Saudi Arabia executed a citizen on Tuesday who it said planned a terrorist attack in the kingdom after joining a training camp abroad.
Ahmed Al Badr illegally left the kingdom for training on the use of weapons and bombs provided by a "hostile country", the Saudi Interior Ministry said.
It said Al Badr was a spy who returned to Saudi Arabia in possession of weapons "to carry out a terrorist act in order to disturb the security of the kingdom".
He was referred to a special court that convicted him of "corruption on earth" and sentenced him to death.
He was executed in the eastern region, the ministry added.
In March, Saudi Arabia executed two citizens convicted of joining a terrorist cell to target security forces.
They were found to have joined a terrorist cell, supplied weapons and ammunition, and tracked and photographed security sites and headquarters in the kingdom with the aim of targeting and killing security forces, the Interior Ministry said.
The two men embraced extremist thoughts known as “takfiri”, it said.
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
