2 Car Bombs Rock Saudi Capital

Insurgents mounted a brazen assault on the Saudi ruling family’s security network Wednesday, setting off car bombs outside the hulking Interior Ministry building and a guard training center in the capital and then exchanging gunfire with police.

The blasts in Riyadh came two weeks after the release of an audiotape believed to have been recorded by Osama bin Laden denouncing the Saudi royal family as “corrupt Zionists” and calling for Muslims to topple the kingdom’s government.

The taped message called for attacks on the Saudi oil industry; after Wednesday’s assault, the price of oil surged by nearly $2 a barrel.

The blasts and gunfire, which left at least 10 people dead and 17 wounded, erupted a day after Saudi forces raided a suspected militant hide-out in Riyadh. They killed at least three gunmen and rounded up suspects as part of an ongoing crackdown against insurgents.

“Bin Laden’s tapes address the general, much broader questions of strategy for the cells. He outlines the priorities,” said Abdullah Bejad, a former radical who now works as a legal researcher. “Attacks usually happen, or escalate, after each of his tapes. But the question remains: Why anyone who talks about jihad can find such a mass following?”

Wednesday’s strikes began at the Interior Ministry, where a remote-controlled car bomb went off inside a traffic tunnel leading to the complex, killing a passing driver. Less than 30 minutes later, a pair of suicide bombers blew up a car outside the training facility on King Fahd Street, the main Riyadh thoroughfare, Saudi sources said.

Seven gunmen were shot to death a short time later when security forces stormed a villa on the northern outskirts of the city. The government said the house was a hide-out for those who plotted the attacks.

Speaking on Saudi television, Deputy Interior Minister Prince Ahmed ibn Abdulaziz sounded a familiar note of defiance.

“They are criminals. They know they are on the retreat and they are scared,” he said. “They are severely hurt, and God willing we will finish them.”

But the bombings, which followed a strike Dec. 6 against the U.S. Consulate in the Red Sea city of Jidda, seemed to contradict the Saudi government’s assurances that the militants were all but shut down.

“It seems like the terrorists are surrounding the government,” said Adel Toraifi, a Saudi researcher who specializes in the kingdom’s militant organizations. “Not that the government is surrounding the terrorists.”

The rulers of this troubled desert kingdom were the Saudi-born Bin Laden’s original archenemy, and analysts interpreted the recent taped message as a bid to galvanize public sympathy by sounding a populist note.

“The people have awoken from their stupor, they realize the degree of corruption and tyranny which you use to rob them of their rights,” said the voice on the tape.

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Hossam Hamalawy of The Times’ Cairo Bureau contributed to this report.