At 7.30 on Saturday morning, they chose the city of Khobar, an important hub of the Saudi oil industry. As many as seven gunmen wearing military-style uniforms opened fire at the Al-Khobar Petroleum Centre building, which houses offices of western oil companies in the Gulf city. They also sprayed with gunfire an oil industry compound housingoffices and apartments of the Arab Petroleum Investment Corporation (Apicorp).
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=526644

Once the gunmen had taken over Oasis, they started to hunt down non-Muslims to kill or take hostage. Abu Hashem, 45, an Iraqi-American engineer, was leaving for work when he heard the sound of gunfire. He went back home and took his wife and two children to a neighbour's house for safety. Abu Hashem noticed that there were blood stains on the floor of his house and went looking for security guards. Instead he found four Saudi men with short beards and whose ages he said were between 18 and 25. A revealing conversation followed. Abu Hashem asked the men: "Are you guards?" They said they were and asked him if he was a Muslim. When he said he was they said: "Give us proof." Abu Hashem knew they could not be regular security guards and took out his identity papers which showed he was a Muslim but also revealed that he was an American of Iraqi origins.

When the gunmen said he was an American, Abu Hashem said this was true but he was an American Muslim. To his relief they said, "we do not kill Muslims" and politely apologised for breaking into his home. They then lectured him on Islam and told him: "We are defending our country and we want to take it from the non-believers" - probably a reference to the royal family of Saudi Arabia.

Another Muslim resident, Salam al-Hakawati, 38, a Lebanese corporate finance official, hid with his wife and two-year-old son upstairs when they heard gunfire. He heard people searching rooms downstairs and saying "this is a Muslim house" when they saw Koranic verses. A man with a machine gun came upstairs and said to him in Arabic: "We only want to hurt Westerners and Americans. Can you tell us where we can find them here?"

Just after sunrise some 40 black-clad Saudi commandos dropped into the compound from three helicopters. There was gunfire and some 50 hostages were freed. Saudi security officials said the gunmen's leader had been arrested, two killed - several escaped.

A manager in the compound said three foreigners, including a Briton and an American, were killed in the rescue.

At about the same time as the high-rise was being stormed, a man who claimed to be Abdul Aziz al-Moqrin, identified as the chief of al-Qa'ida in Saudi Arabia, claimed responsibility for the attack in a tape posted on the internet on a a website noted for militant Islamic comment. He identifies by nationality the foreigners who were killed, although he says it was an American whose body was dragged through the streets. Moqrin denounces the Saudi government for selling out to the US and providing "America with oil at the cheapest prices ... so that their economy does not collapse".

The recording may have been made inside the besieged building because it ends with volleys of shots and men shouting: "Open the door quickly."


having read just 2 articles on this saudi thing, it already stinks to high heaven. if the title doesnt give it away 'We only want to hurt the Westerners. Where can we find them? then you can read the rest of the article for a quick game of catch-the-spookspeak...

ill give $50 to the first person who thinks that these terrorists were making recordings and uploading them to a website whilst being stormed... not cos u deserve the $50, but cos it sounds like you prolly need it...