I am submitting the complete text:
Saudi Arabia Might Recognize Israel Because Of NEOM

by Tyler Durden
Oct 27, 2017 10:15 PM
Authored by Andrew Korybko via Oriental Review,
The half-a-trillion-dollar initiative to build a tristate city at the Saudi, Egyptian, and Jordanian border in the Gulf of Aqaba will more than likely lead to Riyadh recognizing Israel and integrating Tel Aviv into the project.
The ambitious Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman unveiled a $500 billion project at an investment forum earlier this week in an effort to bring some serious substance to his Vision 2030 project of fundamentally diversifying his country’s oil-dependent economy in the coming decade. The proposal calls for a gigantic city called NEOM to be built at the entrance to the Gulf of Aqaba in the northeastern corner of the Red Sea, with the plan being for it to eventually extend into neighboring Egypt and Jordan as well. The Crown Prince promised that it would be a technologically advanced city with its own laws and administration, and it will also be free from anything “traditional”.
The latter remark hints that Mohammed Bin Salman won’t allow the Kingdom’s traditional Wahhabi socio-cultural “regulations” to be enforced there, which goes along with his other headline-grabbing statement during the event when he said that Saudi Arabia will “return…to moderate Islam” and “swiftly deal a blow to extremist ideologies”. Quite clearly, as analyzed in the author’s earlier piece this month about Saudi Arabia’s shifting grand strategy, a “deep state” conflict is indeed being fought in the country between its monarchic and clerical factions, with the former poised to carry out a “soft coup” against the latter as it seeks to “modernize” the country. This will surely result in some behind-the-scenes tumult in the coming future, if not overt destabilization, but the point of the present article isn’t to dwell too much on that tangent.
Instead, it’s relevant to have brought that up in order to make the case that Saudi Arabia is on the cusp of an unprecedented paradigm change that will likely see it recognizing Israel if the monarchy is successful in snuffing out the clerics’ political influence. Saudi Arabia’s Egyptian and Jordanian NEOM partners have already recognized and signed peace treaties with Israel, and Riyadh is known to be coordinating with Tel Aviv in crafting a comprehensive anti-Iranian regional policy, amongst other strategic commonalities that they share. Moreover, the secret meetings between Saudi Arabia and Israel over the years suggest that their relationship is much warmer in private than either side publicly presents it as for their own respective domestic political reasons.
Israel has always wanted relations with Saudi Arabia, though Riyadh has traditionally shirked away from this because it wanted to present itself as a strong supporter of the Palestinian cause, made all the more symbolic by the Saudi monarchy’s custodianship over the Two Holy Mosques given the religious dimensions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. However, if Mohammed Bin Salman comes out on top in his “deep state” “soft coup” against the Wahhabi clerics, then he can easily lay the “blame” on them for his country’s refusal to recognize Israel after all of these decades. Not only could he be interested in doing this as the ultimate expression of his country’s radically transformed identity under his stewardship, but he might be just as importantly driven by the geostrategic imperatives related to Vision 2030’s flagship NEOM project.
@coluber2001,
The Gulf of Aqaba was chosen not just because it would allow NEOM to spread into Egypt and Jordan, but also because of its proximity to Israel, which is promoting its “Red-Med” railway proposal as the perfect Mideast complementary component of the New Silk Road. Tel Aviv keenly knows that the Chinese are always looking for backup plans and transport route diversification in order to not be too dependent on any single connectivity corridor, and in this case, overland rail transit from the Gulf of Aqaba to the Eastern Mediterranean via Israel comes off as exceedingly attractive to Beijing’s strategists. Furthermore, China has fantastic relations with both Saudi Arabia and Israel, so from Beijing’s perspective, this is the perfect Mideast “win-win”, especially if the People’s Republic can find a way to insinuate that its possible financing of both the NEOM and “Red-Med” projects contributed to bringing peace to the Mideast.
In addition, there’s also the Russian factor to take into consideration, and it’s objectively known – though commonly denied in the Alt-Media Community – that Moscow and Tel Aviv are on excellent terms with one another and basically cooperate as allies in Syria. When accounting for the fast-moving Russian-Saudi rapprochement and Moscow’s envisioned 21st-century grand strategic role in becoming the supreme balancing force in Eurasia, it’s likely that Russia would be in favor of any Saudi recognition of Israel and Tel Aviv’s integration into the NEOM project because it would then allow the Russian business elite both in the Russian Federation and Israel to invest in this exciting city-state and the complementary “Red-Med” Silk Road corridor.
Seeing as how Mohammed Bin Salman is trying to purge the clerics’ political influence from the Kingdom, it’s very possible that Saudi Arabia will end up recognizing Israel in the near future and blaming its decades-long delay in doing so on the Wahhabis. The grand intent behind this isn’t just to formalize the Saudi-Israeli anti-Iranian partnership or to show the world just how serious the Crown Prince is in changing the course of his country, but to please Riyadh’s newfound Multipolar Great Power partners in Moscow and Beijing, both of which enjoy exceptional relations with Tel Aviv but would probably be reluctant to invest in the Kingdom’s NEOM city-state project so long as its connectivity access remained dependent on the Suez Canal chokepoint.
Russia and China would feel more strategically secure if Israel was incorporated into this megaproject so that its territory could be used for overland transshipment between the Red and Mediterranean Seas via the “Red-Med” railway proposal, which would then make NEOM infinitely more attractive from a logistics perspective for all sorts of investors.
(I hope I got all this posted correctly. Working from a cellphone has made this very tedious.)
@coluber2001,
None of this changes what's happening now. You seem to myopically assume that the problems in the ME can be solved with some rapprochement between Israel and Saudi Arabia.
You've not even addressed my posts about actual events, just continued parrot fashion with the same pie in the sky nonsense.
What's wrong, got no ideas, answers of your own?
@coluber2001,
Have you googled the supposed author of your text? One would think it might be penned by a real person if it had any substance.
Quote:The Narrator, also known as Tyler Durden, is a fictional character appearing as both the central protagonist and antagonist of the 1996 Chuck Palahniuk novel Fight Club, its 1999 film adaptation of the same name, and the comic book Fight Club 2. The character has dissociative identity disorder, and is depicted as an unnamed everyman known as the Narrator during the day, while he becomes the chaotic and charismatic Tyler Durden at night during periods of insomnia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Narrator_(Fight_Club)
Quote:The heir to the throne in Saudi Arabia has consolidated his hold on power with a major purge of the kingdom's political and business leadership.
A new anti-corruption body, headed by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, detained 11 princes, four sitting ministers and dozens of ex-ministers.
Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a billionaire with investments in Twitter and Apple, is among those held.
Separately King Salman replaced the national guard and the navy chiefs.
The new anti-corruption committee has the power to issue arrest warrants and travel bans.
Attorney General Sheikh Saud al-Mojeb said the status of the detainees would not influence "the firm and fair application of justice", AFP news agency reports.
Saudi broadcaster Al-Arabiya said fresh investigations had been launched into the 2009 Jeddah floods and the outbreak of the Mers virus which emerged in Saudi Arabia in 2012 - but analysts see the detentions as a clear move by the crown prince to strengthen his power base.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-41874117
This is reminiscent of Putin's purge of 'corrupt' oligarchs. It's not the corruption that the problem it's not supporting Putin. This is a power grab, corruption in Saudi Arabia is endemic, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is as corrupt as the rest.
ME expert Frank Gardiner was interviewed on the radio this morning. He said it could set off a tribal war.
Saudi Arabia’s crown prince wants to ‘crush extremists.’ But he’s punishing the wrong people.
By Jamal Khashoggi
October 31

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman speaks at the opening ceremony of Future Investment Initiative Conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. (Saudi Press Agency via AP)
Jamal Khashoggi is a Saudi journalist and author.
Last week before an enthusiastic crowd at an investment conference, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman looked angry when he vowed to “crush extremists” and bring back “moderate Islam” to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. He promised, “we will destroy them, now and immediately.” During the same conference, he announced an ambitious $500 billion free zone that will transform a region the size of Massachusetts into a high-tech, futuristic hub.
The crown prince is reflecting the anger and frustration of many Saudis who have longed to shake off the influences that have so negatively impacted the country. We were waiting for a leader who realizes that extremism, both economic and social, is bad for the country. City states like Dubai, which only just started on its journey to global prominence in 1980, puts into perspective just how much the kingdom, the largest economy in the region, has lost in the past 40 years.

I know why the young Prince Mohammed is so agitated. Salafi Wahhabism, a reform movement within Islam, was prevalent in the country, turned even more anti-modern and xenophobic after two political earthquakes struck the kingdom in 1979 – the first was when Salafi extremists seized the Grand Mosque in Mecca, one of the holiest sites in Islam. The second was Ayatollah Khomeini’s seizure of power in Iran. In Saudi Arabia, the pernicious influence of this 18th-century puritanical streak can be found everywhere: state-sanctioned religious police can intervene even in people’s private lives; educational curricula warn of the kafir or infidels; TV preachers opposed to the rights of women and minorities, and the banning of goods like chess and Barbie dolls.
Prince Mohammed is right to go after extremists. But he is going after the wrong people. Dozens of Saudi intellectuals, clerics, journalists, and social media stars have been arrested in the past 2 months — the majority of whom, at worst, are mildly critical of the government. Meanwhile, many members of the Council of Senior Scholars (“Ulema”) have extremist ideas. Sheikh Saleh Al-Fawzan, who is highly regarded by Prince Mohamed, has said on Saudi TV that Shiites are not Muslims. Sheikh Saleh Al-Lohaidan, also highly regarded, has given legal advice that the Muslim ruler is not bound to consult others. Their reactionary opinions about democracy, pluralism or even women driving, are protected by royal decree from counter argument or criticism.
@coluber2001,
How can we become more moderate when such extremist views are tolerated? How can we progress as a nation when those offering constructive feedback and (often humorous) dissent are banished?
@coluber2001,
There is a popular Twitter handle (@m3takl_en) that exposes the arrests and provides information on the individuals who have been detained in the kingdom, many for several weeks without any charge. There you can find their views — from YouTube and on websites. They are mainly in Arabic, and I can assure you that most are in favor of pluralism and diversity within Islam which traditional Wahhabism totally opposes: They call for open-mindedness, allowing entertainment, allowing women to drive and believe in the rights of minorities; some even went as far as to support ending male guardianship of women, which is still a highly controversial topic. In short, most hold views that would make them ideal partners for Prince Mohammed’s ambitious agenda.
So, why were they arrested? The only possible explanation is that they also called mildly for political rights. It’s true, some are traditional Wahabi Muslims who share the ideas of the scholars of the state-protected official council yet, unlike their peers, they voice their objections to the crown prince’s reforms. Even though I disagree with them, they have the right to express their views, as long as they are not calling for violence.
Can we really present a compelling image of a modern society, complete with robots, foreigners and tourists when Saudis, many miles from “Neom,” are silenced? Is this truly “modern” Arabia?

“I’m one of 20 million people, I’m nothing without them,” said the crown prince as he launched his “Neom” vision for futuristic Saudi Arabia. The 72 intellectuals who have been in jail without charges, and many more who are banned from travel, likely wonder if they and others like them are now outcasts in their own country.
@coluber2001,
Are you on a retainer for Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman? That would explain why, at a time of crisis, you've refused to respond to actual events and just cut and pasted propaganda pieces.
Meanwhile in Saudi Arabia things are actually happening.
Quote:The arrest of dozens of Saudi royal figures, ministers and businessmen is just the start of an anti-corruption drive, the attorney general says.
Sheikh Saud al-Mojeb issued a statement describing the detentions as "merely the start of a vital process to root out corruption wherever it exists".
News of a major purge of Saudi Arabia's business and political leadership emerged on Sunday.
It is seen as bolstering the power of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
An anti-corruption body led by the crown prince, 32, ordered the detentions of 11 princes, four ministers and dozens of ex-ministers. Internationally known billionaire businessman Prince Alwaleed bin Talal was reported to be among those held.
US President Donald Trump backed the move by the Saudi authorities.
"I have great confidence in King Salman and the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, they know exactly what they are doing," he tweeted.
"Some of those they are harshly treating have been 'milking' their country for years!" Mr Trump added.
These are heady and unpredictable times in Saudi Arabia. The Arab world's richest country is undergoing seismic changes almost unprecedented in its 85-year history as a sovereign nation.
The idea of dozens of familiar pillars of the establishment all being publicly and humiliatingly removed from office and detained, albeit in great comfort, would have been unthinkable just three years ago.
But the conservative, stodgy, risk-averse Saudi Arabia of old is under new management these days. Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, who is leading the official anti-corruption purge, appears determined to take on all comers in his drive to both modernise the country and eliminate all opposition, both secular and religious.
He is popular with young Saudis but critics say he is playing for high stakes, risking a dangerous backlash.
Sheikh Saud al-Mojeb's statement on the progress of the investigation spoke of "phase one" being complete.
"A great deal of evidence has already been gathered, and detailed questioning has taken place," it continued.
"All those suspected to date, will have full access to legal resources, and the trials will be held in a timely and open manner for all concerned."
The update on the corruption probe came as the authorities continue to investigate a helicopter crash near Saudi Arabia's border with Yemen.
Prince Mansour bin Muqrin, the deputy governor of Asir province, was returning from an inspection tour when his aircraft came down near Abha late on Sunday.
The cause of the crash is not clear.
Prince Mansour was the son of Prince Muqrin bin Abdulaziz, a former intelligence chief who was crown prince between January and April 2015, when he was pushed aside by Prince Mohammed's father, King Salman, now 81.
The official Saudi Press Agency said the prince and seven provincial officials had been touring coastal projects west of the city of Abha.
State news channel al-Ikhbariya posted on Twitter photographs of the wreckage and a video showing the prince and his companions using the helicopter hours before their deaths.
For the past two-and-a-half years, Saudi Arabia has been leading a coalition that is supporting Yemen's internationally-recognised government in its war with the rebel Houthi movement.
The interior ministry statement did not draw any link between the crash and the conflict, but on Saturday the Saudi military intercepted and destroyed a ballistic missile near the capital, Riyadh, that was fired by Houthi fighters.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-41894175
Saudi Crown Prince’s Mass Purge Upends a Longstanding System
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICKNOV. 5, 2017
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, center, at the Future Investment Initiative last month in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Credit Tasneem Alsultan for The New York Times
LONDON — A midnight blitz of arrests ordered by the crown prince of Saudi Arabia over the weekend has ensnared dozens of its most influential figures, including 11 of his royal cousins, in what by Sunday appeared to be the most sweeping transformation in the kingdom’s governance for more than eight decades.
The arrests, ordered by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman without formal charges or any legal process, were presented as a crackdown on corruption. They caught both the kingdom’s richest investor, Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, and the most potent remaining rival to the crown prince’s power: Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, a favored son of the late King Abdullah.
Prince Mutaib had been removed from his post as chief of a major security service just hours before the arrests announced late Saturday night.
All members of the royal family were barred from leaving the country, American officials tracking the developments said on Sunday.
With the new detentions, Crown Prince Mohammed, King Salman’s favored son and key adviser, now appears to have established control over all three Saudi security services — the military, internal security services and national guard. For decades they had been distributed among branches of the House of Saud clan to preserve a balance of power in Saudi Arabia, the Middle East’s biggest oil producer and an important American ally.
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In the same stroke, the crown prince has cowed businessmen and royals across the kingdom by taking down the undisputed giant of Saudi finance. And over the last several weeks he has ordered enough high-profile arrests of intellectuals and clerics to frighten the remainder of the academic and religious establishment into acceding to his will as well.
Apolitical scholars who used to speak freely in cafes now look nervously over their shoulders, as Crown Prince Mohammed has achieved a degree of dominance that no ruler has attained for generations.
“It is the coup de grâce of the old system,” said Chas W. Freeman, a former United States ambassador. “Gone. All power has now been concentrated in the hands of Mohammed bin Salman.”
Why the crown prince acted now — whether to eliminate future opposition or perhaps to crush some threat he saw brewing — was not immediately clear.
At 32 years old, he had little experience in government before his father, King Salman, 81, ascended to the throne in 2015, and the prince has demonstrated little patience for the previously staid pace of change in the kingdom.
Photo
Prince Alwaleed bin Talal in Riyadh in 2014. He is best known for his investments in brand-name Western companies. Credit Pool photo by Fayez Nureldine
He has led Saudi Arabia into a protracted military conflict in Yemen and a bitter feud with its Persian Gulf neighbor Qatar. He has taken on a business elite accustomed to state subsidies and profligacy by laying out radical plans to remake the Saudi economy, lessen its dependence on oil and rely instead on foreign investment. And he has squared off against conservatives in the religious establishment with symbolic steps to loosen strict moral codes, including a pending end to the longstanding ban on women driving.
Crown Prince Mohammed’s haste, however, may now come at a price, because the lack of transparency or due process surrounding the anticorruption crackdown is sure to unnerve the same private investors he hopes to attract — including through a planned stock offering of the huge state oil company, Aramco.
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Saudi Arabian businessmen and royals anxious about the crown prince’s plans were quietly moving assets out of the country even before the arrests.
“Some of these are businessmen with international status, and if they are caught in this web then it could happen to anyone,” said James M. Dorsey, who studies Saudi Arabia at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore. “How is that going to inspire confidence and attract foreign investment?”
The Saudi Arabian news media, however, celebrated the arrests as a long-awaited cleanup, appealing to populist resentment of self-enrichment enjoyed by the sprawling royal family and its closest allies.
Almost everyone in the capital, Riyadh, and other big cities like Jidda has heard stories about princes absconding with vast sums that had been allocated for a public project.
The arrests are “a frontal assault on some members of the royal family and the impunity with which they have operated in the past,” said Bernard Haykel, a professor at Princeton University who studies Saudi Arabia.
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“It was something that had to be done,” he said, even though the absence of a judicial process “sends a chill down the spine of foreign investors.”
President Trump on Sunday appeared to give a tacit endorsement of the arrests in a phone call with King Salman. A White House summary of the call contained no references to the arrests, and said Mr. Trump had praised Crown Prince Mohammed for other matters.
Three White House advisers, including the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, returned just days ago from the latest in at least three high-level Trump administration visits to Saudi Arabia this year.
Nearly 24 hours after the arrests were announced, no Saudi authority or spokesman had identified those arrested or the charges against them.
Photo
Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, right, in Riyadh in 2014. He was removed from his post as chief of a major security service over the weekend just hours before the arrests. Credit Fayez Nureldine/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
The Saudi-owned satellite network Al Arabiya reported only that a large number of arrests, including 11 princes, had been ordered by an “anticorruption committee” that just hours earlier had been formed under the direction of Crown Prince Mohammed. A royal decree granted the committee powers to detain individuals or seize assets without any trial, process or disclosure.
A list of those arrested began circulating over social media shortly after midnight Sunday, and by Sunday evening senior government officials were reposting the list. News organizations around the region were reporting its contents without contradiction by either the Saudi government or individuals.
In the case of the most politically potent of the detainees, the former security chief Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, the Saudi government appeared on Sunday to have started a social media campaign seeking to make him the new face of public corruption.
Analysts said the list appeared to reflect individuals with a reputation for self-enrichment and those representing rival power centers within the kingdom. Others included the power broker who once ran the royal court under King Abdullah, and the owner of one of the biggest private media companies in the region.
But another was a top aide to Crown Prince Mohammed himself — Adel Fakeih — who had been considered a driving force behind the ambitious program of economic reform, leaving analysts puzzled about the motives.
In what appeared to be an unrelated episode, a helicopter carrying another Saudi royal, Prince Mansur bin Muqrin, the deputy governor of Asir Province, which borders Yemen, crashed on Sunday, killing the prince along with a number of other officials. Al Arabiya, which reported the crash in a brief dispatch, did not identify the cause.
The history of the House of Saud was sometimes punctuated by violent intrafamily strife in the decades before the founding of the modern dynasty, in 1932. Since then, the family has maintained its unity in part by spreading its top government roles and vast oil wealth among different branches of the sprawling clan. Most important was the division of the three main security services, which constitute the hard power on the ground.
King Salman, however, quickly named his favorite son, Mohammed, as his defense minister, chief of the royal court, a top economic adviser and deputy crown prince. Then, this June, the king removed his nephew, Mohammed bin Nayef, from his position as crown prince and his powerful role of interior minister in charge of the internal security forces, secret police and counterterrorism operations. Evidently anxious to forestall resistance, the king also placed the demoted nephew under house arrest. A campaign of leaks spread rumors that he had become addicted to painkillers and other drugs.
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It was unclear why the crackdown targeted Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, who is best known for his past and present investments in brand-name Western companies including Twitter, News Corporation, Apple and the Four Seasons. Prince Alwaleed has been a vocal supporter of the crown prince’s plans to attract outside investors to Saudi Arabia. But when a committee of 34 senior family members — known as the allegiance council — approved Prince Mohammed’s elevation to crown prince, one of the three dissenters was from Prince Alwaleed’s branch of the family, the Talals, according to people familiar with the voting.
Michael Stephens, who studies Saudi Arabia at the Royal United Services Institute in London, recalled the bloody purges other leaders in the region have sometimes used to eliminate rivals. What Crown Prince Mohammed was doing, Mr. Stephens said, “is a more genteel way of making sure there are no challenges to your power.”
Time will tell, Mr. Stephens said, whether the arrests signal a slide into despotism or “whether we will look back and say Mohammed bin Salman is the one guy who saw the wall coming and managed to hurdle it.”
Reporting was contributed by Declan Walsh from Cairo, Neil MacFarquhar from Moscow, Ben Hubbard from Marib, Yemen, Nicholas Kulish from New York, Eric Schmitt from Washington and Mark Landler from Tokyo.
A version of this article appears in print on November 6, 2017, on Page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Abruptly Concentrating Power in House of Saud. Order Reprints| Today's Paper|Subscribe
A ruler who is prepared to let thousands of civilians starve to death just because they're Shia is anything but enlightened and progressive.
Quote:Yemen faces the world's largest famine in decades "with millions of victims" if aid deliveries are not resumed, a senior UN official has warned.
Mark Lowcock, the UN under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs, urged the Saudi-led coalition to lift its blockade of the conflict-torn country.
On Monday, the coalition shut air, land and sea routes into Yemen after Houthi rebels fired a missile at Riyadh.
The ballistic warhead was intercepted near the Saudi capital.
Saudi Arabia said the blockade was needed to stop Iran sending weapons to the rebels.
Iran denies arming the rebels, who have fought the Saudi-led coalition since 2015.
Mr Lowcock was speaking on Wednesday, after briefing the UN Security Council on the issue behind closed doors.
"I have told the council that unless those measures are lifted... there will be a famine in Yemen", Mr Lowcock told reporters.
"It will be the largest famine the world has seen for many decades with millions of victims."
Earlier this week, the UN and the Red Cross warned that a "catastrophic" situation threatened millions of Yemenis who relied on life-saving aid deliveries.
The Red Cross said its shipment of chlorine tablets, vital to combating a cholera epidemic which has affected more than 900,000 people, had been blocked.
The UN says seven million Yemenis are on the brink of famine.
The country relies on imports for virtually everything civilians need to survive, but now neither food, fuel nor medicine can get in.
More than 8,670 people - 60% of them civilians - have been killed and 49,960 injured in air strikes and fighting on the ground since the coalition intervened in Yemen's civil war in March 2015, according to the UN.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-41923769
I don't think I understand the Middle East at all.
Here's what I've got so far in a nutshell... a Fractured Religious system with clans barely tolerating each other. Oil. Money. Some clans getting filthy rich which lots of others get filthy poor. The "barely tolerating each" other clans switch to being at each other's throats. The filthy rich need to divert attention from the wealth disparity so they point a finger at the US (who both funds their society and manipulates it to secure the flow of oil). The fractured religions become more extreme and lash out in every direction. The US discovers its own oil reserves. The filthy rich in the middle east panic and try to break the market to regain control, which fails. They need a way to keep their flow of money with a product which is losing value rapidly, so they propose a solar/wind utopia to be constructed for... Who's going to live there? The clans at each other's throats? Filthy Rich foreigners?
And then a massive internal coup happens, and I'm back to being confused again.
Did I get any of that right, or am I completely lost on all of this?
@rosborne979,
There's a lot said about the split between Protestant and Catholic, but it happened well over a thousand years after Christianity was formed. The Sunni/Shia split was less than a generation. In a nutshell Mohammed left no male heirs, so a system of rulers was set up, then Mohammed's daughter had a son, Ali. The Shia wanted Ali to be the ruler while the Sunni wanted the old system. There's more to it than that, but that's the basics.
Then you have the collapse of the Ottoman Empire during WWI, with the help of Arab nationalists, and the great betrayal as France and Britain carved up what was left for themselves. The redrawing of borders did not respect the various tribes, for example the Kurds are still stateless, what should be Kurdistan covers parts of Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria.
Then there's the rush for oil, and the creation of tiny oil rich Gulf states, putting the money in the hands of very few people. Then there's the CIA/MI5 coup in Iran which installed the Shah, and the linking of the US dollar to Gulf oil creating the petrodollar.
It's a huge **** up.
@izzythepush,
Cripes, I'll never understand this mess.
@rosborne979,
I don't think anyone does. Add the fact that Gulf royalty needs the support of a rather extreme form of Islam to stay in power. Wahhabbism is the spiritual basis of terrorist groups like Al Qaida and IS.
Saudi Arabia’s Purge Of Royals Has Received Wide Support — And Here’s Why
The extraordinary purge of top princes and officials in Saudi Arabia has been described as a push to wipe out dissent against a young crown prince. But experts say the crackdown on corruption is sorely needed — and welcomed.
Read full story:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.buzzfeed.com/amphtml/borzoudaragahi/is-saudi-arabia-silencing-dissent-or-fighting-corruption-a
@coluber2001,
"Experts," or yes men?
It's way too soon to say whether the new leader will be a new broom, and interference in Lebanese democracy and continued action in Yemen does not auger well.
