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by Grizzly » Mon Oct 15, 2018 1:34 am
by elfismiles » Mon Oct 15, 2018 12:01 pm
by seemslikeadream » Mon Oct 15, 2018 12:38 pm
thanks!FBI Declassification Underway in 9/11 Saudi Suit
seemslikeadream » Fri Oct 12, 2018 7:25 pm
viewtopic.php?f=23&t=41356
The Saudis as hitmen, the American CIA as facilitators
FINIAN CUNNINGHAM | 14.10.2018 | WORLD / MIDDLE EAST | FEATURED STORY
Did Saudis, CIA Fear Khashoggi 9/11 Bombshell?
The macabre case of missing journalist Jamal Khashoggi raises the question: did Saudi rulers fear him revealing highly damaging information on their secret dealings? In particular, possible involvement in the 9/11 terror attacks on New York in 2001.
Even more intriguing are US media reports now emerging that American intelligence had snooped on and were aware of Saudi officials making plans to capture Khashoggi prior to his apparent disappearance at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul last week. If the Americans knew the journalist’s life was in danger, why didn’t they tip him off to avoid his doom?
Jamal Khashoggi (59) had gone rogue, from the Saudi elite’s point of view. Formerly a senior editor in Saudi state media and an advisor to the royal court, he was imminently connected and versed in House of Saud affairs. As one commentator cryptically put it: “He knew where all the bodies were buried.”
For the past year, Khashoggi went into self-imposed exile, taking up residence in the US, where he began writing opinion columns for the Washington Post.
Khashoggi’s articles appeared to be taking on increasingly critical tone against the heir to the Saudi throne, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The 33-year-old Crown Prince, or MbS as he’s known, is de facto ruler of the oil-rich kingdom, in place of his aging father, King Salman.
While Western media and several leaders, such as Presidents Trump and Macron, have been indulging MbS as “a reformer”, Khashoggi was spoiling this Saudi public relations effort by criticizing the war in Yemen, the blockade on Qatar and the crackdown on Saudi critics back home.
However, what may have caused the Saudi royals more concern was what Khashoggi knew about darker, dirtier matters. And not just the Saudis, but American deep state actors as as well.
He was formerly a media aide to Prince Turki al Faisal, who is an eminence gris figure in Saudi intelligence, with its systematic relations to American and British counterparts. Prince Turki’s father, Faisal, was formerly the king of Saudi Arabia until his assassination in 1975 by a family rival. Faisal was a half-brother of the present king, Salman, and therefore Prince Turki is a cousin of the Crown Prince – albeit at 73 more than twice his age.
For nearly 23 years, from 1977 to 2001, Prince Turki was the director of the Mukhabarat, the Saudi state intelligence apparatus. He was instrumental in Saudi, American and British organization of the mujahideen fighters in Afghanistan to combat Soviet forces. Those militants in Afghanistan later evolved into the al Qaeda terror network, which has served as a cat’s paw in various US proxy wars across the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia, including Russia’s backyard in the Caucasus.
Ten days before the 9/11 terror attacks on New York City, in which some 3,000 Americans died, Prince Turki retired from his post as head of Saudi intelligence. It was an abrupt departure, well before his tenure was due to expire.
There has previously been speculation in US media that this senior Saudi figure knew in advance that something major was going down on 9/11. At least 15 of the 19 Arabs who allegedly hijacked three commercial airplanes that day were Saudi nationals.
Prince Turki has subsequently been named in a 2002 lawsuit mounted by families of 9/11 victims. There is little suggestion he was wittingly involved in organizing the terror plot. Later public comments indicated that Prince Turki was horrified by the atrocity. But the question is: did he know of the impending incident, and did he alert US intelligence, which then did not take appropriate action to prevent it?
Jamal Khashoggi had long served as a trusted media advisor to Prince Turki, before the latter resigned from public office in 2007. Following 9/11, Turki was the Saudi ambassador to both the US and Britain.
A tentative idea here is that Khashoggi, in his close dealings with Prince Turki over the years, may have gleaned highly sensitive inside information on what actually happened on 9/11. Were the Arab hijackers mere patsies used by the American CIA to facilitate an event which has since been used by American military planners to launch a global “war on terror” as a cover for illegal wars overseas? There is a huge body of evidence that the 9/11 attacks were indeed a “false flag” event orchestrated by the US deep state as a pretext for its imperialist rampages.
The apparent abduction and murder last week of Jamal Khashoggi seems such an astoundingly desperate move by the Saudi rulers. More evidence is emerging from Turkish sources that the journalist was indeed lured to the consulate in Istanbul where he was killed by a 15-member hit squad. Reports are saying that the alleged assassination was ordered at the highest level of the Saudi royal court, which implicates Crown Prince MbS.
Why would the Saudi rulers order such a heinous act, which would inevitably lead to acute political problems, as we are seeing in the fallout from governments and media coverage around the world?
Over the past year, the House of Saud had been appealing to Khashoggi to return to Riyadh and resume his services as a media advisor to the royal court. He declined, fearing that something more sinister was afoot. When Khashoggi turned up in Istanbul to collect a divorce document from the Saudi consulate on September 28, it appears that the House of Saud decided to nab him. He was told to return to the consulate on October 2. On that same day, the 15-member group arrived from Riyadh on two private Gulfstream jets for the mission to kill him.
Official Saudi claims stretch credulity. They say Khashoggi left the consulate building unharmed by a backdoor, although they won’t provide CCTV images to prove that. The Turks say their own CCTV facilities monitoring the front and back of the Saudi consulate show that Khashoggi did not leave the premises. The Turks seem confident of their claim he was murdered inside the building, his remains dismembered and removed in diplomatic vehicles. The two private jets left the same day from Istanbul with the 15 Saudis onboard to return to Riyadh, via Cairo and Dubai.
To carry out such a reckless act, the Saudis must have been alarmed by Khashoggi’s critical commentaries appearing in the Washington Post. The columns appeared to be delivering more and more damaging insights into the regime under Crown Prince MbS.
The Washington Post this week is reporting that US intelligence sources knew from telecom intercepts that the Saudis were planning to abduct Khashoggi. That implicates the House of Saud in a dastardly premeditated act of murder.
But furthermore this same disclosure could also, unwittingly, implicate US intelligence. If the latter knew of a malicious intent towards Khashoggi, why didn’t US agents warn him about going to the Saudi consulate in Istanbul? Surely, he could have obtained the same personal documents from the Saudi embassy in Washington DC, a country where he was residing and would have been safer.
Jamal Khashoggi may have known too many dark secrets about US and Saudi intel collusion, primarily related to the 9/11 terror incidents. And with his increasing volubility as a critical journalist in a prominent American news outlet, it may have been time to silence him. The Saudis as hitmen, the American CIA as facilitators.https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/ ... shell.html
by JackRiddler » Mon Oct 15, 2018 3:05 pm
by seemslikeadream » Mon Oct 15, 2018 3:28 pm
David P Gelles
Verified account
NEW: According to sources, the Saudis are preparing a report that will acknowledge Khashoggi's death was the result of an interrogation that went wrong, one that was intended to lead to his abduction from Turkey. @clarissaward @TimListerCNN report
https://twitter.com/gelles
by elfismiles » Mon Oct 15, 2018 3:50 pm
seemslikeadream » 15 Oct 2018 19:28 wrote:David P Gelles
Verified account
NEW: According to sources, the Saudis are preparing a report that will acknowledge Khashoggi's death was the result of an interrogation that went wrong, one that was intended to lead to his abduction from Turkey. @clarissaward @TimListerCNN report
https://twitter.com/gelles
Call me crazy, but it seems like if you bring a bone saw to an interrogation, you're kind of expecting things to go south
-- Robert Maguire
BREAKING: CNN Reports Saudis Preparing to Admit Jamal Khashoggi Was Killed in ‘Interrogation Gone Wrong’ (VIDEO)
by Aidan McLaughlin | Oct 15th, 2018, 3:17 pm
submit to reddit
CNN reported on Monday that Saudi Arabia is preparing a report in which they will admit that Jamal Khashoggi, the Washington Post columnist who went missing earlier this month, was killed in an “interrogation gone wrong.”
Khashoggi, a prominent Saudi dissident, went missing after walking into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2. Turkish officials said they have proof he was murdered and dismembered by a team of Saudi agents, a charge the Saudi government vehemently denied.
Per CNN, however, the Saudis are preparing a report admitting that they intended to abduct and bring Khashoggi back to Saudi Arabia, but that he was inadvertently killed in the process. The report is intended, per CNN, to absolve the Saudi government of responsibility for the murder by claiming the operation was not cleared.
CNN’s Arwa Damon reported from Istanbul that the report will most likely conclude “the operation was carried out without clearance and transparency, and that those involved will be held responsible.”
Damon added that the Saudis’ report is still being prepared, and could change.
Earlier on Monday, President Donald Trump said he spoke with Saudi King Salman, who “firmly denied any knowledge” of the murder of Khashoggi. Trump also said Salman suggested those responsible for his death could be “rogue killers.”
The Saudis had previously insisted that Khashoggi left the consulate soon after arriving.
This story is developing…
Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com
https://www.mediaite.com/tv/breaking-cn ... one-wrong/
by seemslikeadream » Mon Oct 15, 2018 5:17 pm
Trump suggests 'rogue killers' behind Jamal Khashoggi's disappearance
https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/15/middleea ... index.html
by JackRiddler » Mon Oct 15, 2018 5:42 pm
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/views/ ... tself.html
US sanctions on Riyadh would mean Washington is stabbing itself
Sunday, 14 October 2018
Turki Aldakhil
I read the Saudi statement in response to the American proposals regarding sanctions on Saudi Arabia. The information circulating within decision-making circles within the kingdom have gone beyond the language used in the statement and discuss more than 30 potential measures to be taken against the imposition of sanctions on Riyadh. They present catastrophic scenarios that would hit the US economy much harder than Saudi Arabia’s economic climate.
If US sanctions are imposed on Saudi Arabia, we will be facing an economic disaster that would rock the entire world. Riyadh is the capital of its oil, and touching this would affect oil production before any other vital commodity. It would lead to Saudi Arabia's failure to commit to producing 7.5 million barrels. If the price of oil reaching $80 angered President Trump, no one should rule out the price jumping to $100, or $200, or even double that figure.
An oil barrel may be priced in a different currency, Chinese yuan, perhaps, instead of the dollar. And oil is the most important commodity traded by the dollar today.
All of this will throw the Middle East, the entire Muslim world, into the arms of Iran, which will become closer to Riyadh than Washington.
There are simple procedures, that are part of over 30 others, that Riyadh will implement directly, without flinching an eye if sanctions are imposed.
Turki Aldakhil
This is all when it comes to oil, but Saudi Arabia is not just about oil, it is a leader in the Muslim world with its standing and geographical importance. And perhaps trusted exchange of information between Riyadh and America and Western countries will be a thing of the past after it had contributed to the protection of millions of Westerners, as testified by senior Western officials themselves.
Imposing any type of sanctions on Saudi Arabia by the West will cause the kingdom to resort to other options, US President Donald Trump had said a few days ago, and that Russia and China are ready to fulfill Riyadh’s military needs among others. No one can deny that repercussions of these sanctions will include a Russian military base in Tabuk, northwest of Saudi Arabia, in the heated four corners of Syria, Israel, Lebanon and Iraq.
At a time where Hamas and Hezbollah have turned from enemies into friends, getting this close to Russia will lead to a closeness to Iran and maybe even a reconciliation with it.
It will not be strange that Riyadh would stop buying weapons from the US. Riyadh is the most important customer of US companies, as Saudi Arabia buys 10 percent of the total weapons that these US companies produce, and buys 85 percent from the US army which means what’s left for the rest of the world is only five percent; in addition to the end of Riyadh’s investments in the US government which reaches $800 billion.
The US will also be deprived of the Saudi market which is considered one of the top 20 economies in the world.
These are simple procedures that are part of over 30 others that Riyadh will implement directly, without flinching an eye if sanctions are imposed on it, according to Saudi sources who are close to the decision-makers.
The truth is that if Washington imposes sanctions on Riyadh, it will stab its own economy to death, even though it thinks that it is stabbing only Riyadh!
____________
Turki Aldakhil is the General Manager of Al Arabiya News Channel. He began his career as a print journalist, covering politics and culture for the Saudi newspapers Okaz, Al-Riyadh and Al-Watan. He then moved to pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat and pan-Arab news magazine Al-Majalla. Turki later became a radio correspondent for the French-owned pan-Arab Radio Monte Carlo and MBC FM. He proceeded to Elaph, an online news magazine and Alarabiya.net, the news channel’s online platform. Over a ten-year period, Dakhil’s weekly Al Arabiya talk show “Edaat” (Spotlights) provided an opportunity for proponents of Arab and Islamic social reform to make their case to a mass audience. Turki also owns Al Mesbar Studies and Research Centre and Madarek Publishing House in Dubai. He has received several awards and honors, including the America Abroad Media annual award for his role in supporting civil society, human rights and advancing women’s roles in Gulf societies. He tweets @TurkiAldakhil.
Last Update: Monday, 15 October 2018 KSA 13:02 - GMT 10:02
Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not reflect Al Arabiya English's point-of-view.
by JackRiddler » Mon Oct 15, 2018 7:15 pm
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/10/15 ... ggi/print/
www.counterpunch.org »
The Saudi Atrocities in Yemen are a Worse Story Than the Disappearance of Jamal Khashoggi
By Patrick Cockburn
October 15, 2018
The plot to supposedly murder Jamal Khashoggi, as apparently proved by Turkish audio and video evidence shown to US officials, is a grisly mixture of savagery and stupidity: Jack the Ripper meets Inspector Clouseau. Neither element is surprising because violent overreaction to minor threats is a traditional feature of dictatorial rule. As seems to be the case with Saudi Arabia today, Iraq under Saddam Hussein made immense efforts to eliminate exiled critics who posed no danger to the regime.
It is the purpose of such alleged assassinations and kidnappings to not only silence dissident voices however obscure, but to also intimidate all opponents at home and abroad by showing that even a hint of criticism will be suppressed with maximum force. But it is in the nature of dictators that their judgement is unbalanced because they never hear opinions contrary to their own. Iraq invaded Iran in 1980 and Kuwait in 1990 with disastrous results. Saudi Arabia started its war in Yemen in 2015, with similarly catastrophic results, and now appears to think that it can get away with brazenly assassinating Khashoggi, as apparently proved by Turkish investigators. Saudi Arabia firmly denies any involvement in Khashoggi’s disappearance and says he left the consulate safely that afternoon.
It is important to watch how long the torrent of criticism of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Saudi Arabia will last. President Trump has been muted in his comments, emphasising the need to keep on terms with the Saudis because of the $110bn contract to sell them arms. Some of those most accustomed to kowtowing to Gulf monarchs, like Tony Blair, are comically reluctant to criticise Saudi Arabia despite the compelling evidence of the murder produced by Turkey. The best Blair can do is to say that the issue should be investigated and explained by Saudi Arabia “because otherwise it runs completely contrary to the process of modernisation”. Even for Blair this is surely a new low, and it could also be a dispiriting straw in the wind, suggesting that political elites in the US and UK will not be shocked for long and criticism will be confined to the alleged killing of Khashoggi.
This is an important point because the killing (as suggested by the Turkish investigators) is by no means the worst act carried out by Saudi Arabia since 2015, though it is much the best publicised. Anybody doubting this should read a report just published which shows that bombing and other military activities by the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen is deliberately targeting food supplies and distribution in a bid to win the war by starving millions of civilians on the other side.
There is nothing collateral or accidental about the attacks according to the report. Civilian food supplies are the intended target with the horrendous results spelled out by the UN at the end of September: some 22.2 million Yemenis or three quarters of the population are in need of assistance, 8.4 million of whom are not getting enough food to eat, a number which may increase by 10 million by the end of the year. “It is bleak,” UN humanitarian chief Mark Lowcock told the Security Council. “We are losing the fight against famine.”
But there are those in Saudi Arabia, UAE and their allies in Washington, London and Paris who evidently do not feel any regret and are intent on creating conditions for a man-made famine as the best way of winning the war against the Houthis who still hold the capital Sana’a and the most highly populated parts of the country. This is the conclusion of the highly detailed report called “The Strategies of the Coalition in the Yemen War: Aerial Bombardment and Food War” written by Professor Martha Mundy for the World Peace Foundation affiliated to the Fletcher School at Tufts University in Massachusetts.
The report concludes that “if one places the damage to the resources of food producers (farmers, herders, and fishers) alongside the targeting of food processing, storage and transport in urban areas and the wider economic war, there is strong evidence that the coalition strategy has aimed to destroy food production and distribution in the areas under the control of Sanaʿaʾ.” It adds that the bombing campaign aimed directly at food supplies appears to have begun in 2016 and is continuing and becoming more effective.
Some aspects of the food war are easy to chronicle: on Yemen’s Red Sea coast no less than 220 fishing boats have been destroyed and the fish catch is down by 50 per cent according to the report. It cites one particular incident on 16 September when 18 fisherman from the district of Al Khawkhah were seized, interrogated and released by a coalition naval vessel which then fired a rocket at “the departing boat carrying the fishermen, killing all but one of them”. The report of this incident has been denied by the coalition.
The Saudi-led coalition began its intervention in the Yemeni civil war in March 2015 on the side of the government of Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi and against the “Houthi rebels” whom the coalition claims are backed by Iran. As Saudi defence minister at the time, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was the driving force behind the intervention code named “Decisive Storm”. The coalition air campaign is aided by US aerial refuelling and logistic support while UK military personnel are stationed in command and control centres.
At first, the targets were largely military, but this changed when the coalition failed to win the quick military success its members had expected. Professor Mundy says that “from August 2015 there appears a shift from military and governmental to civilian and economic targets, including water and transport infrastructure, food production and distribution, roads and transport, schools, cultural monuments, clinics and hospitals, and houses, fields and flocks.”
Copiously illustrated with maps and charts, the report shows the impact of bombing and other military activities on the production and availability of food to the civilian population. Lack of electricity to pump water and fuel for farm vehicles have all been exacerbated by the airstrikes. Mundy says that “livestock production has been devastated as families in need sold animals and also found it increasingly difficult to access markets”.
When the farmers do reach a market, their troubles are not over. Coalition air strikes have become more lethal with the beginning of the siege of the Red Sea port of Hodeida by Saudi and Emirati-led forces in June. Some 70 per cent of Yemen’s imports enter the country through Hodeida, which has a population of 600,000. On 2 August the main fish market in the city was attacked along with the entrance to the public hospital where many people were gathered. In July, King Salman of Saudi Arabia issued a general pardon to all Saudi soldiers fighting in Yemen.
The lack of international protests over the war in Yemen, and the involvement of the US and UK as allies of Saudi Arabia and UAE, helps explain one of the mysteries of the Khashoggi disappearance. If the Saudis murdered Khashoggi, why did they expect to carry out the assassination without producing an international uproar? The explanation probably is that Saudi leaders imagined that, having got away with worse atrocities in Yemen, that any outcry over the death of a single man in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul was something they could handle.
by JackRiddler » Mon Oct 15, 2018 11:40 pm
theintercept.com
The Washington Post, as it Shames Others, Continues to Pay and Publish Undisclosed Saudi Lobbyists and Other Regime Propagandists
Glenn Greenwald
October 15 2018, 11:23 a.m.
In the wake of the disappearance and likely murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, some of the most fervent and righteous voices demanding that others sever their ties with the Saudi regime have, understandably, come from his colleagues at that paper. “Why do you work for a murderer?,” asked the Post’s long-time Editorial Page Editor Fred Hiatt, addressing unnamed hypothetical Washington luminaries who continue to take money to do work for the despots in Riyadh, particularly Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, or “MbS” as he has been affectionately known in the western press.
Hiatt urged these hypothetical figures to engage in serious self-reflection: “Can I possibly work for such a regime, and still look at myself in the mirror each morning?” That, said Hiatt, “is the question that we, as a nation, must ask ourselves now.”
wapo-khashoggi-1539616581
Fred Hiatt’s column in the Washington Post.
Screenshot: The Intercept
But to find those for whom this question is directly relevant, Hiatt need not invoke his imagination or resort to hypotheticals. He can instead look to a place far more concrete and proximate: his own staff. Because it is there – on the roster of the Washington Post’s own columnists and Contributing Writers – that one can find, still, those who maintain among the closest links to the Saudi regime and have the longest and most shameful history of propagandizing on their behalf.
Carter Eskew is a former top-level adviser to Al Gore’s 2000 presidential campaign and a Founder and Managing Director of Glover Park Group which, according to the Post’s own reporting, is one of the Saudi regime’s largest lobbyists. Glover Park, says the Post, has “remained silent amid growing public outrage over reports that Khashoggi was killed inside the Saudi Consulate.” Indeed, as the New York Times reported this week, Eskew’s firm, “which was started by former Clinton administration officials,” is the second-most active lobbying firm for the Saudi regime, “being paid $150,000 a month.”
In addition to his work as a Managing Director in one of the Saudi regime’s most devoted lobbying firms, Eskew is also a Contributing Opinion Writer at the Washington Post. His last column was published just three days ago, on October 12 – ten days after Khashoggi disappeared after entering the Saudi consulate in Turkey, and the same day that Eskew’s editor, Hiatt, published his righteous column demanding to know how anyone with a conscience could maintain ties to the Saudi regime (raising a separate but equally important ethical quandary, Eskew’s last Post column was an attack on “Medicare for All,” even though Glover Park clients include corporations with direct financial interests in that debate, none of which was disclosed by the Post).
carter.com_-1539609383
Worse still, according to a noble campaign promoted by Karen Attiah, the Post’s Global Opinion Editor and friend of Khashoggi – a campaign designed to keep track of and shame those who still intend to participate in the Saudi Crown Prince’s “Davos in the Desert” event – Eskew, along with fellow Glover Park Director Mile Feldman, are still scheduled to speak at that event. Given all the moral decrees and shaming campaigns the Post has issued over the past ten days, how can they possibly justify their ongoing relationship with Eskew as his firm lobbies for the Saudi regime and he attends the regime’s P.R.-building event?
That question is even more compelling when it comes to Ed Rogers, the long-time GOP operative who is currently an Opinion Writer for the Washington Post. In addition to his work for Hiatt on the Post’s Op-Ed page, Rogers himself receives substantial financial rewards for his work as an agent of the Saudi regime. Just two months ago, the lobbying firm of which he’s the Chairman, BGR Group (headed by former RNC Chairman and GOP Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour), signed a new contract that includes “assist[ing] the Saudis in communicating priority issues regarding US-Saudi relations to American audiences including the media and policy communities.”
According to the firm’s own press release, “BGR chairman Ed Rogers” – also an Opinion Writer for the Washington Post – “handles the Saudi work.” Like Eskew, Rogers’ last column for the Post was on October 12: just two days ago, the same day Hiatt published his moralizing column demanding to know how anyone with a conscience and a soul could maintain financial ties to the Saudi regime.
rogers.com_-1539610546
Even more awkward for the Post is that – with the possible exception of Tom Friedman – the most influential media figure who devoted himself to depicting MbS as a noble reformer was the Post’s star foreign affairs columnist, David Ignatius. Ignatius has built his career on cultivating an extremely close relationship to the CIA, whose agenda he typically parrots and rarely contradicts. It is not at all surprising that Ignatius would be a devoted propagandist to the Saudi regime, for decades one of that agency’s most cherished allies and partners.
Indeed, Ignatius did not begin his work heaping praise on Saudi tyrants with the ascent of MbS. As the media watchdog FAIR documented last year, “for almost 15 years, Ignatius has been breathlessly updating US readers on the token, meaningless public relations gestures that the Saudi regime—and, by extension, Ignatius—refer to as ‘reforms.'”
But in light of Khashoggi’s disappearance and the Post’s new posture toward the Saudis, it is two recent columns by Ignatius – touting MbS as an admirable reformer – that are now causing substantial embarrassment for the Post’s attempts to moralize on this issue. The first, published in April of 2017, was headlined “A Young Prince is Reimagining Saudi Arabia” and assured Post readers that MbS’s “reform plans appear to be moving ahead slowly but steadily.”
The second one, from March of this year, is even worse, as reflected by its headlined: “Are Saudi Arabia’s reforms for real? A recent visit says yes.” In it, Ignatius recounted his visit to the Kingdom by quoting one pro-MbS commentator after the next, and then himself gushed: “This is the door that seems to be opening in the kingdom — toward a more modern, more entrepreneurial, less-hidebound and more youth- oriented society. It’s a top-down, authoritarian process, for now. But it seems to be gaining momentum.”
ignat.com_-1539612415
Then there is the even more uncomfortable fact that the Post’s owner, Jeff Bezos, played host to MbS during his star-making trip to the U.S. this spring, and was photographed laughing it up with the Saudi tyrant. As the New York Times’ media reporter Jim Rutenberg noted in a hard-hitting article today on the role U.S. media and financial elites played in creating the hagiography surrounding MbS:
As the guest of honor at a Page Six-worthy dinner at the producer Brian Grazer’s Santa Monica home, the crown prince discussed Snapchat’s popularity in his kingdom with the Snap chief Evan Spiegel;Vice’s Shane Smith; Amazon’s chief — and Washington Post owner — Jeff Bezos and the agent-turned-mogul Ari Emanuel.
(While taking aim at a broad range of sycophantic elites who helped build MbS’s deceitful image as a reformer in the west, Rutenberg failed to note the key role played by his own paper’s star foreign policy columnist, Tom Friedman, who not only penned a column hailing the “Arab Spring” ushered in by MbS but lashed out in a profanity-laden attack on those who suggested he was being too gullible and sycophantic toward the young Saudi despot).
by JackRiddler » Tue Oct 16, 2018 1:05 am
Settling The Khashoggi Case Is A Difficult Matter
The negotiation over the Khashoggi case will be extremely difficult. The protagonists are headstrong and dangerous people. The issue could easily escalate.
The Ottoman empire ruled over much of the Arab world. The neo-Ottoman wannabe-Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan would like to regain that historic position for Turkey. His main competition in this are the al-Sauds. They have much more money and are strategically aligned with Israel and the United States, while Turkey under Erdogan is more or less isolated. The religious-political element of the competition is represented on one side by the Muslim Brotherhood, 'democratic' Islamists to which Erdogan belongs, and the Wahhabi absolutists on the other side.
There are more tactical aspects to this historic conflict. When the Saudis cut ties with Qatar it was Turkey that sent its military to prevent a Saudi invasion of the tiny but extremely rich country. This gave Erdogan the financial backing he urgently needs. In response to that the Saudis offered several $100 millions to prop up the YPK/PKK proxy force the U.S. uses to occupy north-east Syria. These Kurdish groups fight a guerrilla war within Turkey and are a threat to its unity.
The effective Saudi ruler, clown prince Mohammad bin Salman (MbS), made a huge mistake when he ordered the abduction (or murder) of the Saudi journalist Khashoggi in Istanbul. The botched operation gave Erdogan a tool to cut the Saudis to size.
But he needs U.S. support to achieve that. The recent release of the U.S. pastor (and CIA asset) Andrew Brunson is supposed to buy him good will with U.S. President Donald Trump. But Trump build his Middle East policy on his Saudi relations. He can not go berserk on them. Some solution must be found.
Khashoggi was a rather shady guy. A 'journalist' who was also an operator for Saudi and U.S. intelligence services. He was an early recruit of the Muslim Brotherhood:
[... MORE ...]
http://www.moonofalabama.org/2018/10/se ... ocess.html
by 8bitagent » Tue Oct 16, 2018 4:43 am
by seemslikeadream » Tue Oct 16, 2018 8:41 am
FBI Declassification Underway in 9/11 Saudi Suit
https://www.courthousenews.com/fbi-decl ... audi-suit/
Turkey finds ‘toxic materials’ during probe into Khashoggi disappearance
By Yaron Steinbuch
Turkish police are investigating toxic materials found inside the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul, where dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi vanished two weeks ago, President Tayyip Erdogan said Tuesday.
Speaking after police conducted a nine-hour search of the mission for clues into the 59-year-old Washington Post columnist’s disappearance, Erdogan also said some materials found inside have been painted over.
Turkish authorities have said they have an audio recording indicating that Khashoggi was killed in the consulate, and have shared evidence with countries including Saudi Arabia and the US.
Saudi Arabia, which has denied any role in Khashoggi’s disappearance, is now prepared to admit that he was killed during an interrogation that went bad.
“My hope is that we can reach conclusions that will give us a reasonable opinion as soon as possible, because the investigation is looking into many things such as toxic materials and those materials being removed by painting them over,” Erdogan told reporters in Ankara.
Modal TriggerA consulate security guard walks in front of the entrance of Saudi Arabia's Consul-General's residence amid a growing international backlash to the disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
A consulate security guard walks in front of the entrance of Saudi Arabia’s Consul-General’s residence.Getty Images
Meanwhile, a Turkish diplomatic source said investigators planned to widen their search on Tuesday to the residence of the top Saudi diplomat in Istanbul.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with government regulations, did not say when the search of the consul’s home would take place.
Turkish TV stations have previously aired footage of a large vehicle leaving the consulate two hours after Khashoggi vanished and parking at the consul’s residence.
With Post Wires
https://nypost.com/2018/10/16/turkey-fi ... ppearance/
chump » Tue Oct 16, 2018 7:36 am wrote:
http://www.voltairenet.org/article203497.htmlJamal Khashoggi and the failed plot against MBS
VOLTAIRE NETWORK | 15 OCTOBER 2018


On 2 October 2018, the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi disappeared after entering the Consulate of Saudi Arabia in Istanbul.
According to the US press, a trap would have been laid out for him, when he was lured into the consulate to hand over to him his new identity documents following his recent marriage. About a dozen Saudi Secret Service Agents entered the consulate to question him. They tortured him, killed him and cut him apart, limb by limb, before sending his remains to the Saudi King.
From that time, Turkey and the United States have been requesting clarifications from Saudi Arabia which is denying the accusations that the US is levelling against it.
Jamal Khashoggi was the nephew Adnan Khashoggi (1935-2017). The latter was an arms-trafficker that played a fundamental role in the Iran-Contras case and was considered the richest man in the world at the beginning of the eighties. Jamal himself was the protégé of the former leader of the Saudi Secret Services, Prince Turki ben Faical, who went on to be the King’s Ambassador in London.
Later on Jamal went on to serve Prince Al-Waleed ben Talal, who was submitted to a long period of torture at the Ritz-Carlton during the palatial coup in November 2017.
In recent years, Jamal Jamal Khashoggi has taken up the defence of the Muslim Brotherhood and Israel. This is why he had been hired by Washington Post.
According to our sources, several members of the Saudi Royal Family whose assets were partially or totally confiscated in November 2017 during the Palace Coup, were preparing a plot against the Crown Prince Mohamed ben Salman (known as “MBS”) and Jamal Khashoggi was caught up in this conspiracy.
Turkey had managed to step up a system to bug the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Turkey’s conduct in this instance constitutes a violation of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. Although it cannot publish them, Ankara has recordings that contain information, extracted under torture, relating to the plot against MBS.
Poppy Strikes Gold
July 9, 2003
By Greg Palast
This excerpt is taken from Greg Palast's book The Best Democracy Money Can Buy available from http://www.gregpalast.com
George W. could not have amassed this pile if his surname were Jones or Smith. While other candidates begged, pleaded and wheedled for donations, the Bushes added a creative, lucrative new twist to the money chase that contenders couldn't imitate: "Poppy" Bush's post–White House work. It laid the foundation for Dubya's campaign kitty corpulence and, not incidentally, raised the family's net worth by several hundred percent.
In 1998, for example, the former president and famed Desert Stormtrooper-in-Chief wrote to the oil minister of Kuwait on behalf of Chevron Oil Corporation. Bush says, honestly, that he "had no stake in the Chevron operation." True, but following this selfless use of his influence, the oil company put $657,000 into the Republican Party coffers.
That year Bush père created a storm in Argentina when he lobbied his close political ally, President Carlos Menem, to grant a gambling license to Mirage Casino Corporation. Once again, the senior Bush wrote that he had no personal interest in the deal. However, Bush fils made out quite nicely: After the casino fiap, Mirage dropped $449,000 into the Republican Party war chest.
Much of Bush's loot, reports the Center for Responsive Politics, came in the form of "bundled" and "soft" money. That's the squishy stuff corporations use to ooze around U.S. law, which prohibits any direct donations from corporations.
Not all of the elder Bush's work is voluntary. His single talk to the board of Global Crossing, the telecom start-up, earned him stock worth $13 million when the company went public. Global Crossing's employees also kicked in another million for the younger Bush's run. (We'll meet Global Crossing again in Chapter 3.)
And while the Bush family steadfastly believes that ex-felons should not have the right to vote for president, they have no objection to ex-cons putting presidents on their payroll. In 1996, despite pleas by U.S. church leaders, Poppy Bush gave several speeches (he charges $100,000 per talk) sponsored by organizations run by Rev. Sun Myung Moon, cult leader, tax cheat—and formerly the guest of the U.S. federal prison system. Some of the loot for the Republican effort in the 1997–2000 election cycles came from an outfit called Barrick Corporation.
The sum, while over $100,000, is comparatively small change for the GOP, yet it seemed quite a gesture for a corporation based in Canada. Technically, the funds came from those associated with the Canadian's U.S. unit, Barrick Gold Strike.
They could well afford it. In the final days of the Bush (Senior) administration, the Interior Department made an extraordinary but little noticed change in procedures under the 1872 Mining Law, the gold rush–era act that permitted those whiskered small-time prospectors with their tin pans and mules to stake claims on their tiny plots. The department initiated an expedited procedure for mining companies that allowed Barrick to swiftly lay claim to the largest gold find in America. In the terminology of the law, Barrick could "perfect its patent" on the estimated $10 billion in ore—for which Barrick paid the U.S. Treasury a little under $10,000. Eureka!
Barrick, of course, had to put up cash for the initial property rights and the cost of digging out the booty (and the cost of donations, in smaller amounts, to support Nevada's Democratic senator, Harry Reid). Still, the shift in rules paid off big time: According to experts at the Mineral Policy Center of Washington, DC, Barrick saved—and the U.S. taxpayer lost—a cool billion or so. Upon taking office, Bill Clinton's new interior secretary, Bruce Babbitt, called Barrick's claim the "biggest gold heist since the days of Butch Cassidy." Nevertheless, because the company followed the fast-track process laid out for them under Bush, this corporate Goldfinger had Babbitt by the legal nuggets. Clinton had no choice but to give them the gold mine while the public got the shaft.
Barrick says it had no contact whatsoever with the president at the time of the rules change.[1] There was always a place in Barrick's heart for the older Bush—and a place on its payroll. In 1995, Barrick hired the former president as Honorary Senior Advisor to the Toronto company's International Advisory Board. Bush joined at the suggestion of former Canadian prime minister Brian Mulroney, who, like Bush, had been ignominiously booted from office. I was a bit surprised that the president had signed on. When Bush was voted out of the White House, he vowed never to lobby or join a corporate board. The chairman of Barrick openly boasts that granting the title "Senior Advisor" was a sly maneuver to help Bush tiptoe around this promise.
I was curious: What does one do with a used president? Barrick vehemently denies that it appointed Bush "in order to procure him to make contact with other world leaders whom he knows, or who could be of considerable assistance" to the company. Yet, in September 1996, Bush wrote a letter to help convince Indonesian dictator Suharto to give Barrick a new, hot gold-mining concession.
Bush's letter seemed to do the trick. Suharto took away 68 percent of the world's largest goldfield from the finder of the ore and handed it to Barrick. However, Bush's lobbying magic isn't invincible. Jim Bob Moffett, a tough old Louisiana swamp dog who heads Freeport-McMoRan, Barrick's American rival, met privately with Suharto. When Suharto emerged from their meeting, the kleptocrat announced that Freeport would replace Bush's Canadians. (Barrick lucked out: The huge ore deposit turned out to be a hoax. When the con was uncovered, Jim Bob's associates invited geologist Mike de Guzman, who "discovered" the gold, to talk about the error of his ways. Unfortunately, on the way to the meeting, de Guzman fell out of a helicopter.)
Who is this "Barrick" to whom our former president would lease out the reflected prestige of the Oval Office? I could not find a Joe Barrick in the Canadian phone book. Rather, the company as it operates today was founded by one Peter Munk. The entrepreneur first came to public notice in Canada in the 1960s as a central figure in an insider trading scandal. Munk had dumped his stock in a stereo-making factory he controlled just before it went belly up, leaving other investors and government holding the bag. He was never charged, but, notes Canada's Maclean's magazine, the venture and stock sale "cost Munk his business and his reputation." Yet today, Munk's net worth is estimated at $350 million, including homes on two continents and his own island.
How did he go from busted stereo maker to demi-billionaire goldbug? The answer: Adnan Khashoggi, the Saudi arms dealer, the "bag man" in the Iran-Contra arms-for-hostage scandals. The man who sent guns to the ayatolla teamed up with Munk on hotel ventures and, ultimately, put up the cash to buy Barrick in 1983, then a tiny company with an "unperfected" claim on the Nevada mine. You may recall that Bush pardoned the coconspirators who helped Khashoggi arm the Axis of Evil, making charges against the sheik all but impossible. (Bush pardoned the conspirators not as a favor to Khashoggi, but to himself.)
Khashoggi got out of Barrick just after the Iran-Contra scandal broke, long before 1995, when Bush was invited in. By that time, Munk's reputation was restored, at least in his own mind, in part by massive donations to the University of Toronto. Following this act of philanthropy, the university awarded Munk–adviser Bush an honorary degree. Several students were arrested protesting what appeared to them as a cash-for-honors deal.
Mr. Munk's president-for-hire did not pay the cost of his rental in Indonesia. The return on Barrick's investment in politicians would have to come from Africa.
Mobutu Sese Seko, the late dictator of the Congo (Zaire), was one of the undisputed master criminals of the last century having looted hundreds of millions of dollars from his national treasury— and a golfing buddy of the senior Bush. That old link from the links probably did not hurt Barrick in successfully seeking an eighty-thousand-acre gold-mining concession from the Congolese cutthroat. Bush himself did not lobby the deal for Barrick. It wasn't that the former president was squeamish about using the authority of his former posts to cut deals with a despot. Rather, at the time Bush was reportedly helping Adolf Lundin, Barrick's sometime industry rival. Africa specialist Patrick Smith of London disclosed that Bush called Mobutu in 1996 to help cinch a deal for Lundin for a mine distant from Barrick's.
Rebellion against Mobutu made the mine site unusable, though not for the company's lack of trying. In testimony in hearings convened by the minority leader of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Human Rights, expert Wayne Madsen alleged that Barrick, to curry favor with both sides, indirectly funded both and thereby inadvertently helped continue the bloody conflict. The allegation, by respected journalist Wayne Madsen, has not been substantiated: The truth is lost somewhere in the jungle, where congressional investigators will never tread.
Though Barrick struck out in Indonesia and the Congo, the big payoff came from the other side of the continent. The company's president bragged to shareholders that the prestige of the Mulroney-Bush advisory board was instrumental in obtaining one of the biggest goldfields in East Africa at Bulyanhulu, Tanzania. Barrick, according to its president, had hungered for that concession—holding an estimated $3 billion in bullion—since the mid-1990s, when it first developed its contacts with managers at Sutton Resources, another Canadian company, which held digging rights from the government. (See footnote 1.) Enriched by the Nevada venture, Barrick could, and eventually would, buy up Sutton. But in 1996, there was a problem with any takeover of Sutton: Tens of thousands of small-time prospectors, "jewelry miners," so called because of their minuscule finds, already lived and worked on the land. These poor African diggers held legal claim stakes to their tiny mine shafts on the property. If they stayed, the concession was worthless.
In August 1996, Sutton's bulldozers, backed by military police firing weapons, rolled across the goldfield, smashing down worker housing, crushing their mining equipment and filling in their pits. Several thousand miners and their families were chased off the property. But not all of them. About fifty miners were still in their mine shafts, buried alive.
Buried alive. It's not on Bush's resume, nor on Barrick's Web site. You wouldn't expect it to be. But then, you haven't found it in America's newspapers either.
There are two plausible explanations for this silence. First, it never happened; the tale of the live burials is a complete fabrication of a bunch of greedy, lying Black Africans trying to shake down Sutton Resources (since 1999, a Barrick subsidiary). That's what Barrick says after conducting its own diligence investigation and relying on local and national investigations by the Tanzanian government. And the company's view is backed by the World Bank. See Chapter 8 of my book "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" for more on this.[2]
There's another explanation: Barrick threatens and sues newspapers and human rights organizations that dare to breathe a word of the allegations—even if Barrick's denials are expressed. I know: They sued my papers, the Observer and Guardian. Barrick even sent a letter to the internationally respected human rights lawyer Tundu Lissu, a fellow at the World Resources Institute in Washington, DC, outlining its suit against the Observer and warning that it would take "all necessary steps" to protect its reputation should the Institute repeat any of the allegations. Barrick's threats are the least of Lissu's problems. For supplying me with evidence—photos of a corpse of a man allegedly killed by police during the clearance of the mine site, notarized witness statements, even a police video of workers seeking bodies from the mine pits—and for Lissu's demanding investigation of the killings, his law partners in Dar es Salaam have been arrested and Lissu charged by the Tanzanian government with sedition.
In 1997, while Bush was on the board (he quit in 1999), Mother Jones magazine named Barrick's chairman Munk one of America's "10 Little Piggies"—quite an honor for a Canadian—for allegedly poisoning the West's water supply with the tons of cyanide Barrick uses to melt mountains of ore.
Notably, one of the first acts of the junior Bush's Interior Department in 2001 was to indicate it would reverse Clinton administration rules requiring gold extractors to limit the size of waste dumps and to permit new mines even if they were likely to cause "substantial, irreparable harm." The New York Times ran a long, front-page story on this rule-relaxing windfall for Nevada goldmining companies, but nowhere did the Times mention the name of the owner of the largest gold mine in Nevada, Barrick, nor its recent payroller, the president's father.
[1] Barrick has responded to every allegation reported in my first report on the company in a manner certain to get my attention: The company and its chairman sued my papers, Guardian and the Observer. While I have a distaste for retort by tort, I have incorporated their legitimate concerns to ensure their views are acknowledged in Chapter 8 of my book "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy"
[2] A bit of confusion here: Barrick swore to my paper that the alleged killings "related to a time years before [Barrick] had any connection whatsoever with the company to which the report referred." Yet Barrick's president and CEO, Randall Oliphant, told Barrick's shareholders that prior to their acquisition of Sutton, "we followed the progress at Bully (i.e., Bulyanhulu) for five years, remaining in close contact with the senior management team." That would connect them to the mine in 1994. The mining company wants me to report their version of events. Okay, here's both of them.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/a ... _gold.html
BFEE Factbook: GW Bush, James R Bath & House of bin Laden
https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... _id=991298
The Bush-Saudi Connection Scandal - documented
https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... id=1256051
Terror Flight School Owners flew Saudis on "unsupervised flights" over USA
https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... id=1526859
BBV:Teresa LaPore-created butterfly ballot, defends defective touchscreen
https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... _id=951723
Why was Richard Perle meeting with Adnan Khashoggi?
https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... _id=350494
BFEE: 9-11 Saudi Connection is Off Limits …
https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... _id=116624
George W Bush connection to the BCCI scandal ?
https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... _id=157573
The Bush Organized Crime Family
https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... _id=875102
I could go on, maybe I will
https://www.democraticunderground.com/d ... 04x2316608
“Six Degrees of Adnan Khashoggi,’ Part 4
The 9/11 edition.
Timothy NoahNov 14, 20016:31 PM
As Chatterbox previously noted (here, here, and here), Adnan Khashoggi is connected to every shocking event that has occurred since 1960, usually by no more than one or two degrees. A partial list would include Iran-Contra, Wedtech, BCCI, the Marcos Philippine kleptocracy, the Synfuels fiasco, and the discovery of buried mustard gas in the pricy Spring Valley neighborhood of Washington, D.C. To these we must now add the tragic events of Sept. 11.
As always, Chatterbox emphasizes that Khashoggi’s proximity to these events does not demonstrate criminality on his part. But it does illustrate Khashoggi’s “Where’s Waldo?”-like ubiquity in the noir environment where shocking events tend to take place. Khashoggi is what the journalist Malcolm Gladwell has termed a “connector,” that is, a person who stands at the intersection of many social networks. (For more on Gladwellian connectors, click here.) At the moment, Khashoggi appears to be preoccupied with a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation and pending class action concerning some alleged financial improprieties on the part of a Khashoggi-controlled telemarketing and infotainment company called GenesisIntermedia. This story has been bird-dogged by David Evans, the small-caps columnist for Bloomberg News. Hence our first connection to 9/11: Bloomberg News’ founder, Michael Bloomberg, just got himself elected mayor of New York City in the confusing aftermath of the World Trade Center’s collapse.
Khashoggi’s second connection to 9/11 is more direct but also more difficult to verify: An Oct. 7 article by Frank Connolly in Ireland’s Sunday Business Postquotes unnamed U.S. intelligence officials alleging that Khashoggi has made “protection payments” to Osama Bin Laden.
The other connections mostly fall into the category, “If You’re a Rich Guy From Saudi Arabia, It’s a Small World.” We begin with this passage from Peter Bergen’s new book, Holy War, Inc.:
During this period Mohammed bin Laden [a.k.a. Osama’s rich dad, now deceased] would also jump-start the career of another Saudi billionaire, Adnan Khashoggi, known in the West for his flamboyant spending, his walk-on part in the Iran-contra scandal, and his nephew, Dodi Fayed, who died along with Princess Diana in the Paris car crash. In the early 1950s Mohammed needed some trucks for his construction business in a hurry. Khashoggi was able to make a $500,000 purchase of trucks in the United States, for which Mohammed paid him a commission of $50,000. It was Khashoggi’s first business deal.
Also, drawing from a Sept. 23 article by Greg Burton in the Salt Lake Tribune:
Adnan Khashoggi’s father, Mohammed Khashoggi, was Mohammed Bin Laden’s family physician;
Adnan Khashoggi attended college in Alexandria, Egypt, with some of Mohammed Bin Laden’s children (though not Osama, who’s a good 20 years younger).
Soon after Sept. 11, it was alleged, apparently inaccurately, that the CIA had once funded Bin Laden. Khashoggi has almost certainly received financial assistance over the years from the CIA.
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Rudolph Giuliani once tried (unsuccessfully) to prosecute Adnan Khashoggi for fraud in connection with a real estate venture. Khashoggi accused Giuliani of grandstanding in order to get elected mayor of New York. Giuliani was New York City mayor on Sept. 11.
Bonus Non-9/11-Related Khashoggi Sighting: Reader Jon Lasser sent in the following snippet from “The Curse of the Sevso Silver,” a long yarn by Peter Landesman in the November Atlantic about intrigue surrounding some ancient Roman treasure:
In late September, Van Rijn met with Yard detectives at the British embassy in Madrid. He had with him an old friend, a man he and the detectives had been referring to in telephone conversations as “our friend in Spain.” The friend was Felice Cultrera, an amateur art-and-antiquities collector; the owner of casinos in Paris, Belgrade, and Prague; someone who was allegedly linked to the Sicilian drug-running Santapaola Mafia; and a money man for the weapons merchant Adnan Khashoggi [italics Chatterbox’s].
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/200 ... hoggi.html
“Six Degrees of Adnan Khashoggi,’ Part 6
Richard Perle’s new pal.
Timothy NoahMarch 12, 20037:30 PM
Everybody’s favorite shadowy arms dealer is back in the news! It is the premise of this occasional series that Adnan Khashoggi is connected to every shocking world event since 1960. In previous items, Chatterbox has linked Khashoggi to Sept. 11, Iran-Contra, the Marc Rich pardon, Wedtech, BCCI, the Marcos Philippine kleptocracy, the Synfuels fiasco, the breakup of the Beatles, and Charlie Chaplin’s serial seductions of teenage girls. (For details, see the “Six Degrees” archive, below.) Chatterbox does not mean to suggest that Khashoggi has committed any crimes. But it does seem to be the case that if you make Khashoggi’s acquaintance, the odds are that you’re not a nice person.
The latest individual to cross Khashoggi’s path is America’s leading Iraq hawk, Richard Perle. In the March 17 issue of TheNew Yorker, Seymour Hersh suggests that Perle is cashing in on his position as chairman of the Defense Policy Board, an influential group of nongovernment advisers to the Pentagon. (Perle denied the charge, said on CNN that Hersh was “the closest thing American journalism has to a terrorist,” and, though previously reluctant to cede U.S. policymaking to foreign governments, is preparing to sue Hersh for libel in Great Britain, where plaintiffs enjoy a much lighter burden of proof than in the United States.)
Hersh’s argument hinges on a lunch Perle had in Marseilles two months ago with … Adnan Khashoggi. According to Hersh, Perle was seeking Saudi investment in Trireme Partners L.P., a company specializing in homeland security and defense where Perle is a managing partner. Perle maintains that the lunch was never intended to be about Trireme, and, in fact, that the lunch ended up being an occasion for Khashoggi’s friend Saleh al-Zuhair, a Saudi industrialist, to argue with Perle about the pending Iraq war. But Khashoggi says Perle’s reason for arranging the lunch was monetary:
As Khashoggi saw it, Trireme’s business potential depended on a war in Iraq taking place. “If there is no war,” he told me, “why is there a need for security? If there is a war, of course, billions of dollars will have to be spent.” He commented, “You Americans blind yourself with your high integrity and your democratic morality against peddling influence, but they were peddling influence.”
Chatterbox presumes Hersh’s lawyer will call Khashoggi as a witness.
Khashoggi was also linked recently to Barry “Dame Edna” Humphries, whose recent disparagement of Spanish literature in his Vanity Fair column caused a minor ruckus. Humphries’ son attempted suicide in December, apparently because he was distraught about his breakup with Khashoggi’s fetching daughter, Octavia.
“Six Degrees of Adnan Khashoggi” Archive:
Feb. 11, 2002: Part 5
Nov. 14, 2001: Part 4
July 9, 2001: Part 3
Feb. 26, 2001: More “Six Degrees of Adnan Khashoggi”
Dec. 4, 2000: Did Adnan Khashoggi Throw the Election to Dubya?
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/200 ... art-6.html
Trumpter Fire
The palatial penthouse, Bloomberg reports, takes a tip from Saudi arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi: “One reason Trump’s triplex is so vast, he has written, is a trip he took to...Khashoggi’s condo nearby, where he stepped into a living room bigger than his own.” Trump, who has the best temperament, wanted to level up with a Saudi arms dealer. That’s reassuring.
viewtopic.php?f=33&t=40931
by Karmamatterz » Tue Oct 16, 2018 11:35 am
can someone explain to me(grizzly as it is) why
a Saudi dissident being killed by Saudi assassins suddenly makes Washington grow a conscience?
by JackRiddler » Tue Oct 16, 2018 1:43 pm
why a Saudi dissident being killed by Saudi assassins suddenly makes Washington grow a conscience?
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