More evidence of Saudi doubletalk?

More evidence of Saudi doubletalk?
Judge caught on tape encouraging Saudis to fight in Iraq

By Lisa Myers & the NBC Investigative Unit
Updated: 7:28 p.m. ET April 26, 2005

WASHINGTON - Sheik Saleh Al Luhaidan, seen in video seated to the right of the crown prince, is chief justice of Saudi Arabia's Supreme Judicial Council. His sermons and words carry great significance.

In an audiotape secretly recorded at a government mosque last October and obtained by NBC News, Luhaidan encourages young Saudis to go to Iraq to wage war against Americans.

"If someone knows that he is capable of entering Iraq in order to join the fight, and if his intention is to raise up the word of God, then he is free to do so," says Luhaidan in Arabic on the tape.

He warns Iraq is risky because "evil satellites and drone aircraft" watch the borders. But he says going is religiously permissible.

"The lawfulness of his action is in fighting an enemy who is fighting Muslims and came for war," says Luhaidan.

"It seems to me that it's the Saudis who are doing the antagonizing, but that's just me."

Or we could just turn the Saudis into enemies and then see the floodgates open to Saudi support for terrorists in Iraq and elsewhere. Or we can cultivate them and try to keep them under control.

As for the Crown Prince sitting next to the guy, do we know that this judge wasn't later called on the carpet for his comments? I bet MSNBC-DNC wouldn't bother to report that if it did happen.

I just think we need to see the media's incessant drum beating against the Saudis for what it is: an anti-oil, environmental fanaticism driven agenda. The leftists in the media hate the Saudis because they supply us with their biggest bugaboo, oil. Oil is the worst substance on the planet to these nutcases and to them the Saudis represent the suppliers of "the West's oil addiction" and the overall conspiracy of "Big Oil" to steal our money and pollute our air. And of course since they think they can connect Bush to the Saudis, all the more reason to bash the Saudis.

Yes the Saudis are due some criticism, but they're also due some credit for the strides they've made in combatting terrorism. Al Qaeda is on the ropes in no small measure because of the hurt the Saudis have finally put on them. Am I saying they're above reproach? No. But which of our allies are? At the same time I'm not willing to adopt this media-driven hate the Saudis-frenzy. We rely on them for far too much both in terms of national security and economic interests for me to feel we can afford to stick a boot up their backsides. We'll come out on the short-end of that deal. Don't give in to fashionable media driven "Boogeyman of the Month" demonization campaigns. See the far-left agenda that's behind that.

Or we could just turn the Saudis into enemies and then see the floodgates open to Saudi support for terrorists in Iraq and elsewhere.

Hel-lo... They're already our enemies. That's why they backed Al Qaeda terrorists.

Cultivate the friendship of a muslim extremist? Good luck.

As for the Crown Prince sitting next to the guy, do we know that this judge wasn't later called on the carpet for his comments?

Do we know he wasn't speaking for the Crown Prince?

The leftists in the media hate the Saudis because they supply us with their biggest bugaboo, oil.

The rightists love the Saudis for the very same reason and as a result ignore their hatred of all things USA.

Yes the Saudis are due some criticism, but they're also due some credit for the strides they've made in combatting terrorism.

LOL! Yeah, after their 'homies' killed thousands of US citizens. Some courage.

The situation in Saudi Arabia has been created by the Saudi's themselves - including the public advancement of people like Osama Bin Laden. The ruling family uses the Wahabi clerics and the Wahabi clerics use the ruling family. Both are morally, religiously and politically corrupt. The Wahabi clerics have no moral support from any other Muslims, including other Sunnis. Thus, they get billions from the ruling family to promote Wahabi schools for undeducated Muslim boys all over the middle east and Wahabi Mosques in the west. That is their price for supporting the ruling family. The ruling family extracts only one price from the Wahabi clerics. Their teachings cannot challenge the ruling family. Osama had to leave Saudi Arabia not because he ofended the Wahabi clerics, but because he broke the alliance between those clerics and the ruling family - if they supported him, they would have had to fight the ruling family; they were not then ready to do that.

It is a devils-pact that we should no longer support.

The U.S. is better positioned than any other country in the world to adapt and adjust to changes that would result from a disruption in the flow of oil from Saudi Arabia - better positioned than either China, India or Europe. Would those dispruptions equal or exceed the 1970s oil "embargoes"? Possibly, but we survived them and within a decade the adjustments had been absorbed into the economy and the Opec-cartel began to weaken. Fear of oil disruption should not stop us from changing our relationship with the Saudis. We will adjust and survive and excel, that's what Americans do.

We should directly, and publicly confront every Saudi statement and action, in and out of Saudi Arabia, that promotes, defends or helps educate new generations of west-hating young recruits for terrorism.

Saudi clerics and funds freely promote insurgent activities in Iraq, ex-Taliban terrorists in Afghanistan, Palestinian terrorists, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, fundamentalist, west-hating Muslim groups in all of Africa, west-hating Muslim Imams and Mosques in Europe and North America. They will willingly take back a Saudi captured in the West, but they never turn over to the west a known terrorist they capture and the west is never allowed unrestricted access to those they do capture. Saudi cooperation with the west, with respect to terrorism, is directed to defending the Saudi ruling family, not the west.

We should push Saudi Arabia into the hands of its own terrorists by publicly opposing many of their policies and forcing them to defend those policies and oppose us or lose the support of the clerics. If we keep uping the demands for moderation and ending their export of terrorism, then anything short of military confrontation with us will be seen, by the Wahabis, as weak and lead, in time, to a break between the ruling family and the clerics. The ruling family could only win the resulting civil war by abandoning its alliance with the Wahabi's and destroying them in the opening phase of that war. It will be long and bloody. If the terrorists and the Wahabis can be defeated in Saudi Arabia, then with the right external influences (covert) the winners could be the most moderate forces left in the ruling family. If the terrorists and the Wahabis were to win that civil war, then we can extinquish the Saudi oil wells, permanently.

By the time that civil war was over, we would have already made most of the technological and economic adjustments needed to rely less on the Saudi oil.

We cannot set back the promotion of Muslim extremism, and terrorism, if we cannot set back it's primary financial sponsor - Wahabi/Saudi Arabia. The school, Mosque, foundation funding method is simply a mask the Wahabis use for a program that is, at its heart, no different than the terrorists in its goals.

Let's end that program in the west and take the full consequences of doing so now, on our terms; not later, on their terms.

"It seems to me that it's the Saudis who are doing the antagonizing, but that's just me."

Please show me some proof that the Saudi government in any way supported or help plan the 9-11 attacks. Because the hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, that implicates ALL Saudis and all Saudi citizens?? That means EVERYONE in the country and government there hates all things US as you so hysterically put it? If they all hated us, Iraq would be in far worse shape than it is and US casualties far more than 1600 KIA.

I guess by your reasoning the government of New York State and the people of New York State should all be suspect because terrorist Tim McVeigh was from there. I support all people in the South should be considered suspect because some few belong to race hate groups and lend support to such groups. Sorry, this broadbrushing isn't going to fly. You're a victim of leftist media brainwashing.

"The 9/11 Commission Report, though it does not mention Khalid bin Mahfouz by name, refers to the “Golden Chain,” a “financial support network . . . put together mainly by financiers in Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf states,” which was responsible for Osama bin Laden’s “strong financial position in Afghanistan” from 1996 to 1998."

Says nothing about the Saudi regime being responsible for financing. If a government is to be held responsible for the indecent acts of their citizens, then I guess we better indict every US president from W. Bush back. This is the problem with the anti-Saudi propaganda. It seeks in no way to distinguish the acts of individual Saudis from the Saudi government's actions and positions.

As I said, do I think the Saudi regime above reproach? Of course not. I think their treatment of women and Christians is quite unconscienable. But do I think they can be changed by turning them into enemies? Absolutely not. We stand much more of a chance of changing them through engagment than through creating an adversarial relationship. Indeed, we've already seen positive changes such as a brutal crack down on Al Qaeda in the last 2 years where they have put more Al Qaeda out of commission than EVERY OTHER NATION ON EARTH COMBINED, and put serious hurt on its financial support in Saudi Arabia, something that to me trumps their pre 9-11 permissiveness about such activities. Additionally we've seen recent municipal elections as well.

If we publically turn against the Saudi regime and undermine them entirely as another poster on this thread advocates, what comes next will be FAR WORSE for the US when Al Qaeda radicals are able to shoot their way into power there. And such a regime will NEVER be changed for the better no matter what we do. And we would have no military option for dealing with them since invading Saudi to overthrow a radical regime would mean inflaming Muslim anger throughout the world as US troops occupy the land of Islam's holiest sites.

You really need to stop being so short-sighted here and stop substituting emotion for thinking. Our only good options with the Saudis is to engage them, push for change and ally with them in crushing Al Qaeda both within Saudi Arabia and elsewhere. Like it or not, there is no good second option here. As I said, do I see them as angels and darlings? Absolutely not. But at the same time I do see the reality that we cannot wage a successful war on terror by cutting out the Saudi's regimes help and handing them over to Al Qaeda radicals.

Just like we had to maintain an uneasy relationship with Stalin to defeat the Third Reich, we have to maintain positive, if uneasy, relations with the Saudis to both keep our economy stable and to make strides in rolling up the Al Qaeda network. Think beyond your emotions.

The Saudis created the madrassas worldwide, they perpetuate wahabbiism, they do little other than to try to control their own overthrow by the people. And they are ungrateful for the reprieve we gave them after their countrymen killed our citizens and soldiers on 9/11. They've killed or captured more al-queda because their country was the base for al-queda operatives, so naturally, there are more terrorists milling around . As for oil, the sooner we wean ourselves off the saudi nipple, the better. Americans are ingenious and will work around the oil problem if the need arises. Oh, and $4.00 a gallon gas? Gas is already $2.20-$2.70 a gallon and climbing and the saudis and OPEC only act when it looks like we may get our oil from Russia or our own soil. With our billions in oil money they only pump up the monster of muslim extremism and the world becomes more unstable...

"As for oil, the sooner we wean ourselves off the saudi nipple, the better. Americans are ingenious and will work around the oil problem if the need arises. Oh, and $4.00 a gallon gas? Gas is already $2.20-$2.70 a gallon and climbing and the saudis and OPEC only act when it looks like we may get our oil from Russia or our own soil. With our billions in oil money they only pump up the monster of muslim extremism and the world becomes more unstable..."

One problem...Russia's oil infrastructure, especially its ports, are so inadequate for oil export it would take YEARS to build it up sufficiently that it could replace the Saudi supplies. Right now Russia cannot meet our oil needs or even replace the amount of oil we get from the Middle East simply because we cannot now get it out of Russia. And so far the oil companies just really aren't investing a whole lot to build up Russia's export facilities. Does that need to happen? ABSOLUTELY. I would like for nothing more than to kiss off the Middle East permanently. But this is not a short term solution.

Additionally, can we honestly say Russia hasn't been working against US interests too, possibly even more than the Saudis in some ways? Russia has helped the Iranian nuclear program and is supplying missiles to Syria and upgrading their military.

Look, I don't like what the Saudis did in the past but they have worked to correct it and the unholy non-aggression pact they had with Al Qaeda pre-911 is now off and has been for at least 2 years now. They have worked aggressively to roll up Al Qaeda in the Saudi Kingdom and that helps us immensely in our war on terror.

We cannot underestimate the value of having a Saudi government now actively engaged against Al Qaeda. Do I like their past behaviors? Of course not. But we cannot pretend we don't need them to win this war anymore than we could think we could have won World War II without Stalin. We have to put emotionalism aside here and realize that the intracies of security and foreign policy don't allow for us to cut off our nose to spite our face by tossing aside allies who may not have always worked in our interests. The fact is the Saudis are now working in our interests much more than they ever have. Does more progress need to occur? Absolutely. But that won't happen by giving them the finger and walking away. Indeed, it could ensure a regime far worse than the one we have now, specifically one run by Al Qaeda, takes over there. Are YOU willing to put that kind of oil and wealth into the hands of Bin Laden by handing them Saudi Arabia?? I sure as hell am not. And do you think Bin Laden would like nothing better than to get a hold of that money to buy every kind of WMD he can get his hands on to strike us with? You bet. I think in fact that may be his number 1 goal, to get a hold of Saudi Arabia to provide himself with a never ending stream of wealth with which to attack us. You have to admit that would be an absolute nightmare scenario.

We have to keep the Saudi government working for us against Al Qaeda. And engaging them allows us to use them to our benefit. Stop acting like this is a one way relationship that only benefits the Saudis. And if you think we can just "work around" $4-$5 a gallon gas, think again. Our economy would absolutely tank for years and years to come, with the airlines going bankrupt, shipping costs for EVERYTHING going through the roof adding severe inflation to food and consumer goods putting many millions more unemployed. That would be a disaster. I'm not willing to see that happen just to make ourselves feel good because we thumbed our noses at an important ally. That accomplishes NOTHING.

I say to you what I say to any liberal: Form your opinions by THINKING, not FEELING. FEELING we need to kick the Saudis in the ass accomplishes NOTHING. We will only get them down the road of changing their behavior by ENGAGING THEM. We've brought them a hell of a long way already through engagement. Let's not stop now just because it feels good, or just because the agendized left-wing US media convinces us the Saudis are pure evil.

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