Khashoggi's sons forgive Saudi killers,
sparing 5 execution
AYA BATRAWY
“We, the sons of
the martyr Jamal Khashoggi, announce that we forgive those who killed our
father as we seek reward from God Almighty,” wrote one of his sons, Salah
Khashoggi, on Twitter.
Salah Khashoggi,
who lives in Saudi Arabia and has received financial compensation from the
royal court for his father's killing, explained that forgiveness was extended
to the killers during the last nights of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan in
line with Islamic tradition to offer pardons in cases allowed by Islamic law.
The Saudi court's ruling in December that the
killing was not premeditated paved the way for Friday's
announcement by leaving the door open for reprieve. Additionally, the finding
was in line with the government’s official explanation of Khashoggi's slaying
that he was killed accidentally in a brawl by agents trying to forcibly return
him to Saudi Arabia.
The family's
decision to pardon Khashoggi's killers comes as questions continue to linger
over who ultimately ordered the operation and whether his sons have come under
pressure. The trial was widely criticized by rights groups and an independent
U.N. investigator who noted that no senior officials nor anyone in charge of
ordering the operation was found guilty. The independence of the Riyadh
criminal court was also brought into question.
Prior to his
killing, Khashoggi had written
critically of Saudi Arabia's crown prince in columns for the Washington
Post. He'd been living in exile in the United States for about
a year as Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman oversaw a crackdown in Saudi Arabia
on human rights activists, writers and critics of the kingdom's devastating war
in Yemen.
In October 2017, a
team of 15 Saudi agents was dispatched to Turkey to meet Khashoggi in the Saudi
Consulate in Istanbul for what he thought was an appointment to pick up
documents needed to wed his Turkish fiancee. The group included a forensic
doctor, intelligence and security officers and individuals who worked for the
crown prince’s office.
Turkish officials
allege Khashoggi was killed and then dismembered with a bone saw.
The body has not been found. Turkey, a rival of Saudi Arabia, apparently had
the Saudi Consulate bugged and has shared audio of the killing with the CIA,
among others.
Khashoggi’s Turkish
fiancee, Hatice Cengiz, said Friday that the “killers came from Saudi with
premeditation to lure, ambush & kill him.”
“Nobody has the
right to pardon the killers. We will not pardon the killers nor those who
ordered the killing,” she wrote on Twitter in response to the family's pardon.
Agnes Callamard,
the U.N. special rapporteur who investigated his killing, said the announcement
of forgiveness was anticipated.
“All of us who,
over the last 20 months, have reported on the gruesome execution of Jamal
Khashoggi, and absence of accountability for his killing, expected this,"
she said in a Facebook post and added that Saudi authorities were “playing out
what they hope will be the final act in their well-rehearsed parody of
justice.”
The grisly killing,
which took place as Khashoggi's fiancee waited for him
outside the consulate, drew international condemnation of Prince Mohammed.
The 34-year-old
prince, who has the support of his father King Salman, denies any involvement.
U.S. intelligence agencies, however, say an operation like this could not have
happened without his knowledge and the Senate has blamed the crown prince for
the murder.
After initially
offering shifting accounts of what
transpired, and under intense international and Turkish pressure,
Saudi prosecutors eventually settled on the explanation that Khashoggi had been
killed by Saudi agents in an operation masterminded by two of the crown
prince’s top aides at the time. Neither was found guilty in trial, however.
In addition to the
five who had been sentenced to execution, the Saudi trial concluded last year
that three other people were found guilty of covering up the crime and were
sentenced to a combined 24 years in prison. In all, 11 people were put on trial
in Saudi Arabia for the killing.
Saudi media outlet
Arab News sought to clarify Friday that the announcement made by Khashoggi’s
sons may spare the convicted killers from execution, but does not mean they
will go unpunished.
In an interview in
September with CBS’ “60 Minutes,” Prince Mohammed said he takes "full
responsibility as a leader in Saudi Arabia.” But he insisted that he had no
knowledge of the operation, saying he cannot keep close track of the country’s
millions of employees.
THESE ARE
THE SHITBAG MUSLIMS WHOSE BORDERS WE HAVE DEFENDED FOR TWO YEARS. THE VERY
SHITBAG SAUIDIS THAT THE BUSH CRIME FAMILY STARTED TWO WARS TO PROTECT AFTER
THE SAUDIS INVADED US 9-11
MBS: The
Rise to Power of Mohammed bin Salman
Ben
Hubbard. Random House/Duggan, $28 (384p) ISBN 978-1-9848-2382-3
Journalist Hubbard debuts with an incisive
portrait of modern Saudi Arabia and 34-year-old crown prince Mohammed bin
Salman, better known by his initials MBS. Though much about MBS’s early years
remains unknown, Hubbard details his close relationship with his father, the
governor of Riyadh, following the untimely deaths of two of MBS’s older
half-brothers, and his willingness to threaten with violence those who don’t
fall in line. After his father’s ascension to the throne in 2015, MBS took
control of the royal court and became minister of defense. He implemented
ambitious social and economic reforms, including rolling back the kingdom’s ban
on women drivers, and courted Western investors with plans to build a $500
billion “smart city” near the Red Sea. He also declared war on the Houthi
rebels in Yemen, escalated tensions with Iran and Qatar, detained hundreds of
ministers and royal family members in the Ritz-Carlton hotel in a move billed
as an anti-corruption push, and empowered underlings to aggressively silence
dissidents—a campaign that led to the slaying of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in
Saudi Arabia’s Turkish consulate in 2018, severely damaging MBS’s international
reputation. Hubbard enriches the narrative with informed discussions of Saudi
history and culture, illuminating the kingdom’s complex blend of religious
fundamentalism and technological ambition. This deeply researched and vividly
written account provides essential insight into a figure poised to lead the
region for the next half century. (Mar.)
Saudi Arabia's crown prince responds to coronavirus by getting rid
of enemies
David A. Andelman
Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is facing some
existential problems. He's losing the war in Yemen, the coronavirus has forced him
to scale back visits by millions to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, and the plummeting price of oil
on the back of a supply war with Russian President
Vladimir Putin are together shaking the most fundamental underpinnings of his
leadership — not to mention threatening a global recession.
So what does he do? He takes a leaf out of President Donald
Trump's playbook by getting rid of some of his most (allegedly) troublesome
opponents. Instead of a simple purge, however, the crown prince, known
by his initials, MBS, took the far more
dramatic step of arresting his cousin, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef; his uncle, Prince Ahmed bin
Abdelaziz, as well as one of Nayef's brothers and one of Abdelaziz's sons. The
first two have been charged with treason, which carries the death penalty. The
crown prince was already in hot water for allegedly ordering the
execution-style slaying of Washington Post
columnist Jamal Khashoggi. But with this escalation, the Saudi leader is pushing the
boundaries once again to see what exactly he can get away with.
All these issues have been brewing for some time. The crown
prince has given no quarter in five years of war in Yemen, which has turned
very much into a proxy war with
Iran —
each power supporting opposing factions for control of this strategic corner of
the Arabian peninsula.
The Saudis have long been watching anxiously as demand for oil
ratcheted down and
new energy sources, particularly from the United States, have come online. With
the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, demand for oil has plunged even further.
To hold prices in line, the Saudis called an emergency meeting
last week of the OPEC oil cartel to lower production quotas.
Russia balked at OPEC's demand, led by Saudi Arabia, to cut 1.5
million barrels a day in output and stabilize prices at $40 a barrel. Putin has
no problem with low oil prices, since Russia's cost of production is under $20 a barrel. But he would like to see
America's fracking efforts — an already costly proposition to — become
uneconomical.
Without a deal, Saudi Arabia said it would sell oil to China for a discount and
potentially raise its own output by as much as 2 million barrels a day — moves
that would result in flooding the market with oversupply. Oil prices around the
world plummeted more than 25 percent Monday to $31 a barrel. Since oil still
underpins the Saudi economy, accounting for 50
percent of its GDP and
some 70 percent of its export earnings, this is a serious gamble for the crown
prince, who has pledged to modernize and diversify his country's financial
future.
And then along came the coronavirus. Here the crown prince has
been forced to make some of the toughest decisions of his career. The one that
has already sent shock waves through the Islamic world was his decision
to suspend the
year-round umrah pilgrimage
in which as many as 20 million faithful — most from Saudi Arabia itself — take
part every year. This has also raised the question of whether the annual hajj
pilgrimage, which attracts millions Muslims more from every corner of the
globe, would be allowed at the end of July.
Throughout, criticism of the
crown prince has
quietly been mounting at home. He wants desperately to succeed his father on
the throne; King Salman is
now 84 and
said to be frail. Still, the day after the arrest of the four princes stunned
the kingdom, the king was shown in photos released by the royal
palace to be in good health, receiving foreign ambassadors and reading state
documents. Perhaps the king is anxious to remain in power to welcome world
leaders to the G-20 summit in Riyadh in November.
What has allowed the crown prince such a free hand? Certainly he
has benefited from the unalloyed support of his father, who seems to accept his
son's overt power grabs. Unanimity is vital since the next king is not chosen
until the previous one has died. The crown prince clearly wants nothing left to
chance.
But he also has innumerable enablers — world leaders and
business leaders alike — who have repeatedly failed to confront the
leader. Amazon's Jeff
Bezos was
photographed beaming next to him not long before the crown prince was revealed
to have ordered the disastrous hacking of Bezos' cellphone.
Trump is a particularly bad offender. Trump has never
fully accepted the
conclusions of his own intelligence system that the crown prince
personally ordered the savage murder and dismemberment of Khashoggi. Not surprisingly, Trump
said nothing about the arrest of the four senior royals this past weekend.
But the crown prince's manipulations — and Trump's inaction —
have a price. In the early morning hours on Tuesday, the prince and
Trump talked on the phone, according to a White House official. Hours later, the Saudi
prince flooded the oil market, hammering world stock, bond and currency
markets.
This price war, of course, has implications for Trump's own
re-election in November — especially if it threatens the American oil industry,
which employs some 9.8 million
American workers and
is projected to add as many as 1 million more U.S. fracking jobs in the next
five years.
The crown prince and Trump are currently facing a very similar
set of challenges: The coronavirus threatening Americans at home and Muslims in
Mecca and Medina; oil price and supply disruptions affecting the economies of
both nations; unresolved and increasingly expensive wars respectively in
Afghanistan and Yemen.
Perhaps now is the time to begin to break that circle of
dependency before an impending crisis becomes a real crisis.
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