It is unbelievable, how the dominoes fell in the 1979 Middle East.
February 1979 > Iran and Khomeini
July 1979 > Iraq, Saddam Hussein
November 1979 > The Grand Mosque crisis, Saudi Arabia
December 1979 > Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
And guess what ?
Exactly 50 years later, we are still paying for all this. Iran, Bin Laden, Iraq, Al Quaeda and ISIS... dang.
Middle East at large is a slow fuse powder keg. Screw one country only once, pay the price for the next 100 years.
Incidentally, the French GIGN elite police strike force was called to the rescue by the Saudis. They saturated the Grand Mosque underground with tear gas (some says more lethal gas, mustard or sarin but it is
extremely doubtful) to get the rebels out so that the Saudi Forces could shoot them in the open.
The whole thing was kept secret but if the operation fails and leaks in the press (Le Canard enchainé, for a start) then President Giscard d'Estaing (France very own Jimmy Carter, really) is even more screwed than OTL. Mitterrand probably gets a larger victory in 1981.
As if "Les diamants de Bokassa" wasn't enough, Giscard is screwed up another time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamonds_Affair