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Israel pitched to India this weekend its idea of a new transportation corridor in the Middle East bypassing the most critical oil chokepoint in the world which is very close to Iran, the Strait of Hormuz. During the Mediterranean Dialogues conference in Rome on Saturday, Israel’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of Intelligence, Israel Katz, met with India’s Minister of External Affairs, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, to discuss bilateral trade and presented Israel’s “Tracks for Regional Peace” initiative.

Despite the buildup of U.S. military presence in the Persian Gulf, Iran may “attack again,” the chief of the U.S. Central Command, General Kenneth McKenzie told Foreign Policy in an interview. “I think the strike on Saudi Aramco in September is pretty indicative of a nation that is behaving irresponsibly,” Gen. McKenzie said. “My judgment is that it is very possible they will attack again.”

Saudi Arabia's Google talks prove Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman is the most powerful leader in the Middle East Google and Amazon are reportedly in advanced talks with Saudi Arabia to build a tech hub in that country. This is the result of seven months of swift reforms in Saudi Arabia that began under Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman. It's not only proof that bin Salman's reforms have worked, but also that he is now the most powerful man in the entire Middle East. Jake Novak | @jakejakeny Published 4:09 PM ET Thu, 1 Feb 2018 Updated 5:14 PM ET...

Saudis Are Hoping Mohammed bin Salman Will Drain the Swamp A road trip among ordinary Saudis revealed high hopes, and hardly any worries, about the country's new political era. BY STEVEN A. COOK | NOVEMBER 21, 2017, 12:46 PM We must be doing 80 miles per hour on a rutted road outside the northwestern Saudi town of Ula. It is late and I am tired, but I’ve got one eye on the road and one eye on the dashboard indicator light signaling that the Chevy Tahoe in which I am traveling has low tire pressure. What would happen if this...

The Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia issued a ruling forbidding war against the Jews and proclaiming that Hamas is a terror group. The Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia, Abdulaziz Al Sheikh, issued a surprising religious ruling, saying that fighting against Israel was inappropriate and that Hamas is a “terror organization.” The Muslim cleric issued the ruling while answering a question on a television program regarding the Palestinian riots surrounding the Temple Mount in July, Turkey’s Anadolu news agency reported. Israel’s Communications Minister Ayoub Kara welcomed the unexpected decision and invited the Mufti to visit Israel.

No American or European on the face of this earth could force a Palestinian leader to sign a peace treaty with Israel that would be rejected by an overwhelming majority of his people. Trump's "ultimate solution" may result in some Arab countries signing peace treaties with Israel. These countries anyway have no real conflict with Israel. Why should there not be peace between Israel and Kuwait? Why should there not be peace between Israel and Oman? Do any of the Arab countries have a territorial dispute with Israel? The only "problem" the Arab countries have with Israel is the...

From TOI: Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas traveled to Saudi Arabia unexpectedly on Monday to meet with King Salman and Crown Prince Muhammed Bin Salman, with the Gulf kingdom at the height of a major crackdown on members of the royal family. Abbas had been in Egypt, where he was scheduled to meet with Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, when he was summoned to Riyadh to meet with the Saudi rulers, according to the official PA news site Wafa. The timing is very curious, as this sudden invitation came at the same time of the current upheaval in Saudi Arabia...

A couple of years ago I attended seminars with Chinese and Israeli counterterrorism experts in Beijing, in my capacity as a board member of a foundation that promotes Sino-Israel relations. A senior Chinese official complained that the Saudi royal family funds every radical madrassa in Xinjiang province, where Muslim Uyghurs of Turkish ethnicity form the majority. With a long and porous border stretching through sparsely-populated lands, Chinese security couldn’t prevent the funds from pouring in. I asked our Chinese hosts why they didn’t remonstrate with the Saudi government. The Chinese official said, “We talk to the Saudis all the time,...

King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud on Saturday named Crown Prince Mohammed head of a corruption “supreme committee” in addition to a council that oversees Saudi Aramco, which in the past had been governed largely by technocrats. Salman said the move was because of “what we have noticed of exploitation by some of the weak souls who have put their own interests above the public interest, to, illicitly, accrue money.” Ibrahim Al-Assaf, a former finance minister and current director of Saudi Aramco, was among at least 17 princes, current and former government ministers and business executives taken into custody, according...

Abdulrahman Al-Wuhaib, senior vice president, said in the Wednesday statement that.. Saudi Aramco will assumes Sole Ownership America's largest refinery. The Port Arthur Texas Complex includes 26 distribution terminals, and hold an exclusive license to use the Shell brand for gasoline and diesel sales in Texas, most of the Mississippi Valley, the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic markets. //Snipp// Jeff Eggemeyer ... The largest refinery in our country, being in sole ownership of the Saudi government, ... You need only look at the current "free market" strategy (mutilating currency reserves to destroy corporate and NOCC competitors) being employed by the Sauds, and...

Royal Dutch Shell and Saudi Aramco appear to be getting a divorce, breaking up their joint venture in U.S.-based refining assets. The two companies joined together to create Motiva Enterprises LLC in 1998, a 50-50 joint venture that operated three refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast. But Shell and Saudi Aramco have seen their interests head in different directions. "It is now time for the partners to pursue their independent downstream goals," said Abdulrahman Al-Wuhaib, a senior vice president of Saudi Aramco’s downstream unit. Reuters reported that the relationship started to fray after Motiva announced a $10 billion expansion of...

The chairman of Saudi Arabia's state oil giant said on Monday that plans for a possible initial public offering are not being driven by a need for cash amid a global slump in oil prices, but instead signal a desire for greater openness to outside investors. Speaking at an investment conference in the Saudi capital of Riyadh, Khalid al-Falih said the potential listing of the world's largest oil producer "is not for cash" but a "sign of the times" that the kingdom is open for business. "If we do it, the percentage will not be such that it's going to...

Saudi Arabia is poised to break records for oil production this summer, analysts said, as domestic-energy needs soar during its scorching summer and the holy month of Ramadan and threaten its ability to ramp up exports. Saudi Arabia has said it produced a near-record 10.3 million barrels a day in May, a mark that industry observers said could increase to 11 million barrels this summer as air-conditioning use increases with temperatures reaching 110 degrees Fahrenheit. The country has the ability to produce 12.3 million barrels a day for 90 days, but it has never pumped this much. Saudi output averaged...

State oil giant Saudi Aramco has suspended plans to build a US$2 billion clean fuels plant at its largest oil refinery in Ras Tanura, three industry sources said. The energy project appears to be one of the first suspended in Saudi Arabia in response to the halving of the oil price in the last six months. The Ras Tanura clean fuels project, including a naphtha hydrotreater, was to be part of a second phase of upgrades to Aramco’s refineries, and was originally due to go on stream in 2016. “They withdrew the bidding,” said one source familiar with the matter,...

A Saudi Arabian accused of associating with several of the September 11 hijackers and who disappeared from his home in the United States a few weeks before the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, is in London working for his country’s state oil company. Abdulaziz al-Hijji and his wife Anoud left three cars at their luxurious home in a gated community in Sarasota, Florida — one of them new — and flew to Saudi Arabia in August 2001. The refrigerator was full of food; furniture and clothing were left behind; and the swimming pool water was still...

The 1991 spill into the Persian Gulf, which began on January 21, was purposely caused by the Iraqis in order to delay or prevent a threatened US-led invasion of Kuwait, including possible landings by US Marines. On February 23, American forces, including the 1st Marine Division, 2nd Marine Division, the 1st Light Armored Infantry, overran Iraqi defenses quickly, but expressed shock at the extent of the environmental disaster surrounding them. The US lost 148 service members in combat, 458 were wounded in the First Gulf War which lasted from August 2, 1990, to February 28, 1991, when America and its...

Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil exporter, is expected to cut the number of oil rigs by as much as 20% until year-end amid lower crude output, people familiar with the situation said. Last year, Saudi Arabian Oil Co., or Saudi Aramco, the state-run oil company, had about 130 offshore and onshore rigs in operation at peak times, a number that is set to fall by up to a fifth throughout 2009, the people said. "They haven't announced any specifics but they are saying there will be a reduction in the number of rigs by 20%," one Gulf-based oil industry...

To engineer a huge expansion in the chemicals business, the oil giant has put a woman in charge Nabilah Al-Tunisi was wrapping up an executive M.B.A. at Stanford University two summers ago when she got an urgent call from Saudi Aramco headquarters in Dhahran. Pack your bags, she was told, and move to Houston. Al-Tunisi had just been put in charge of the engineering on a new $25 billion refinery and petrochemicals plant--the Ras Tanura Integrated Project. Ras Tanura, a tiny finger in the Persian Gulf, already has a 550,000-barrel-per-day refinery, Aramco's biggest. Under a joint venture with Dow Chemical...

Detention transformed doctor into man of peace Saudi carries no bitterness home as he ends San Antonio stay 05/25/2002 By DAVID McLEMORE / The Dallas Morning News SAN ANTONIO - Dr. Al-Badr Al-Hazmi sits easily on the carpeted floor of the mosque. He speaks with a soft intensity, the words spilling out as he describes the day his life was turned upside down. Stony-faced FBI agents whisked him from his San Antonio home a day after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He was flown to New York and secreted in a detention cell for nearly two weeks. Like hundreds...

Leading players in the petroleum industry, including Saudi Arabia and Exxon Mobil Corp., are aggressively arguing that plenty of crude oil remains for world consumption, in an effort to counter critics who contend crude output is about to plateau. That argument, known as peak-oil theory, has provided intellectual backing for the boom in crude prices and sowed doubts among some policy makers about crude's long-term reliability as an energy source. Such doubts, coupled with concern over sky-high prices, have added impetus to the search for oil substitutes -- including in Washington, where President Bush this year declared the U.S. "addicted...