Wahhabi clerics are easily provoked upon hearing that other Muslims may entertain the idea of restoring the Muslim caliphate. They strongly believe that Muslims other than themselves are godless and unqualified to claim the honor of reviving the caliphate, a multi-ethnic transnational empire with Sharia and the bonds of faith as the basis of government.

As they consider themselves to represent the only true and pure Islam, they endorse the view that if such a caliphate is to return, they should take the lead in shaping its creed and outlook. They are therefore determined to denounce any contemporary Muslim who may entertain the idea that one day all Muslims will be united under the umbrella of a single polity. If such a unification were ever possible, they themselves should be the only active agents in its birth, regardless of how remote or unrealistic this possibility might be.

The restoration of the caliphate remains alive in the imagination of some, but not all, contemporary Muslims. Previous caliphates never included all Muslims as subjects. Yet the project of reviving the caliphate became important among some Muslims after the Ottoman caliphate was abolished in 1924. The only Islamist political movement that openly prioritizes the restoration of the caliphate project is Hizb al-Tahrir. Under Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda occasionally invoked the caliphate as a mobilizing idea, but it was never central to its ideology. The Muslim Brotherhood paid lip service to restoring the caliphate while remaining mainly concerned with national projects, despite its claim of being a transnational movement.

The latest Saudi director of Imam Muhammad Ibn Saud University, a stronghold of Wahhabi theology and jurisprudence, attacked all those who think that Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan will restore the caliphate. Suleiman Aba al-Khayil reiterated a typical Wahhabi attack on Erdogan and his Turkish state, invoking blasphemy, debauchery and, amusingly, Turkish nudist clubs as reasons disqualifying the prime minister from the post of sultan or caliph. He asked how a Saudi brought up on the "pure" creed of the country dared to expect Erdogan to restore the caliphate when his state was immersed in sin and was the archenemy of the creed of Saudi Arabia.