.. from the top down. Trump’s favorite publisher, American Media Inc., issued an obsequious glossy magazine pushing MBS’ allegedly transformative, enlightened vision onto American supermarket shelves. New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, among other journalists, portrayed MBS as an Arab reformer Americans had longed for.
That rapturous reception, along with MBS’ consequence-free decimation of Yemen – one of the most extreme humanitarian crises on earth – and the crown-prince-to-prince relationship with Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner that MBS cultivated may help explain why Riyadh believed it could get away with murdering Khashoggi.
Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry made sure to tweet out a photo of MBS and Pompeo, all smiles.
.. Bin Salman “pledged that the work of the Saudi public prosecutor will produce a full and complete conclusion with full transparency for the world to see,” Pompeo said in a statement late Tuesday, adding: “My assessment from these meetings is that there is serious commitment to determine all the facts and ensure accountability, including accountability for Saudi Arabia’s senior leaders or senior officials.”
Earlier Tuesday, Trump tweeted that MBS, with Pompeo present, “totally denied any knowledge” of the grim events in the Saudi consulate on October 2. And that followed on Trump’s stated reluctance to cut off substantial and long-standing Saudi arms deals with the U.S., though The Daily Beast reported Tuesday that the administration is considering some measure of punishment over the Khashoggi disappearance, potentially including sanctions.
Riedel said much depended on the willingness of the Trump administration to accept whatever explanation the Saudis end up offering for the killing of a dissident.
“The key to this cover-up is it puts a delta between MBS and the crime,” he said. “The argument MBS didn’t know doesn’t pass the laugh test.”
Lindsey Graham Calls for Sanctions on Saudi Arabia Over Khashoggi Disappearance
While he described Saudi Arabia as, in the past, “a good ally,” Mr. Graham said “there is a difference between a country and individual. The MBS figure to me is toxic. He can never be a world leader on the world stage…This guy has got to go.”
.. Mr. Graham said he “can never do business with Saudi Arabia again until we get this behind us.” Mr. Graham described the crown prince as a “wrecking ball.”
While he described himself previously as Saudi Arabia’s “biggest defender” in the Senate, Mr. Graham said the alleged murder of Mr. Khashoggi made him “feel used and abused.”
If a Prince Murders a Journalist, That’s Not a Hiccup
Frankly, it’s a disgrace that Trump administration officials and American business tycoons enabled and applauded M.B.S. as he
- imprisoned business executives,
- kidnapped Lebanon’s prime minister,
- rashly created a crisis with Qatar, and
- went to war in Yemen to create what the United Nations calls the world’s worst humanitarian crisis there.
Some eight million Yemenis on the edge of starvation there don’t share this bizarre view that M.B.S. is a magnificent reformer.
.. Trump has expressed “great confidence” in M.B.S. and said that he and King Salman “know exactly what they are doing.” Jared Kushner wooed M.B.S. and built a close relationship with him — communicating privately without involving State Department experts — in ways that certainly assisted M.B.S. in his bid to consolidate power for himself.
The bipartisan cheers from Washington, Silicon Valley and Wall Street fed his recklessness. If he could be feted after kidnapping a Lebanese prime minister and slaughtering Yemeni children, why expect a fuss for murdering a mere journalist?
.. M.B.S. knows how to push Americans’ buttons, speaking about reform and playing us like a fiddle. His willingness to sound accepting of Israel may also be one reason Trump and so many Americans were willing to embrace M.B.S. even as he was out of control at home.
In the end, M.B.S. played Kushner, Trump and his other American acolytes for suckers. The White House boasted about $110 billion in arms sales, but nothing close to that came through. Saudi Arabia backed away from Trump’s Middle East peace deal. Financiers salivated over an initial public offering for Aramco, the state-owned oil company, but that keeps getting delayed.
.. The crackdown on corruption is an example of M.B.S.’s manipulation and hypocrisy. It sounded great, but M.B.S. himself has purchased a $300 million castle in France, and a $500 million yacht — and he didn’t buy them by scrimping on his government salary.
.. In fairness, he did allow women to drive. But he also imprisoned the women’s rights activists who had been campaigning for the right to drive.
Saudi Arabia even orchestrated the detention abroad of a women’s rights activist, Loujain al-Hathloul, and her return in handcuffs. She turned 29 in a Saudi jail cell in July, and her marriage has ended. She, and not the prince who imprisons her, is the heroic reformer.
.. The crown prince showed his sensitivity and unpredictability in August when Canada’s foreign ministry tweeted concern about the jailing of Saudi women’s rights activists. Saudi Arabia went nuts, canceling flights, telling 8,300 Saudi students to leave Canada, expelling the Canadian ambassador and withdrawing investments. All for a tweet.
.. Western companies should back out of M.B.S.’s Future Investment Initiative conference later this month. That includes you,
- Mastercard,
- McKinsey,
- Credit Suisse,
- Siemens,
- HSBC,
- BCG,
- EY,
- Bain and
- Deloitte,
all listed on the conference website as partners of the event.
.. We need an international investigation, perhaps overseen by the United Nations, of what happened to Jamal. In the United States, we also must investigate whether Saudis bought influence with spending that benefited the Trump family, such as $270,000 spent as of early 2017 by a lobbying firm for Saudi Arabia at the Trump hotel in Washington. The Washington Post reported that Saudi bookings at Trump Chicago increased 169 percent from the first half of 2016 to the first half of this year, and that the general manager of a Trump hotel in New York told investors that revenues rose partly because of “a last-minute visit to New York by the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia.”
.. If Saudi Arabia cannot show that Jamal is safe and sound, NATO countries should jointly expel Saudi ambassadors and suspend weapons sales. The United States should start an investigation under the Magnitsky Act and stand ready to impose sanctions on officials up to M.B.S.
America can also make clear to the Saudi royal family that it should find a new crown prince. A mad prince who murders a journalist, kidnaps a prime minister and starves millions of children should never be celebrated at state dinners, but instead belongs in a prison cell.
What Jamal Khashoggi Story Says About US Leadership
The president on Thursday said he ‘doesn’t like’ that Saudi Arabia may be involved in the disappearance of Jamal Khashoggi but won’t stop arms sales. Trump also noted Khashoggi was not a U.S. citizen.