Arab Youth Survey

"Now in its milestone 15th year, the annual ASDA’A BCW Arab Youth Survey is largest study of its kind of the Arab world’s largest demographic – its over 200 million youth. The survey presents evidence-based insights on the hopes, attitudes and aspirations of Arab youth, informing governments, the private sector, multilateral institutions and academics on policymaking, business strategy and emerging trends."

Link here.

Ready, Fire, Aim: U.S. Interests in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria

"It is widely claimed that the United States was inadequately engaged in the Syrian maelstrom. Nonsense! Since 2014, we have spent well over $50 billion in appropriated funds to train, arm, and otherwise support various factions in the conflict, including some with direct links to al Qaeda. This fiscal year alone, DoD has budgeted $15.3 billion and the Department of State about $1 billion for Syria. In total disregard of international law, we have carried out well over 11,000 air and missile strikes against both government and rebel forces in Syria and deployed about 2,000 U.S. troops there to support secessionist factions. We cannot escape a considerable measure of moral responsibility for both the perpetuation of the conflict in Syria and some of the 200,000 undocumented and 375,000 documented Syrian dead, about 125,000 of whom have been verified as pro-government, 133,000 as anti-government, and 112,000 as noncombatant, neutral civilians. But we have made it clear we will not contribute to Syria’s reconstruction."

Link here.

We need diplomacy not sanctions for peace in Syria

The truth is that the U.S. engagement from 2011 was misguided and doomed to fail. The U.S. goal was to overthrow Assad in order to end a regime backed by Russia and Iran. Yet, both countries were prepared to more than match Obama’s commitment of forces, especially with Russia’s intervention in 2015, rendering the U.S.-backed insurgents a complete failure. The misguided proxy war stoked by the U.S., Saudi Arabia, and other US allies eventually displaced more than 10 million people and led to the deaths of around half a million civilians and combatants.

Moreover, Operation Timber Sycamore supported Sunni jihadists favored by Saudi Arabia, and it was the splintering of those jihadist forces that led to the rise of ISIS in Syria. This was a classic boomerang effect, where the initial CIA action came back to haunt the U.S. in even more disastrous terms.

Link here.

Face to Face: Saudi Arabia-Iran

An in-depth look at the military spending, the economy and the drivers of growth for the two regional rivals.

Link here.

Saudi Arabia Has Become a Geopolitical Loose Cannon

The Saudi state is an artifact of Western militarism and imperialism, growing out of the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire after World War I. Abdul Aziz ibn Saud eventually fulfilled his lengthy quest to unify the peninsula. Discovery of oil in 1938 gave his country an unexpected international importance.

Four decades ago the Islamic revolution in Iran, which inspired Shia in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s eastern provinces, and seizure of Mecca’s Grand Mosque by Islamic extremists caused the monarchy to turn its theocracy in a totalitarian direction. The royals enforced the Wahhabist clergy’s fundamentalist interpretation of Islam in return for the latter urging obedience to the Saudi state. Hence, ruling princes mixed private libertinism with public piety, treated women as inferior, prohibited non-Muslim faiths, and deployed the mutawa, or religious police. Also, they provided large-scale subsidies to spread Wahhabism abroad, through mosques, schools, teachers and textbooks.

The result was a decrepit, corrupt gerontocracy undermining virtually every Western value and interest. However, the doddering monarchy, passed among the aging sons of ibn Saud, possessed oil and money aplenty. This earned the regime plenty of affection in the West, and especially the United States.

Link here.

PERSPECTIVE: To Truly Fight Terror, Counter Salafist Jihadist Ideology First

Additionally, several ISIS defectors I interviewed specifically told me how al-Wahhab’s Kitab at-Tawhid was the chief and the most important part of their training, a book also widely and historically adopted by today’s Saudi Arabia. Furthermore, I observed that Salafist literature and books were adopted by terrorists including al-Qaeda for their indoctrination and training during the investigations I carried out as a counterterrorism police chief in Turkey.

This is the reason Sheikh Adel al-Kalbani, the former Imam of Kaaba, the Grand Mosque of the Prophet Muhammad in Mecca, and a Salafi himself, openly and sincerely admitted that “ISIS is a true product of Salafism, and we must deal with it with full transparency.”

The fact is, some Saudi princes, clerics, and charities for decades have been pouring out billions of dollars to promote their understanding of Islam, Wahhabism. They have found willing partners among the vulnerable populations in the Central Asian and Afghan-Pakistani regions, Africa, the Balkans and even in Europe. These funders indirectly assist ISIS and al-Qaeda-friendly organizations to fast-track their recruitments process on their behalf. In the leaked U.S. embassy cables, it was openly addressed that Saudi Arabia was “a critical source of terrorist funding” where the money is mostly spent on training of Wahhabi clerics, production and distribution of Wahhabi textbooks, media outreach and donations to local schools or cultural centers.

Thanks to the Saudis spreading Salafism all over the world, these terrorists reach ideologically ripe people among their targeted groups who are already educated by the Wahhabis.

Link here.

Intel Vets Tell Trump Iran Is Not Top Terror Sponsor

The public image of Iran as a hotbed of fanatical terrorists has been usurped since the August 1998 bombings of the U.S. Embassies in east Africa by Al Qaeda and other radical Sunni entities. The U.S. Government’s own list of terrorist attacks since 2001 shows a dramatic drop in the violence carried out by Iran and an accompanying surge in horrific acts by radical Sunni Muslims who are not aligned with Iran. The latest edition of the Global Terrorism Index, a project of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, shows that four groups accounted for 74 percent of all fatalities from terrorism in 2015 — Boko Haram, Al-Qaeda, the Taliban and ISIS.

Thirteen of the 14 Muslim Groups identified by the U.S. intelligence community as actively hostile to the US are Sunni, not Shia, and are not supported by Iran:

– ISIS (Sunni)
– The Al-Nusra Front (Sunni)
– Al-Qa’ida Central (Sunni)
– Al-Qa’ida in Magheb (Sunni)
– Al-Qa’ida in Arabian Peninsula (Sunni)
– Boku Haram (Sunni)
– Al-Shabbab (Sunni)
– Khorassan Group (Sunni)
– Society of the Muslim Brothers (Sunni)
– Sayyaf Group in the Philippines (Sunni)
– Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan (Sunni)
– Lashgar i Taiba (Sunni)
– Jemaa Islamiya (Sunni)
– Houthis (Shia)

Link here.

Ending America’s Disastrous Role in Syria

"Here are the basics. In 2011, in the context of the Arab Spring, the US government, in conjunction with the governments of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, and Israel, decided to bring down Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, even though overthrowing another country’s government amounts to a blatant violation of international law. We know that in 2012, if not earlier, President Barack Obama authorized the CIA to work with America’s allies in providing support to rebel forces composed of disaffected Syrians as well as non-Syrian fighters. US policymakers evidently expected Assad to fall quickly, as had occurred with the governments of Tunisia and Egypt in the early months of the Arab Spring."

-----------------------------------------

"America’s official narrative has sought to conceal the scale and calamitous consequences of US efforts – in defiance of international law and the UN Charter – to overthrow Assad. While the US vehemently complains about Russian and Iranian influence in Syria, America and its allies have repeatedly violated Syrian sovereignty. The US government mischaracterizes the war as a civil war among Syrians, rather than a proxy war involving the US, Israel, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Qatar."

Link here.

Eye of the Storm

Regionally, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are now seeking ways to compensate for the loss of Syria as a place where they could defy and bleed Iran. A renewed desire to reverse their regional fortunes could lead them to try regaining a foothold in Lebanon. The Gulf states, Israel, and the United States do not want Iran to reap the benefits of a victory in Syria. If ever they seek to rebalance the regional relationship with Tehran in the Levant, the only place to do so would be Lebanon, despite the many risks that would accompany such an effort.

Link here.

How Saudi Arabia captured Washington

Rather, they described Gulf donations as playing a much subtler role in influencing Washington — one that is less explicit and thus less dramatic. But that role is also, by design, systemic and thus pervasive, making it less egregious-seeming but perhaps more distorting than the incidents described by the Times.

"It doesn't mean that he's bought and paid for," one of the experts said, referring to a hypothetical think tanker or academic whose work would be funded by Gulf donations. "But at one level there is a kind of silencing effect. It's more about what doesn't get written about."

The expert, like others, described an unspoken effect whereby scholars, who are naturally aware of their funders' sensitivities, might think twice before writing critically on those issues.

"'I could write about Saudi sectarianism, but then I might lose some money,'" the expert said, explaining the thoughts a Gulf-funded scholar might have. "'I could write about UAE human rights abuses, but, you know, there are abuses everywhere, and there are a million other things I can write about.'"

"It's probably not going to affect how the analysis is done, but there may be some self-censoring on certain topics you don't raise unnecessarily, topics that are sensitive to the Saudis or others in the Gulf," another expert said.

Though American and Gulf interests have drifted further apart since 2011, Washington's pro-Gulf consensus has proven strangely resilient

This contributes, they said, to a practice in Washington whereby the bad behavior of other Middle East states — particularly US adversaries such as Iran — receive heavy attention and debate. But bad behavior by Gulf allies — human rights abuses, opposition to democracy movements, foreign policy actions that often undercut US interests — while far from ignored are discussed with less frequency and vigor.

Link here.

HRW: Saudi terrorism is killing people in Yemen

Doha, Qatar - The Executive Director of Human Rights Watch (HRW) has questioned Saudi Arabia's accusation of Qatar funding terrorism while the Kingdom itself continues to carry out "terrorism that is killing people in Yemen".

The conflict in Yemen has escalated dramatically since March 2015, when the Saudi-led forces launched a military operation against the rebels.

Since the conflict began, more than 10,000 people have been killed and millions have been driven from their homes.

"We don't talk about government terrorism such as the Saudi-led coalition that is killing people in Yemen," HRW's Kenneth Roth said at the Freedom of Expression, Facing up to the Threat conference in Qatar's capital Doha on Monday.

"I am not aware of Qatar financing terrorist groups, but I am aware of the long-term Saudi promotion of an extreme version of Islam that is often adopted by terrorist groups."

Link here.

Acceptable Losses - Aiding and abetting the Saudi slaughter in Yemen

By Andrew Cockburn

Just a few short years ago, Yemen was judged to be among the poorest countries in the world, ranking 154th out of the 187 nations on the U.N.’s Human Development Index. One in every five Yemenis went hungry. Almost one in three was unemployed. Every year, 40,000 children died before their fifth birthday, and experts predicted the country would soon run out of water.

Such was the dire condition of the country before Saudi Arabia unleashed a bombing campaign in March 2015, which has destroyed warehouses, factories, power plants, ports, hospitals, water tanks, gas stations, and bridges, along with miscellaneous targets ranging from donkey carts to wedding parties to archaeological monuments. Thousands of civilians — no one knows how many — have been killed or wounded. Along with the bombing, the Saudis have enforced a blockade, cutting off supplies of food, fuel, and medicine. A year and a half into the war, the health system has largely broken down, and much of the country is on the brink of starvation.

This rain of destruction was made possible by the material and moral support of the United States, which supplied most of the bombers, bombs, and missiles required for the aerial onslaught. (Admittedly, the United Kingdom, France, and other NATO arms exporters eagerly did their bit.) U.S. Navy ships aided the blockade. But no one that I talked to in Washington suggested that the war was in any way necessary to our national security. The best answer I got came from Ted Lieu, a Democratic congressman from California who has been one of the few public officials to speak out about the devastation we were enabling far away. “Honestly,” he told me, “I think it’s because Saudi Arabia asked.”

Link here.

The Untold Story Behind Saudi Arabia’s 41-Year U.S. Debt Secret

But Simon, better than anyone else, understood the appeal of U.S. government debt and how to sell the Saudis on the idea that America was the safest place to park their petrodollars. With that knowledge, the administration hatched an unprecedented do-or-die plan that would come to influence just about every aspect of U.S.-Saudi relations over the next four decades (Simon died in 2000 at the age of 72).

The basic framework was strikingly simple. The U.S. would buy oil from Saudi Arabia and provide the kingdom military aid and equipment. In return, the Saudis would plow billions of their petrodollar revenue back into Treasuries and finance America’s spending.

Link here.

Saudi Arabia Uncovered, by ITV, the UK

Story link here.

The Saudis get good return on their dollars spent in the US

Eleven Months of the Appalling War on Yemen

"Since the Saudis and their allies started pummeling Yemen with indiscriminate bombing and the use of inherently indiscriminate cluster munitions last March, the U.S. has been reliably backing the Saudis in this unnecessary and indefensible war with weapons, refueling, and intelligence. The U.S. has helped the Saudis to whitewash and obscure their crimes, and the Obama administration has done this despite credible reports from multiple human rights organizations and the U.N. that the Saudi-led coalition is likely guilty of war crimes and possibly even crimes against humanity. It isn’t just Yemenis who can see no moral or legal justification for what has been done to their country, for there is no justification for it to be found. The U.S. should immediately halt its deplorable support for this war and apply whatever pressure it can to get the Saudis and their allies to stop the intervention."
Link here.

The US Role in Sustaining Islamic Terrorists

LETTER FROM WASHINGTON — From the January 2016 issue
A Special Relationship
The United States is teaming up with Al Qaeda, again

By Andrew Cockburn

"Even as we have continued our desultory bombing campaign against the Islamic State, Ahrar al-Sham and Nusra are creeping closer and closer to international respectability. A month after the London Eleven meeting, a group of scholars from the Brookings Institution published an op-ed making the case for Ahrar al-Sham: 'Designating [the] group as a terrorist organization might backfire by pushing it completely into Al Qaeda’s camp.' (The think tank’s recent receipt of a multiyear, $15 million grant from Qatar was doubtless coincidental.)

Over the past year, other distinguished figures have voiced support for a closer relationship with Al Qaeda’s rebranded extensions. David Petraeus, another former head of the CIA, has argued for arming at least the 'more moderate' parts of Nusra. Robert Ford, a former ambassador to Syria and a vociferous supporter of the rebel cause, called on America to 'open channels for dialogue' with Ahrar al-Sham, even if its members had on occasion slaughtered some Alawites and desecrated Christian sites. Even Foreign Affairs, an Establishment sounding board, has echoed these notions, suggesting that it was time for the United States to 'rethink its policy toward al-Qaeda, particularly its targeting of Zawahiri.'”

Link here.

Saudi Arabia's Wahhabists are walking assholes

The West’s Alliance With Saudi Arabia Fuels Islamism

"The spread of extremist Islamist ideology is then as much a result of Western foreign policy as of Saudi machinations. Western and Gulf support for the rebels in Syria followed a similar path as the one observed in Afghanistan, before ISIS started to turn against the West and the Gulf states. But it is no coincidence that ISIS is adopting Saudi religious textbooks in its schools, killing Shia in Saudi Arabia just like the early Wahhabi zealots wanted to, and generally garnering much support on a popular level in the kingdom."

Link here.

Saudi Arabia - another great US ally

More scum that we associate with ... and they own Hillary.

Crimeand punishment: Islamic State vs Saudi Arabia 

Inside Saudi Arabia’s Campaign to Charm AmericanPolicymakers and Journalists