Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, is a country in West Asia covering the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, bordered by the Red Sea, Jordan, Iraq, Kuwait, the Arabian Gulf, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Yemen, with its capital and largest city Riyadh. Islam emerged in what is now Saudi Arabia in the early seventh century, and Arab dynasties originating from the region founded the Rashidun, Umayyad, Abbasid and Fatimid caliphates among numerous other Muslim states in Asia, Africa and Europe. Saudi Arabia was founded in 1932 by King Abdulaziz, who united Hejaz, Najd, and parts of Eastern and South Arabia into a single state through a series of military and political campaigns beginning in 1902; the Kingdom is the Third Saudi State, successor to the First Saudi State of 1727 to 1818 and the Second Saudi State of 1824 to 1891. Since petroleum was discovered in 1938, the kingdom has become the world's second-largest oil producer and leading oil exporter, and is a founding member of OPEC.