A short history lesson to debunk Saudi lies about who has historically really attacked Mecca.

A short history lesson to debunk Saudi lies about who has historically really attacked Mecca.

Below are images from the scenes of the Saudi forces' assault on the Grand Mosque in Mecca, with smoke rising from the mosque during their attack on the Safa and Marwa galleries, reportedly with the assistance of the French special forces GIGN in 1979, in what became known as the Grand Mosque seizure.

The incident began on November 20, 1979 (1 Muharram 1400 AH), when Juhayman al-Otaybi and hundreds of his followers entered the Grand Mosque in Mecca and seized control of the Grand Mosque by force, in response to the wave of Westernization that had swept through the country at the time.

Although it is strictly prohibited for non-Muslims (aka infidels) to enter the boundaries of the sacred Grand Mosque, according to the consensus of Muslim jurists throughout the ages and based on an explicit Qur'anic verse (which MBS later abolished), the Saudi authorities decided to seek the assistance of a full team of French non-Muslims to storm the Grand Mosque.

Contrary to the official Saudi regime narrative, which downplays the extent of foreign involvement in the 1979 Grand Mosque incident, testimonies from French operation commanders, Western documents, and independent investigations, including those by the BBC and Al Jazeera, reveal that the French role was the mastermind behind, and a central pillar of, the operation that ultimately secured win for the Saudi regime after its initial military attempts failed.

After the early assaults by Saudi army and National Guard forces failed, with the Saudi forces suffering heavy losses against Juhayman's entrenched group, the Saudi regime faced a threat to its political and religious legitimacy. King Khalid bin Abdulaziz therefore sent a secret and urgent request to the then-French President, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, asking him to rescue the regime from the crisis. Giscard d'Estaing responded immediately, fearing the collapse of the regime and the potential impact on global oil supplies.

Paris secretly dispatched a small team of elite French Gendarmerie forces from GIGN, led by Captain Paul Barril and two of his colleagues, including Christian Lambert.

Given the strict religious prohibition against non-Muslims entering the Grand Mosque, numerous accounts, including French testimonies and Western intelligence reports, state that the French experts underwent a "formal and expedited procedure for a nominal conversion to Islam" (!) by reciting the two declarations of faith before Saudi officials in order to overcome the religious and legal obstacle.

Although some subsequent official Saudi and French accounts attempted to claim that the French team directed operations from a hotel in the nearby city of Taif without entering Mecca itself, the French team has confirmed that they entered the Grand Mosque and participated directly in the assault and crackdown alongside Saudi forces.

The French found that the Saudi forces were disorganized and their morale had collapsed, and that storming the basement and narrow galleries, such as the Safa and Marwa gallery, was impossible using conventional weapons without causing mass casualties among the assaulting forces. Accordingly, the French team:

Reorganized the entire assault plan and trained Saudi forces, as well as some Pakistani auxiliary forces, in Taif. They also supplied and shipped large quantities of a special chemical gas, CS gas (ortho-chlorobenzalmalononitrile), known as a riot-control agent that causes severe irritation and incapacitation, and supervised the drilling of holes in the floors and ceilings of the Grand Mosque and its underground areas, through which gas and water were pumped into the hideouts in an effort to force Juhayman's group to surrender or emerge incapacitated and unable to continue fighting.

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