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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — France’s defense minister criticized the U.S. on Saturday over what she described as “unanswered” attacks in recent months threatening the Persian Gulf, warning that the decades-long American deterrence in the oil-rich region appeared to be losing its power. Florence Parly separately said France “deplored” both U.S. President Donald Trump’s unilateral withdrawal of America from Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers that led to the re-imposition of crushing sanctions, as well as Tehran recently breaking the deal’s enrichment, stockpile and centrifuge limits. While saying France would continue to talk to Iran, her speech before...

The oil giant released a valuation target ranging from $1.6 trillion to $1.7 trillion. The figures fall short of the $2 trillion target Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has been fixed on for more than two years. The difference in value illustrates the operational, geopolitical and governance risks that investors face betting on the offering, writes Ben Dummett. The IPO still has potential to be the world's biggest by surpassing the $25 billion Alibaba raised in 2014. But the stock listing is beginning to reveal a set of dueling interests for Saudi Arabia. Saudi leadership wants the stock offering...

CAIRO (REUTERS) - ARAB League Secretary General Ahmed Aboul Gheit on Saturday led Arab foreign ministers in lambasting Turkey's military operation in northeast Syria as an "invasion of an Arab state's land and an aggression on its sovereignty". Iraqi Foreign Minister Mohamed Ali Alhakim, president of the current Arab League session, also condemned Turkey's offensive into Syria during an emergency meeting of the body, called by Egypt. The offensive "will exacerbate humanitarian crises, increase the suffering of the Syrian people, and strengthen the ability of terrorists to reorganize their remnants," Alhakim said. Alhakim and Lebanon's Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil called...

Israel received surprising support from Bahrain’s Foreign Minister, who backed the Jewish state’s retaliatory strikes in Lebanon after the Hezbollah terror organization attacked IDF targets on Sunday, blaming Lebanon for the situation. The aggression of one state against another is prohibited by international law. A state standing by, watching battles taking place on its borders and putting its people in danger is a state that greatly neglects its responsibilities,” Minister Khalid bin Ahmed al-Khalifa tweeted. He further said that “it is unacceptable for Lebanon to be put in a situation of a possibility of a devastating war in which it has no...

U.S. President Donald J. Trump backed the United Kingdom after Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps seized a British-flagged tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, saying the Islamic Republic is in “big trouble”. “Iran is showing their true colours,” President Trump told reporters outside the White House, adding: “Iran is in big trouble.”The President’s relationship with British government ministers and prominent opposition politicians, such as hard-left Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and London mayor Sadiq Khan, has often been strained, as they have rushed to commentate negatively on his administration in hopes of winning the approval of left-liberal activists and media commentators.Nevertheless, the American leader’s attitude to his...

WASHINGTON (AP) — With Iranian military threats in mind, the United States is sending American forces, including fighter aircraft, air defense missiles and likely more than 500 troops, to a Saudi air base that became a hub of American air power in the Middle East in the 1990s but was abandoned by Washington after it toppled Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein in 2003. The Saudi Foreign Ministry announced the basing agreement Friday without mentioning details.

King Salman of Saudi Arabia has pulled off in Mecca what many had thought unlikely -- getting 20 or so disparate Arab nations to unite in a common position against Iran. ... In middle-of-night, back-to-back summits at Islam's holiest of sites, the aging but still-attentive Saudi monarch got a double endorsement of his claims that Iran is destabilizing the Middle East and a backing of his call for "the international community to shoulder its responsibility. The six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council and 21 Arab League nations present called for Iran to stop "interfering in the internal affairs" of its neighbors and...

Since taking office in 2017, President Donald Trump has achieved more for Israel and the Jewish people than any other president before him. Since 1948, the State of Israel has seen friendly presidents of the United States as well as unfriendly, but today Israel’s greatest friend sits in the White House. Since taking office in 2017, President Donald Trump has achieved more for Israel and the Jewish people than any other president before him, even rivaling Harry Truman, who voted in favor of and later recognized the Jewish state. The list of accomplishments President Trump and his administration have produced...

[GCC=Gulf Cooperation Council] Makkah: The GCC Summit in Makkah has condemned the recent sabotage operations, which targeted four tankers in UAE’s regional waters and drone attacks on Saudi oil facilities. The GCC leaders discussed the exceptional circumstances and dangerous challenges the region is undergoing following the recent attacks on the UAE and Saudi Arabia and their ramifications and direct threat to the regional security and peace, to freedom of global marine navigation and trade as well as to world oil markets as a result of attempts by some countries to undermine security and stability of the region, support terrorism and...

Just ahead of U.S. sanctions on Iran set to snap back on Monday targeting primarily the energy, shipbuilding, shipping, and banking sectors, Iran’s most prominent conservative cleric has announced that if oil exports are halted, Saudi tankers will be confiscated and Gulf countries attacked. Powerful Shia cleric Ayatollah Ahmad Alamolhoda is the Friday Prayer leader in Mashhad, considered Iran’s spiritual capital and among the holiest places in Shia Islam, and sits on the government’s “Assembly of Experts” but has no formal government role or decision-making ability. However, he’s a powerful leader and chief spiritual force behind Iran’s conservative faction who...

As Iran girds for possible war with the United States, President Trump may turn out to be the best friend it has. Despite the saber-rattling of senior aides and Trump’s own tweets, when push has come to shove over the past two years, the president has repeatedly backed away from the threatened use of military force. Whether the target has been North Korea, with which warnings of “fire and fury” have become little more than an exchange of “beautiful” letters between Trump and Kim Jong Un, or Venezuela, where the threat of “all options” has failed to upset the status...

President Donald Trump during a Saturday rally in Wisconsin described a phone call with the leader of Saudi Arabia in which he demanded more money from the oil-rich nation. “Look, Saudi Arabia, very rich country, we defend them, we subsidize Saudi Arabia. They have nothing but cash, right? We subsidize them. And they buy a lot from us, $450 billion they bought,” Trump began. “You know, You had people wanting to cut off Saudi Arabia. They bought $450 billion. I don’t want to lose ‘em! But the military, we subsidize Saudi Arabia!” “I called the King,” he continued. “I like...

Jeddah: Saudi Arabia’s King Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud called for an emergency meeting of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member states and leaders of Arab League countries to discuss the security of the region and measures to enhance it, according to a Saudi Press Agency (SPA) report late on Saturday. The Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said King Salman had invited Gulf leaders and Arab states to two emergency summits in Mecca on May 30 to discuss recent "aggressions and their consequences" in the region. The extraordinary meeting has been called following attack on the commercial maritime ships in the territorial...

RIYADH/DUBAI (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia is taking managerial control of Saudi Binladin Group and discussing a possible transfer of some of the giant construction group’s assets to the state while its chairman and other family members are in detention, sources told Reuters. Binladin, which had over 100,000 employees at its height, is the biggest builder in the country and important to Riyadh’s plans for large real estate, industrial and tourism projects to help diversify the economy beyond oil. However, the group has been hurt financially in the past couple of years by a slump in the construction industry and a...

In this Dec. 14, 2017 file photo, the remains of an Iranian Qasef-1 Unmanned Aerial Vehicle is seen during a press briefing at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling in Washington. Image Credit: AP Dubai: Saudi Energy Minister Khalid Al Falih said on Tuesday that two oil pumping stations for the East-West pipeline had been hit by explosive-laden drones, calling the attack "an act of terrorism" that targeted global oil supplies. Falih condemned the attacks in a statment saying: "The latest acts of terrorism and sabotage in the Arabian Gulf... not only target the Kingdom but also the security of oil supplies...

Dubai: Saudi Energy Minister Khalid Al Falih said on Tuesday that two oil pumping stations for the East-West pipeline had been hit by explosive-laden drones, calling the attack "an act of terrorism" that targeted global oil supplies. Falih condemned the attacks in a statment saying: "The latest acts of terrorism and sabotage in the Arabian Gulf... not only target the Kingdom but also the security of oil supplies to the world and the global economy." "These attacks prove again that it is important for us to face terrorist entities, including the Houthi militias in Yemen that are backed by Iran,"...

Saudi Araba said drones attacked one of its oil pipelines as other assaults targeted energy infrastructure elsewhere in the kingdom on Tuesday, shortly after Yemen’s rebels claimed a coordinated drone attack on the Sunni power. The assaults marked the latest incidents challenging Mideast security after the alleged sabotage of oil tankers off the coast of the United Arab Emirates earlier this week amid heightened tensions between the U.S. and Iran. Yemen’s Houthi rebels, whom Saudi Arabia has been fighting against since March 2015, said they launched a series of drone attacks on the kingdom, across the border from Yemen. […]...

Saudi Arabia announced on Monday that two of its oil tankers suffered “significant damage” from sabotage attacks off the coast of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) near the Strait of Hormuz. The attacks reportedly also damaged two ships from other nations, one of them registered to Norway. The Saudis and Emiratis did not name any suspects but their implications about the motive suggested a link to Iran. Saudi Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih said the sabotage was intended to “undermine the freedom of maritime navigation, and the security of oil supplies to consumers all over the world.” The minister’s statement stressed...

Most news consumers understand that media, in general, plays favorites. They cheer on and protect Designated Heroes, and with seemingly boundless energy relish every opportunity to assail Designated Villains. We’ve long known, from polling and other quantifiable metrics, that journalists have very pronounced political biases. Even as journalists often indignantly tout the objectivity of their work product and defend the credibility of others in their profession, the sorry results stand for themselves. It’s no longer controversial—other than in the most surreal, eye-rolling conversations with committed left-wing partisans—to say the American media leans overwhelmingly left and has a strong preference for...

ohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’’s crown prince, on Friday defended China’s use of concentration camps for Muslims, saying it was Beijing’s “right”. "China has the right to carry out anti-terrorism and de-extremisation work for its national security,” Prince Mohammed, who has been in China signing multi-million trade deals much to the annoyance of his Western allies, was quoted as saying on Chinese state television. Xi Jinping, China’s leader, told the crown prince the two countries must strengthen international cooperation on de-radicalisation to “prevent the infiltration and spread of extremist thinking”. China has detained an estimated one million Uighur Muslims in...