qaʿida on the Arabian Peninsula (al-Qāʿida fī Jazīrat al-ʿArab). This chapter concentrates on how this particular group, which launched a series of attacks on mostly Western targets in Saudi Arabia from 2003 onwards, came about, what al-Maqdisi's influence on them has been and why he was so influential. The focus is on the years 1995–2005, since in 1995 the ṣaḥwa-led opposition after the Gulf War can be said to have ended and a new and violent phase of contention started, while al-Qaʿida on the Arabian Peninsula (QAP) more or less ceased to exist as a Saudi organisation in 2005.

As we saw in the previous chapter, al-Maqdisi made extensive use of the Wahhabi religious tradition, mostly used by quietist Salafis, to make his case against the Saudi regime, thereby further underlining his position as a quietist Jihadi-Salafi. This becomes even clearer with QAP: while al-Maqdisi's framing of the problems in Saudi Arabia failed to attract many followers of the non-violent, political and relatively moderate ṣaḥwa, his radical solutions combined with his close adherence to the (quietist) Salafi-Wahhabi tradition and Saudi historical imagination are precisely what explains his ideological influence on QAP, as we will see.