War with Isis: If Saudis aren't fuelling the militant inferno, who is?
With Riyadh increasingly suspected of funding the terrorist
group, the West may have to rethink its relationships, says Robert Fisk
Robert Fisk
Wednesday, 4 February 2015
The image of a Muslim burned alive is more terrible for millions
of Muslims than that of an “unbeliever” burned alive. So just who are
the Muslims who support the immolation of a young Jordanian? And, more
to the point, who are their masters? Jordanians, more than half of whom
are Palestinians, must now debate the dichotomy of tribal loyalty and
religion, and ask a simple question: who are their real allies – and
their real national enemies – in the Middle East? The searchlight beam
of their attention, and of Washington’s, will now again pass over the
Gulf and that most Wahhabi of nations, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Put
bluntly, should the world blame the Saudis for the inflammable monster
that is Isis?
The US, where the State Department and the Pentagon have themselves
been divided over Saudi Arabia’s foundational role in Salafist violence –
the former happy to stroke the monarchy as a pro-Western “moderate
force for good”, the latter suspecting that all Islamist roads lead to
Riyadh – may now have to recalculate its relationship with the Kingdom.
While President Obama predictably talked of Isis “barbarism” this week,
The New York Times was revealing that the so-called “20th 9/11 bomber”,
Zacarias Moussaoui, wishes to testify that he once delivered letters
from Osama bin Laden to Crown Prince Salman – now the Saudi King – and
that prominent Saudi royals were helping to fund al-Qaeda.The report was
compiled by Scott Shane, who specialises in “security” reporting, and
Moussaoui’s allegations refer to events that happened well over 13 years
ago. Moussaoui himself was arrested before the 9/11 attacks. It also
seems unlikely that a comparatively lowly al-Qaeda functionary would
have personal contacts with a Saudi crown prince, or handle a database
of al-Qaeda donors which allegedly included Prince Turki al-Faisal, then
the intelligence majordomo in the Kingdom, and Prince Bandar bin
Sultan, then the Saudi ambassador to the US but now out of favour.http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/war-with-isis-if-the-saudis-arent-fuelling-the-militant-inferno-who-is-10024324.html#
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