Saudi Hackers Attack Al-Alam Twitter Account

Iran’s Arabic-language Al-Alam news network said hackers from Saudi Arabia have broken into its official Twitter account on Monday.

Al-Alam said the act of online sabotage had been “a hasty reaction” after the Iranian network provided extensive coverage of the liberation of the Iraqi city of Mosul on Monday from terrorists fighting the Baghdad government, IRIB reported.

The network said it was not the first time Saudis were directing outrage at Al-Alam’s media activities by hacking or filtering its channels and websites.

This time, it said, the Saudi hackers engaged in sabotage after the widespread coverage of the heavy defeat suffered by the self-styled Islamic State terrorists in Mosul.

Iraqi Army soldiers and allied volunteer fighters had launched a large-scale, multi-front offensive to liberate Mosul in October 2016 from the militants who espoused Wahhabism—the extremist belief widely promoted by Saudi Arabia worldwide.

Nevertheless, Iraqi forces finally liberated the entire city on Monday.

Several Iranian websites have been hacked in recent months including government websites by forces believed to be close to Arab opposition groups based in Saudi Arabia.