Seizing on regional and international preoccupation with blood-soaked upheavals in West Asia, Saudi Arabia has quietly escalated a brutal execution campaign targeting political dissidents. Between January and mid-July alone, the kingdom executed nine prisoners of conscience, each under discretionary judgments (Taazir), meaning the death sentences were left to the judge’s discretion rather than in accordance with specific legal provisions.

The latest victim was Ali al-Alawi, a resident of Um al-Hamam in Al-Qatif, whose execution was announced by the Interior Ministry on July 14. He was accused of “joining a terrorist organization to destabilize security and traveling abroad for weapons and explosives training”, a recycled charge frequently used by Saudi authorities to justify executions. Al-Alawi’s fate mirrored that of Mahdi Ahmad al-Bazroun, who was executed a week earlier on July 7 without prior notice to his family. Notably, al-Bazroun was not even listed among the prisoners most at risk, according to human rights organizations and opposition watchlists, despite facing similarly vague charges: “harboring fugitives, joining a terrorist group, and plotting terrorist attacks.”

Before them, two brothers from Al-Qatif, Hasan Mohammad and Abdullah al-Ghaith, were executed on May 3, shocking their hometown of Al-Malaha. A week later, on May 10, the authorities executed Abdullah Abu Abdullah, the brother of martyr Ali Abu Abdullah, who was killed by Saudi forces during the 2017 storming of Al-Musawwara neighborhood in Al-Awamiyah. Their father was arbitrarily detained from August 2017 until June 2021, and another son, Abdul Mohsen, was assassinated by a Saudi hit squad during the January 2019 Um al-Hamam massacre, which left six activists dead, according to local sources speaking to Al-Akhbar.

On April 26, the state executed Ali al-Rabah, a young athlete and protester from Al-Awamiyah, listed on execution watchlists. According to the European-Saudi Organisation for Human Rights (ESOHR), al-Rabah had not been accused of murder, emphasizing that Saudi Arabia systematically uses terrorism charges to criminalize political activism and expression.

The month of February also witnessed politically motivated executions. On February 12, Ali al-Leif, also from Al-Awamiyah, was executed after years in solitary confinement and denial of basic rights following his 2017 arrest. In January, Abdullah al-Sulaim was executed on the 18th, followed by Ali al-Sulaiman on the 28th, neither of whom had been publicly identified as facing imminent execution.

ESOHR’s legal director, attorney Taha al-Hajji, lamented the near-total absence of information surrounding al-Alawi’s case, and those of the other eight executed men. “These cases remain unknown due to a total lack of transparency and the families’ silence,” he told Al-Akhbar.

Al-Hajji rejected the belief that silence protects detainees. “In reality, silence only gives the regime cover to kill detainees in cold blood,” he said, criticizing the notion that publicity provokes the state to act more harshly. On the contrary, he argued, cases that receive public and media exposure often force the authorities to backtrack. “Several high-profile prisoners of conscience were spared execution because their cases gained public attention, like that of Mohammad al-Ghamdi, among others.”

As with over 200 other prisoners previously executed or killed by the state, the regime has again withheld the bodies of the nine recent victims, denying their families funeral rites and proper burial. A source speaking anonymously told Al-Akhbar that families are often blindsided, learning of executions through state media or Interior Ministry statements. “Many of these victims were executed without trial or credible charges. Their families are also forbidden from holding funerals or even receiving condolences,” the source said.

The source added that the state fears large funerals and mourning processions could turn into protests. “Since the 2011 Second Uprising of Dignity, authorities have consistently withheld bodies to prevent the world from seeing the massive funeral processions that could often turn into demonstrations against oppression, tyranny, and repression.”

This execution campaign has cast a shadow of fear over the families of more than 100 detainees currently facing death sentences, including at least nine minors. Human rights organizations warn the true number may be significantly higher. One source revealed to Al-Akhbar that Saudi authorities recently transferred some detainees from Dammam’s General Investigation Prison (al-Mabahith) to Riyadh, calling the move a “clear indicator” that more executions are imminent. “The ongoing and escalating pace of state killings has sparked panic among the families of detainees awaiting execution.”

Attorney al-Hajji urged families to take initiative. “They must find ways to raise their children’s cases internationally, to reach organizations and activists outside Saudi Arabia.”

In response to the latest wave of executions, the LIQAA Opposition issued a statement condemning the regime’s contempt for legal norms. “The Saudi regime has erased both time and law. Defendants are given no opportunity to defend themselves or rebut unfounded charges. No legal provisions guarantee the right to a fair trial under just conditions. All this has been discarded. Sentences are issued not by judges, but by the king and his crown prince, who are equally complicit in these crimes under a judiciary stripped of independence.”

The Opposition linked the rising execution rate to the regime’s effort to suppress dissent ahead of full normalization with Israel, calling it “the ultimate betrayal of the Ummah’s cause.” The statement added, “Every interest you hold in our land is soaked in our blood. Every dollar you earn here helps fund the machinery that beheads our brothers. You disgrace your people and your principles by supporting a regime of killers.”

Activists from Qatif, Al-Ahsa, and Al-Hijaz launched a campaign to expose the fundamentally political nature of these executions, describing them as “decisions issued by the political ruler in Najd, who governs through bloodshed and terror.”

Both ESOHR and the UK-based human rights group Reprieve underlined that Saudi Arabia’s increasing number of executions in 2024 and 2025 reflects a systematic policy. “In 2024, Saudi Arabia executed at least 345 people, the highest number in its modern history,” they said. “By July 2025, that number had already reached 200, doubling the figure from the same period the year before.”

The groups warned that Saudi Arabia is on track to break its own record once again in 2025. The overwhelming majority of those executed, they noted, come from vulnerable groups: foreign workers, the poor, protesters, and political dissidents, convicted in trials that fail to meet even the most basic standards of justice.

This is an edited translation by Al-Akhbar English of an article originally published in Arabic.

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