Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia (ⁱ/ˌsɔːdiː əˈreɪbiə/, ⁱ/ˌsaʊ-/), officially known as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is an Arab state in Western Asia constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula. With a land area of approximately 2,150,000 km² (830,000 sq mi), Saudi Arabia is geographically the second-largest state in the Arab world after Algeria. Saudi Arabia is bordered by Jordan and Iraq to the north, Kuwait to the northeast, Qatar, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates to the east, Oman to the southeast, and Yemen to the south. It is the only nation with both a Red Sea coast and a Persian Gulf coast, and most of its terrain consists of arid inhospitable desert or barren landforms.

The area of modern-day Saudi Arabia formerly consisted of four distinct regions: Hejaz, Najd, and parts of Eastern Arabia (Al-Ahsa) and Southern Arabia ('Asir). The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was founded in 1932 by Ibn Saud. He united the four regions into a single state through a series of conquests beginning in 1902 with the capture of Riyadh, the ancestral home of his family, the House of Saud. The country has since been an absolute monarchy, effectively a hereditary dictatorship governed along Islamic lines. The ultra-conservative Wahhabism religious movement within Sunni Islam has been called "the predominant feature of Saudi culture", with its global spreading largely financed by the oil and gas trade. Saudi Arabia is sometimes called "the Land of the Two Holy Mosques" in reference to Al-Masjid al-Haram (in Mecca), and Al-Masjid an-Nabawi (in Medina), the two holiest places in Islam. The Kingdom has a total population of 28.7 million, of which 20 million are Saudi nationals and 8 million are foreigners.

King Of...

King Of... was a television comedy talk show made by Big Talk Productions for Channel 4. It was first broadcast on 17 June 2011 and was hosted by Claudia Winkleman. The show featured two celebrity guests per episode and a studio audience. The guests discussed what is the 'king of' various categories.

On 24 June 2011, Channel 4 announced that King Of... was to be cut short due to Winkleman's pregnancy. The final 2 episodes, with Ruby Wax & Johnny Vegas and Billie Piper, were not recorded.

Episodes

Series 1

References

External links

King Abdullah

King Abdullah may refer to:

Current monarchs

Previous monarchs

See also

Salman of Saudi Arabia

Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (Arabic: سلمان بن عبد العزيز آل سعود‎‎, Salmān ibn ‘Abd al-‘Azīz Āl Sa‘ūd, Hejazi Arabic (born 31 December 1935) is the King of Saudi Arabia, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques and the head of the House of Saud.

He served as the Deputy Governor and then the Governor of Riyadh for 48 years from 1963 to 2011. He was appointed as Minister of Defence in 2011. He was also named the Crown Prince in 2012 following the death of his brother Nayef bin Abdulaziz Al Saud. Salman was crowned as the new King of Saudi Arabia on 23 January 2015 following the death of his half brother, King Abdullah. Among the most notable events during his reign so far have been Saudi Arabia's military intervention in the Yemeni Civil War, the 2015 Mina stampede during the Hajj, and the execution of Nimr al-Nimr and 46 others opponents of the regime on 2 January 2016.

Early life

Salman was born on 31 December 1935, and is reported to be the 25th son of King Abdulaziz ibn Saud. Salman and his six brothers make up what is referred to as the Sudairi Seven. He was raised in the Murabba Palace.

Arabian Peninsula

Arabian Peninsula, simplified Arabia (Arabic: الجزيرة العربية‎ al-jazīra al-ʿarabiyya, « Arabian island ») is a peninsula of Western Asia situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. From a geological perspective, it is considered a subcontinent of Asia.

It is the largest peninsula in the world, at 3,237,500 km² (1,250,000 sq mi). The Arabian Peninsula consists of the countries Yemen, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates as well as parts of southern Iraq and Jordan. The peninsula formed as a result of the rifting of the Red Sea between 56 and 23 million years ago, and is bordered by the Red Sea to the west, the Persian Gulf to the northeast, the Levant to the north and the Indian Ocean to the southeast. The Arabian Peninsula plays a critical geopolitical role in the Middle East and Arab world due to its vast reserves of oil and natural gas.

Before the modern era, it was divided into four distinct regions: Hejaz, Najd, Southern Arabia and Eastern Arabia. Hejaz and Najd make up most of Saudi Arabia. Southern Arabia consists of Yemen and some parts of Saudi Arabia and Oman (Dhofar). Eastern Arabia consists of the entire coastal strip of the Arab side of the Persian Gulf (the Khaleej).