Abdul Rahman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud ( ar, عبد الرحمن بن عبد العزيز آل سعود, ''ʿAbd ar Raḥman ibn ʿAbd al ʿAzīz Āl Suʿūd''; 1931 – 13 July 2017) was a senior member of the House of Saud and Saudi Arabian deputy minister of defense and aviation. At the time of his death, he was the oldest living member of the

Sudairi Seven The Sudairi Seven ( ar, السديريون السبعة, ''As Sudayriyyūn as Sabʿah''), also spelled ''Sudairy'' or ''Sudayri'', is the commonly used name for a powerful alliance of seven full brothers within the Saudi royal family. They are al ...

Early life and education

Abdul Rahman was born in 1931 as the sixteenth son of

King Abdulaziz Abdulaziz bin Abdul Rahman Al Saud ( ar, عبد العزيز بن عبد الرحمن آل سعود, ʿAbd al ʿAzīz bin ʿAbd ar Raḥman Āl Suʿūd; 15 January 1875Ibn Saud's birth year has been a source of debate. It is generally accepted ...

and third son of

Hussa bint Ahmed Al Sudairi Hussa bint Ahmed Al Sudairi ( ar, حصة بنت أحمد السديري; 1900–1969) was one of the wives of King Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia, with whom she had seven sons and four daughters. Her sons included two future Saudi kings, Fahd and Sa ...

. He was the first of King Abdulaziz's sons to study in the West and received a bachelor's degree in economics and business administration from the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

. He also graduated from the California Military Academy.

Career

Prince Abdul Rahman was the counsellor for royal family affairs during the mid-1970s. He replaced his brother, Prince Turki, as the deputy minister of defense and aviation in 1978 when Turki resigned. Prince Abdul Rahman also involved in business activities. In the 1980s, when he was deputy minister, Abdul Rahman reportedly provided food service to the ministry with his own company. During

Prince Sultan Sultan bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (c. 5 January 1928 – 22 October 2011) (Arabic: سلطان بن عبدالعزيز آل سعود ''Sulṭān ibn ʿAbdulʿazīz Āl Suʿūd''), called ''Sultan the Good'' (Arabic: سلطان الخير ''Sulṭa ...

’s absence from the Kingdom for medical treatment, he increased his activity at the ministry. Abdul Rahman was often described as becoming more irritable with age. He was relieved from his post as deputy minister on 5 November 2011. According to '' Al-Quds Al-Arabi'', he was dismissed by King Abdullah when, unhappy at being bypassed as crown prince in favor of Prince Nayef, he refused to declare allegiance to Nayef.

Views and succession

Following the

Gulf War The Gulf War was a 1990–1991 armed campaign waged by a Coalition of the Gulf War, 35-country military coalition in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Spearheaded by the United States, the coalition's efforts against Ba'athist Iraq, ...

Prince Abdul Rahman as deputy defense minister objected to the request of Prince

Khalid bin Sultan Khaled bin Sultan Al Saud ( ar, خالد بن سلطان بن عبد العزيز آل سعود) (born 24 September 1949) is the former deputy minister of defense and a member of the House of Saud. Early life and education Prince Khalid was bor ...

to be named as the chief of staff of the Saudi army. Prince Abdul Rahman was reportedly the only son of King Abdulaziz to oppose the 2007 formation of the

Allegiance Council The Allegiance Council ( ar, هيئة البيعة ''Hay’at al-Bay‘ah''), also known as the Allegiance Commission or Allegiance Institution or Succession Commission, is the body responsible for determining future succession to the throne of ...

, despite support from nearly all sons of the king. The apparent reason for his protests was the fact that he was next in age, after Crown Prince Sultan; the new succession arrangement is based on merit, rather than age.

Prince Salman A prince is a male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary, in some European states. Th ...

, his younger brother and the referee in family disputes, reportedly met with Abdul Rahman and told him to "shut up and get back to work".

Personal life and death

Prince Abdul Rahman married Maha Al Ibrahim, sister of King Fahd's wife Al Jawhara Al Ibrahim and Al Ibrahim's brothers (including Waleed Al Ibrahim). His another wife was Munira bint Turki bin Ahmed Al Sudairi. His son-in-law is

Nayef bin Fawwaz Al Sha'lan Nayef bin Fawwaz Al Shaalan Al Ruwaily (born 1956) ( ar, نايف بن فواز الشعلان) is a Saudi Arabian diplomat and businessman. As a grandson of Prince Nuri Al-Shaalan, Nayef is a prince and a member of the House of Al-Shaalan. Busi ...

. One of Abdul Rahman's son, Mohammed, was named the deputy governor of Riyadh in 2017. Abdul Rahman died on 13 July 2017 at the age of 86. Funeral prayers were performed at the Grand Mosque in Mecca on 15 July, and he was buried at

Al Adl cemetery The Al-Adl cemetery ( ar, مقبرة العدل, Maqbarat al-‘Adl, lit=Cemetery of Divine Justice) is one of the earliest and largest and of six resting places in Mecca. It is also the second substantial cemetery in the city. History and locat ...

. One of his sons, Saud, died in November 2021, just a few years after Abdul Rahman.

Ancestry

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Saud, Abdul Rahman Abdulaziz

Abdul Rahman Abd al-Rahman ( ar, عبد الرحمن, translit=ʿAbd al-Raḥmān or occasionally ; DMG ''ʿAbd ar-Raḥman''; also Abdul Rahman) is a male Arabic Muslim given name, and in modern usage, surname. It is built from the Arabic words '' Abd'', '' ...

1931 births 2017 deaths

University of California, Berkeley alumni