Wow - 172 "Islamic militants" arrested in Saudi Arabia

Some were even alleged to be training to fly aircraft into targets.

CNN reports:

The [Interior Ministry] issued a statement saying the detainees were planning to carry out suicide atttacks against "public figures, oil facilities, refineries... and military zones" -- some of which were outside the kingdom.

"They had reached an advance stage of readiness and what remained only was to set the zero hour for their attacks," Interior Ministry spokesman Brig. Mansour al-Turki told The Associated Press in a phone call. "They had the personnel, the money, the arms. Almost all the elements for terror attacks were complete except for setting the zero hour for the attacks."

The ministry did not say the militants would fly aircraft into oil refineries, as the September 11, 2001 hijackers flew planes into buildings in New York and Washington, but it said in a statement that some detainees had been "sent to other countries to study flying in preparation for using them to carry out terrorist attacks inside the kingdom."

The Saudis didn't just nab suspects either. As CNN goes on to report:

In their crackdown, the police seized large quantities of weapons, explosives and money. More than 120 million riyals ($32.4 million) had been seized in the operation, one of the largest sweeps against terror cells in the kingdom.

Not everyone arrested was Saudi, incidentally. Nor has anyone been identified as being a member of Al Qaeda. But as CNN reminds the reader:

The al Qaeda terror group, whose leader Osama bin Laden is a Saudi, has called for attacks on the kingdom's oil facilities as a means of crippling both the kingdom's economy and the hurting the West, whom he accuses of paying too little for Arab oil.