The Siege of Mecca deaths and ending only after the intervention of Saudi National Guard and Special Forces. Yaroslav Trofimov's book provides the first detailed account of this siege. The book is based on interviews with surviving participants and eyewitnesses, including former terrorist supporters of Juhayman al-Otaybi, as well as hundreds of declassified U.S., British and French government documents. The Siege of Mecca The Siege of Mecca: The Forgotten Uprising in Islam's Holiest Shrine and the Birth of Al Qaeda is a 2007 book by Wall Street Journal correspondent Yaroslav Trofimov about the 1979 Grand Mosque seizure in Mecca. Hundreds of Islamic radicals led
Battle of Mecca (1916) 1916 most of the Ottoman army had gone to Taif, a hill station in Arabia accompanying Ghalib Pasha, the governor of Hijaz. Only 1,000 men were left to defend Mecca. Many of them were asleep in barracks in the valley on June 10 when the Sharif of Mecca, Hussein bin Ali fired a shot into the air from the window of the Hashemite palace signaling the beginning of the Arab Revolt. Hearing this his 5000 supporters started firing on Turkish troops in three fortresses overlooking the holy city, and at the Jirwall barracks on Jeddah road. The attack upon the