[fella]

Israel has the water technology that they need to run a city like that.

[Artemis Webb]

As much as I’d love this to be true I can’t imagine that it is. The internal insurrection would be too great. A coup might even be possible (probable). Better for the House of Saud to continue walking the political tightrope they’ve walked for decades.

[Pontiac]

Quite clearly, as analyzed in the author’s earlier piece this month about Saudi Arabia’s shifting grand strategy, a “deep state” conflict is indeed being fought in the country between its monarchic and clerical factions, with the former poised to carry out a “soft coup” against the latter as it seeks to “modernize” the country.

I believe he has this backward.

It would be the clerical state carrying out the coup on the monarchy not the other way around.

And I would bet my paycheck that it will happen if the prince actually tries to modernize Saudi Arabia. And I don’t think it would be ‘soft’.

[faithhopecharity]

Eventually Saudi Arabia needs to establish proper relations with Israel. Neon city project or not. Saudi hurts itself tremendously with all it’s hate preaching, building of mosques to preach more and more hate inside European countries and USA, and of course all the lost opportunities these aggressive activities cause. The prince seems to realize some of this. I think he should be able to overcome the Islamic hate-preachers by quoting directly from their own Koran —� which, while it has over 100 anti- Christian and anti- jewish verses, also has their Alluh instructing then that he has given Israel to the Jewish people. That should suffice nicely to at least establish normal proper relations with Jerusalem - someone within Islam like the prince needs to be quoting their Koran on this subject instead of just little old me 🤠🤠🤠

[Gen.Blather]

“Seeing as how Mohammed Bin Salman is trying to purge the clerics’ political influence from the Kingdom, it’s very possible that Saudi Arabia will end up recognizing Israel in the near future and blaming its decades-long delay in doing so on the Wahhabis”

Several issues here. My understanding is that the Saudi government has all the clerics on its public parole. That should give them a lot of power. The real problem for the royals, though, is the requirement in the Quran that if somebody considers themselves to be “religious” they must kill anybody who is trying to change the religion. Recognizing Israel would qualify as, at the very least, flying against tradition. The royals might face assassination or even revolution. Throw in Iranian meddling in internal politics, a costly and unpopular war in Yemen and Saudi Arabia may be in for a bumpy twenty-first century.

[WatchungEagle]

This is going to go over well on the Saudi street.

[rrrod]

Trump doctrine is working

[marron]

The half-a-trillion-dollar initiative to build a tristate city at the Saudi, Egyptian, and Jordanian border in the Gulf of Aqaba will more than likely lead to Riyadh recognizing Israel and integrating Tel Aviv into the project.

Now I'm interested.

[Gay State Conservative]

Saudi Arabia recognizing Israel? No telling *what* might happen (good or bad).

[2ndDivisionVet]

Ping!

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks 2ndDivisionVet.

Tel Aviv keenly knows that the Chinese are always looking for backup plans and transport route diversification in order to not be too dependent on any single connectivity corridor, and in this case, overland rail transit from the Gulf of Aqaba to the Eastern Mediterranean via Israel comes off as exceedingly attractive to Beijing's strategists. Furthermore, China has fantastic relations with both Saudi Arabia and Israel, so from Beijing's perspective, this is the perfect Mideast "win-win", especially if the People's Republic can find a way to insinuate that its possible financing of both the NEOM and "Red-Med" projects contributed to bringing peace to the Mideast.

• Zumwalt: Islam's Link to Terrorism: Saudis Recognize It, but We Won't
• Iraqi Kurds feel 'abandoned' by the U.S. as Israel offers support
• [Obama's Islamofascists] NASA [Kenya] to swear in Raila Odinga if UhuRuto are declared winners

[Berosus]

What the article doesn’t mention is that Israel already has a port, Eilat, between Egypt and Jordan on the Gulf of Aqaba.

[Cronos]

MBS is making a number of mistakes:

1. Saudi Arabia is an empire of the Saud family tied in with the al-Wahhab family and Wahabbi clerics
2. It is based on 3 pillars:
   1. a strict religious tie in in the state wious police etc
   2. tacit agreement to spread Wahabbism, leading to the rise of Al Waeda, the Taliban, Abu SAyyaff, Al Shabab, Boko Haram
   3. Money payouts to the people to keep them happy -- no need to work, low cost for petrol, free handouts
3. MBS is destroying 1 and 2 and he is running out of money for 3

Tying up with Israel will cause the Palestinians, Turks and other Sunnis to attack the Al Saud family, leading to the collapse of the Saudi Empire

The Iranians will be extremely happy with this. They get the Saudis to collapse. That's the only reason they were "anti-Israel" -- Hamas are Sunni and hate Shia