The Saudi Pattern of Deception

Families of the victims of the 9/11 attacks are trying to sue the government of Saudi Arabia, the country from which 15 of the 19 hijackers came from. The legal team has new documents outlining the Saudis’ history of bankrolling terrorism and extremism, helping to expose the pattern of deception used by the Saudis to portray themselves as a staunch ally of the United States.

The legal team, for example, has a sworn statement from someone in Afghanistan who says he personally saw a representative of Turki al-Faisal, the former head of Saudi intelligence, give a check for $267 million to a top Taliban official in 1998. Treasury Department documents were obtained that showed that the International Islamic Relief Organization, a charity described by The New York Times as “heavily supported by members of the Saudi royal family” was being used to support terrorists at least into 2006.

In October 2002, the Council on Foreign Relations released a report concluding that the country had served as a primary source of funding for Al-Qaeda. “It is worth stating clearly and unambiguously what official U.S. government spokespersons have not. For years, individuals and charities in Saudi Arabia have been the most importance source of funds for al Qaeda, and for years the Saudi officials have turned a blind eye to this problem,” it said.

Despite being an avowed enemy of Al-Qaeda, it cannot be denied that major elements of the Saudi government have acted to support the terrorist organization and radical Islam as a whole.

Saudi Arabia has also played an important role in the rise of other terrorist groups, including Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group that carried out the December 2008 Mumbai attacks and has links to Al-Qaeda. Muhammad Saeed, the leader of the group, went to Saudi Arabia in 2005 to help organize the transit of LET members to Iraq and Europe. The group’s chief financier until 2003, Mahmoud Mohammed Ahmad Ba’aziq, “coordinated fundraising activity with non-governmental charities and businessmen in Saudi Arabia.” It is also known that at least one LET school in Pakistan was built in 2005 with Saudi financing. The Taliban militants are also relying on donors in the Gulf for financing.

The Saudi have also tried to hail their “terrorist rehabilitation program” as a nearly infallible counter-terrorism program, using it to cement their status as a full-fledged partner in the War on Terror. As part of their public relations campaign, Saudi officials boasted that not a single graduate of the program had returned to a life of terrorism. Now we know of many relapsed patients of the Saudis, including at least 14 of those on their published list of most wanted terrorists. It is theoretically possible that the Saudis suddenly found out about these cases before writing up the list, but their other acts of deceit should cast doubt on the credibility of that excuse.

American organizations have also had a long battle with the Saudis’ repeated claims that they have reformed their school’s textbooks and cleansed them of extremism. In 2006, the Saudis announced they had removed such passages, only to be debunked by Freedom House. This resulted in a similar pledge to revise the books, and again, such material remained according to a 2008 study by the Hudson Institute.

Similar deception was practiced in denying the importance of Saudi Arabia to the insurgents in Iraq. “There isn’t any organized terror finance, and we will not permit any such unorganized acts,” said a spokesperson for the Interior Ministry in December 2006. The statement came in reaction to the conclusion of the Iraq Survey Group that “funding for the Sunni insurgency comes from private individuals within Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states,” which also accused the Kingdom of being “passive and disengaged.” The denial is hard to believe, considering the fact that the majority of suicide bombings in Iraq have been carried out by Saudis, and about 40 percent of the foreign fighters were Saudi.

The Associated Press further debunked the Saudi Interior Ministry’s statement. The newspaper interviewed two Iraqi officials who confirmed the significance of Saudi money in bankrolling the insurgents, which included a $25 million payment to an Iraqi cleric who then used the money to buy Russian shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles called Strelas. Truck drivers were also found who admitted carrying boxes of cash from the Kingdom into Iraq for the insurgents.

In a country without any freedom to speak of, it is impossible for such a well-organized effort to support the insurgency to exist without significant elements of the government knowing about it.

The website of the Saudi embassy brags about the reforms that have taken place, the officials and Muslim leaders who have denounced terrorism, and how Saudi Arabia has played an important role in tackling Al-Qaeda. While it is true that the Saudis have taken action against Al-Qaeda, particularly since the 2003 attacks in Riyadh, the War on Terror goes beyond that one organization. Saudi financing continues to reach Muslim Brotherhood fronts and other extremists and the country remains a strict Islamic state based on radical Sharia Law.

Saudi Arabia has made some improvements, however. King Abdullah is placing more liberal-minded government officials in power by firing the heads of the religious police and top religious court, the latter of which issued fatwas allowing things like the murder of those helping to make “immoral” television shows. The government has also arrested a prominent cleric who issued a fatwa saying attacks on Israelis were justified during the Gaza offensive.

While some encouraging reforms have been made, Saudi Arabia still has a long way to go to be considered a true ally in the war against radical Islam.

Make NO MISTAKE about it. The Saudis are our enemy. And as long as we buy their oil, we bankroll them.

You fellows seem to think that "SAUDI," actually means something, like "Belgian," or the "The French." It most emphatically does not. The Saudis we are discussing are more like an huge inbred crime family; A medieval crime family, The House of Saud, which was a bandit gang of very minor desert royalty until WWI.

There is the King, there are about 3500 Princes of the Blood and their families and advisors. Each controls some aspect of the country and the economy. Think Prohibition Chicago or the street-by-street drug trade in any major American city. A key difference: each of these Princes of the Blood is a multi-millionaire to a differing agree. In addition to controlling some aspect of the economy (e.g., there is a MacDonald's Prince, a Burger King Prince, a Chevrolet car Prince, a Caterpiller Prince, etc right down to candy-bars and mouthwash. A specific Prince gets a cut from every specific item sold in the Kingdom. On top of this, Princes of the Blood will also typically have a government job, ranging from no-shows to the top ministeries and directorates. The various Royal councils decide how much of a cut of the oil money each Prince of the Blood gets, ranging from astronomical sums down to a mere $5-6 million.

"But wait," as the late Billy Mays used to say, "There's more." Below Princes of the Blood and their immediate families, advisors, ministerial employees, and tribal connections, there are just plain Princes ... as the King,and all the Princes of the Blood like any other good rich Muslim chaps, have 4 wives at a time, a harem, and untold concubines. These are last two categories turn out royal bastards on an assembly line basis. These Princes also have their families, on both sides of the blanket, their advisors, and their retainers.

Each of THEM gets a cut of the oil money, plus a government job. Of course, there are millions of Saudis, (about 20 million at last unreliable count) who have no direct royal connection. However, through tribal connections, they belong to some prince or other, through whom they receive food. clothing, shelter, transportation, medical care, and substantial cash allowances.

The whole shooting match is powered by guest workers (probably about 5 million) and an increasing number of Saudis who actually show up at some commercial enterprise or other. Most however, spend their day shopping, driving from one fast food franchise to another and going to the mosque at the muezzin's call.

Saudis (like many ME Muslims) are also pathologically inbred. There are many marriages between 1st and 2d cousins, and most marriages are consanguineous, with a horrible rate of birth defects to show for it. Typical case in point, Osama bin Ladin, one of 75 children and father of some 80 more, he is abnormally tall, cross-eyed, deaf, with faulty kidneys, and mad as a hatter. All in all, a fairly typical Saudi (Dad was Yemeni, who have similar customs). In Riyadh, Kidney Dialysis Units are much more common than barber shops.

With all these billions floating around and not necessarily connected to functioning brains, the support for jihad from KSA is, as you note, huge, and each family has its own clerical attachment. The imams compete for followers by offering rewards for jihad and vying for the most devilish punishment for the infidels. They also raise sums that would make any American televangelist go green with envy.

Now for the good news: Many of the more powerful Princes of the Blood are pro-American ... maybe even most! The smarter among this ruling class realize that Islam could upset their very well stocked apple carts. The Saudi government, therefore, such as it is, keeps the oil flowing, and is on the whole, officially friendly.

As red-blooded American boys with pure hearts and stout limbs, our first tendency might be to clean this rat's nest out of the oil barn and install some progressive right-thinking YMCA Member and modern government with liberty and justice for all.

Fuggedaboutit. Whatever follows in Saudi Arabia is just naturally bound to be much worse for us than the seething medieval Soprano family we are dealing with now, who are at least capable of keeping the oil flowing and do not always follow OPEC..OTOH, while that's going on, another set of Princes might well be bankrolling mad-dog clerics, suicide bombers, buying bullets for al-qaida, HAMAS, and the Taleban, and sending 20 or 30 of their more energetic sons off to fight in Kosovo and Chechnya ....

Welcome to the Middle East, lands of the Religion of Peace, O unworthy infidel..

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