Shi’a Shaykh on Saudi TV

Al-Arabiya reports today on a controversy brewing in Saudi Arabia over plans to broadcast a Shi’a cleric on Saudi Television’s religious programming for the first time. According to the story, internet chat rooms are going crazy over the reports that Shaykh Hassan al-Saffar had already recorded two segments for broadcast on the official Saudi television station. Saudi TV officials have denied the stories as “unjustified rumours”, while Saffar confirmed to al-Arabiya that he had in fact recorded the segments, and had not been contacted about any plans to cancel their scheduled broadcast.

Given the rather extreme anti-Shi’ism rampant in Saudi Wahhabism, as well as the structural bias against Shi’a within the Saudi state, this would be a rather remarkable development.

“Rather remarkable development”, indeed! This would be a major, groundbreaking event, providing official recognition of the legitimacy of the Shi’a version of Islam as at least non-objectionable, if not out-and-out support of it. While King Abdullah, as Crown Prince, made clear his willingness to meeting with the Shi’a and to publicize those meetings, this would definitely be a step further down the road. But, as this post from the Abu Aardvark blog notes, it’s not a done deal yet.