Draft:Qathani

Muhammad ibn Abdullah Al Qahtani (1935-1979) was a Saudi jihadist who claimed to be the Mahdi destined to bring about Judgement Day. In 1979, he led the Grand Mosque seizure with the help of his brother-in-law Juhayman al-Otaybi. Sharing a name with the Prophet Muhammad and arriving in Mecca from the north, he believed he was fulfilling a prophecy. Al Qahtani and al-Otaybi met while imprisoned for sedition and pledged to establish a millenarian theocracy in preparation for the judgment day, rejecting the Saudi monarchy and condemning the Wahhabist ulema. They led an army of up to 600 militants, many of whom were theology students from the Islamic University in Medina, and seized the Grand Mosque in Mecca on 20 November 1979. Using the mosque's public address system, they called on all Muslims to follow Al Qahtani. The Saudi Arabian Army, with assistance from the French GIGN, besieged the mosque. During the recapture, Qahtani was killed, with his jaw blown off.